HemiHelp
Children helping Children Concert
Cadogan Hall London Saturday 24th February 2007
We had our rehearsal and fortunately none of us made any mistakes so
we were pleased with ourselves and went for lunch, which consisted of
whatever we had brought with us. Afterwards as watched as Hayley
Westenra had her rehearsal which was great fun, she was very particular
about the sound and the lighting being just right, but she was always
very nice and polite to the sound man and the lighting crew, she seemed
to be so very calm and very confident, and she sang so very well. During
a break, I had a chance to meet her and she was happy to sign some of
her CD’s that I had brought with me, she was quite happy to chat to me
and asked about how my rehearsal had gone. My Dad took a photograph of
us too.
The time seemed to fly by as we watched the other acts doing their
rehearsing, they were all very good. Canon Roger Royle was the host for
the evening, I managed to meet him and have a chat with him too, he was
really nice and friendly, and treated me like I was a genuine star, and
told me how very pleased he was to meet one of the talented young
performers before hand, and shook my hand.
I waited with the other children in one of the large dressing rooms back
stage, for the time to come when we were needed on stage, fortunately we
were in the first half so it wasn’t so long, (less time for us to get
nervous) The HemiHelp girls and the music group instructors kept us busy
though and made us laugh. We could see and hear the performance on
screens which were all over the place which was good, so whatever room
you were in you could tell what was going on stage.
When the time came for us to go on, we were ushered out of our dressing
room and up the stairs to the area behind the stage, we had to be very
quiet at this point, there were signs everywhere saying “quiet please
you can be heard on the stage” we could clearly hear the performance
that was on the stage before us, then everybody clapped and the lights
went down, and our time had arrived, we were told to be quick the only
problem was that we had to climb a set of stairs on one side of the
stage in complete darkness and get into our allotted positions, this was
exceedingly difficult for me, as I have a problem climbing stairs anyway
and often fall, fortunately I somehow managed it, without ending up on
my face.
Phil was on stage getting our instruments in position as a couple of
stage hands were moving items from the previous act, so a lot was going
on all around us. I could hear Phil whispering ready from my right and
the lights went up and we were totally flooded it took a little while
for my eyes to adjust to the change, the lights seemed to be a lot
brighter than they were during our rehearsals, I could just see the
front row of people in the hall. I could see my Dad and Sister in the
front row on my right, everybody was smiling at us, but I still felt a
bit nervous, Canon Roger Royle introduced us and we started our
performance and everybody clapped and clapped, they seemed to love it
and Roger Royle said some nice comments about us as we went back the way
we came to our dressing room, all very relieved that it had gone so well
and none us had got stage fright, or made any mistakes with our parts.
We had a little wait and then it was time for the interval, we were then
led into the Carrington Suite to meet with Her Royal Highness Princess
Alexandra and other dignitaries and patrons of the HemiHelp charity.
There was lots of food and drink in there, but we didn’t get any time to
eat or drink anything, as everybody was congratulating us, and shaking
our hands and telling us how wonderful everything was.
Her Royal Highness then came in to meet us, followed closely by her lady
in waiting, and two policemen from the Royal protection squad. She came
straight over to us and started to talk to each one of us in turn, my
Dad and Laura had come in by then, and they were saying how well we had
done when it was my turn to speak to Her Royal Highness, (now for weeks
and weeks before the concert, my Dad had been helping me practice my
curtsying, which I found very difficult, because of my balance problems,
he would often help me by demonstrating how it should be done, and I
would usually bow, pretending to be him, we must have done this hundreds
of times until I got it right) so when Princess Alexandra spoke to me
and my Dad, something totally unexpected happened, I bowed and my Dad
did a perfect curtsy, which he tried to turn into a bow without much
success afterwards! She didn’t seem to notice (or pretended not to
anyway,) she was very pleasant and asked me how I came to be chosen to
be in the concert and told me she was very impressed with how well we
had all done, and she was having an enjoyable evening, my Dad took some
photographs of me with her.
Hayley Westenra was there and chatted to us, she was doing her part
last, so she had rather a long wait, she was very easy to talk to and I
talked to her quite a bit, my Dad was talking about New Zealand, and how
different things were there, as he had been there, he said he knew her
home city of Christchurch very well and thought it was one of the
loveliest cities he had stayed in which pleased her as she lives there,
when she isn’t in her London flat.
The second half of the concert was more relaxed for us, as we had done
our bit and been introduced to Princess Alexandra, so we able to just
enjoy it. When it was all over we all went back on stage and got a
terrific applause and Hayley Westenra and Charlotte Ritchie were
presented with a bouquet of flowers each. We all said our goodbyes to
everybody and we said goodbye to Hayley Westenra, not to be out done, my
Dad managed to get his picture taken with her too, I think it was an
amazing evening and one I will never forget as long as I live,
especially meeting a member of the Royal Family, but the best bit though
for me was meeting Hayley Westenra for the first time and spending time
with her, she is such an excellent classical singer, and a wonderful
person too
Back
All About Me
What Katy did
Living with hemiplegia
HemiHelp
Us performing in the concert I am second from right
HRH Princess Alexandra and me during the interval
Me on stage looking relieved after the performance