Hubris

It was, I suppose, inevitable. I posted some critical comments about the choir at Thursday's Mass. Jonathan and I had already arranged to sing tonight's. You can probably write the rest of the story yourself, in outline.

The detail was that firstly, Jonathan was delayed, so not only did we not have time for the planned final run-through, but also I sang the Asperges on my own. And that was fine.

But for some reason, I then launched confidently into the Gradual, rather than the Introit. I have never done such a thing before, and hope never to do so again. Jonathan was understandably puzzled, but sang along until I realised my mistake, when we stopped and sang the Introit.

Then I managed to play the intonation for the Gloria so badly that Father was thrown, got off to a false start, stopped, and then waited for me to give him the intonation again... (in fairness, playing the keyboard on an iPad is never that comfortable).

Then when we got to the Gradual in its proper place, I managed to wander all over the place in the verse (which I had learned well and practiced assiduously).  Providentially, I managed to get back towards something of a stable key and recognisable melody in time to cue Jonathan's entry at the end, but it was not my finest hour.

The Alleluia went all right, and after that we settled down a bit and the rest of the Mass was sung without further major mishap.

Nonetheless, it did feel like a severe dose of Murphy's Law...