Chichester Local Group Report - Thursday October 16th 2025

15 singers attended the Chichester Inn SDFS singing session led by Alan.  
 
Before singing, there was consideration of whether or not the Chichester SDFS would like to get involved again in the 2026 Chichester Fringe event.  Alan indicated that he was not keen to lead this as it could end up being a very similar format to the one he put together for last year and thought that if someone else were prepared to take it on, he/she would come up with a different approach.  Steve A bravely said that he would like to design a suitable programme based around songs collected by a local Midhurst collector that he has been studying and would deal with the organizational stuff.  He would not however, like to do this as soon as 2026 but prefer to put this together for 2027.  Alan and all present agreed this concept and that it would be best to leave this for another year to allow time to learn new material.  Alan was happy to teach new material including tunes and lead during the actual event.
 
Reverting back to the evenings’ practice, Alan said he wanted to try out material that might be suitable to sing at the Weald & Downland Advent Market where the group was scheduled in November (23rd).  (Henny distributed wrist bands for the event at this point).  Following this Alan led the group through various potential Christmas/Winter songs.
 
"The Falmer Carol" gave a reasonable start, with the decision to leave out verse 3 (Then Towards) so it was not too long.  "Fields Lie Silent" proved as popular as ever with the group and this was followed by the song "When It’s Christmas Time", originally introduced by the Lewis group, which wasn’t quite so well known and sounded better sung briskly.  Amarylis had requested "The Friendly Beasts" be included in the W&D event. All agreed that a jazzy approach helped with this particular slightly unusual offering!  It became evident that some in the group didn’t really know Alan’s next suggestion of "The Ditchling Carol", so it would probably not be included in the set list.  
 
In the second half of the session, everyone confidently started with "Pentonville" and "Sweet Bells" with absolutely no need for words for either familiar carol!  "Masters In This Hall" followed, again best sung at pace and possibly with the help of a drum beat.  All remembered "Where Stormy Winds Do Blow" – a winter song - followed by "The Woodcutter".  At Lyn’s suggestion, the evening finished with the popular "Fieldmouse Carol" and Alan introduced the idea of a bit of harmony for the men in the chorus which he said he hoped could be practiced further at the next SDFS session.  (He promised to send this change to Steve for the Blog and hope that it could be learned at Worthing next Month.)
 
That brought the evening to a close and all agreed they were looking forward to meeting up for a curry as a pre-Christmas celebration before the November meeting in Chichester.  A big thank you to Chris and Lyn for suggesting and co-ordinating.
 
 
Anne Sartain