The girls and I have done something crazy – we’ve auditioned for Annie!
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We’re not alone though.
Hundreds of people have put themselves out there for the Horsham Arts Council’s May 2017 production.
Mesmerised by the musical, we signed up for audition timeslots after the information evening and then went home to face the music…karaoke music.
Many a neighbour must have heard the lamentingly sweet sounds of Maybe floating through the air from our place last week, with some fairly strained high notes being hit in It’s a Hard Knock Life.
I was totally living the lines from New York City, which seemed so relevant to family life in Horsham right now “Too busy, too crazy, too hot, too cold, too late, I’m sold!”
I haven’t sung anywhere but in church and my kitchen for 30 years, so my audition wasn’t pretty.
I still can’t believe I went through with it…but how could I live with myself if I let the opportunity pass by without giving it a shot?
For a week, the girls and I slunk off to quiet spots to make a lot of noise in private.
None of the girls would let me hear them sing and none of them wanted to hear me sing.
We wanted to leave it all on the audition stage in front of a panel of five plus the four other applicants trying out in our half hour.
Katianna overheard me in the bath once and asked me if that was my serious singing voice.
I assured her that I hadn’t been hiding an awesome operatic skill from her for 14 years and she was rocked to the core.
It was the sweetest thing in the world that she believed that I was secretly an amazingly talented vocalist who had been keeping a lid on it for her whole life.
I’m pretty sure I never told her I was.
I put together a costume to wear to my audition – pleated navy skirt, pearls and a beret – hoping that the casting panel would be too distracted by my unusual attire to notice my rusty voice.
Pretty sure that trick didn’t work.
My girls informed me that I looked desperate.
I told them that I’d nailed exactly the look I’d been aiming for.
Desperately seeking a part in the Annie ensemble.
Yolande Grosser’s column, A Mum’s World, appears in Monday’s edition of the Wimmera Mail-Times.