A Christmas carol concert is the nearest most of us are going to get to a religious experience this Christmas. If you are going to make the effort to leave the pub and sing a few tunes about the babe in a manager, it’s a good idea to make sure you are singing Silent Night in the most uplifting surroundings possible.

I was lucky enough to be invited by The Salvation Army to their Christmas Carol concert for their annual musical take over of The Royal Albert Hall. I knew the music would be great and the carols well-chosen, but I must admit the thing I was really looking forward to was the venue itself.

Every since as a kid reading the book about the Royal Albert Hall being turned into a giant, wobbling jelly the Albert Hall has had a hold on me. The decadent, plump shape of it. The secret, Russian-doll quality it has once you are in. You descend lower and lower, through passages and bars and stairs. Then, once in the auditorium itself you are encased in another atmosphere all together.

Whether you have a snug, but not very intimate, box, or are in the arena close to the stage to look at the Hall is to look at décor created with Victorian flair. It is gilded within an inch of its life. Every smidgen of space seems filled with people perched like starlings on phone lines. You tot it up in your head: there must be ten thousand carollers here. Not quite. The space is deceptive; because you are stacked on top of each other you think there are more people than there are. The hall only holds just over 5,000 people.

It’s like singing inside a very ornate, very large Christmas decoration. Thanks to the wine and champagne on sale in the many bars of the Hall, the place crackles with festive cheer. The massive organ (Britain’s second largest) looms impressively, while Christmas trees on the main stage glow different colours under their charming sprinkling of fake snow.

This is the place to go for your carols. Forget the midnight mass, the village hall offering. Get yourself to The Royal Albert Hall for a festive carol concert that will please all the senses. There are plenty of concerts before Christmas (and they don’t last that long either).

 

This entry was posted on Friday, December 12th, 2008at 10:31 am and is filed under Christmas 2008. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

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