St John’s, Pevensey Road, Hastings, Saturday 5 December 2015
This has been a good year for Seaview. The 30th birthday has brought The Big Sleep, among other events, to help the community at large realise how important it is to the area and the scope of its work.
It may be that the recent publicity brought more people to the carol service. This was certainly one of the largest congregations we have had for the event, which meant the singing was even more enthusiastic than normal.
The acoustic in the church is not helpful, and some of the speakers were not clearly heard at the rear of the church, but their love for Seaview, and their passion for its work, communicated even where the words did not get through.
No such problem with the music. The a cappella group Now & Then gave us fine versions of I saw three ships, January Lullaby and Driving cold winter away. They were followed by Seaview’s own choir who sang Silent Night and Once in Royal David’s City, and chanted Mary had a baby to great effect.
The final group were Sound Waves who brought us Past 3 o’clock, God rest ye merry, and a whimsically funny version of The Twelve Days of Christmas. They were joined by the Seaview Choir for a full version of Silent Night, before the music concluded with everyone joining them for Good King Wenceslas.
At this point everyone was able to move to the back of the church were refreshments were provided and a chance for people to chat and catch up with each other after a very busy few weeks.