The Essen Haus held its Oktoberfest on September 18th this year and we were invited to sing a few songs during the break between the two bands in the afternoon. It was good to be back at the Essen Haus after Oktoberfest was canceled last year due to the pandemic. This was our first performance since February 2020, so it was good to singing together again in the friendly confines of the Essen Haus parking lot. It was a beautiful day, and I think we all had a good time.

Here are a few photos of the choir in action. As always, click on the thumbnail to see the larger image.

It’s been quite a while (since March 12, 2020), but we are planning to resume rehearsals and we already have a few events on our Fall calendar. We haven’t planned out the entire Fall schedule yet, but this is what we have so far:

September 2, 2021: We are planning on having our last summer biweekly meeting at the Biergarten in Olbrich Park at 6:30 pm. There may also be a Vorstand meeting here as well.

September 9: We are tentatively planning on having our first rehearsal on Thursday September 9th. But with the Dane County mask mandate and the air flow issues in Turner Hall we are thinking about have the rehearsal out doors, either at the Turner Hall parking lot or else at a city park shelter. The rehearsal would probably begin around 6:30 pm to take advantage of the daylight. This is all very tentative; there will be email updates as we get closer.

September 18: We will be singing at the Essen Haus Oktoberfest once again! We’ll probably be singing later in the afternoon as we usually do. We’ll discuss the timing at one of our rehearsals.

October 9: We’ve been invited to sing at the Strassenfest in Plain Wisconsin on Saturday October 9. The details, including transportation to Plain, are still pending.

We’ve been meeting informally every two weeks or so this summer, and on July 8th we met at the Biergarten at Olbrich Park. If you’ve never been there, you really should visit sometime – it’s a great place to sit and relax and enjoy the view on Lake Monona. Oh, and perhaps drink a beer or two.

We met there at 6:30 or so and after we had warmed up, Paul Essert led us through a few songs. It was a beautiful evening, with very few mosquitos, and it was good to sing together again. I’m sure it’s only a coincidence that soon after we began to sing, several of the tables near us suddenly became empty 🙂

As always, click on the thumbnail image to see the larger image.