Oh the horror – not content with our last two weeks of audio recording, this week someone foisted a video camera on me and asked me to take some footage of the rehearsal. Why do people choose me for these things? I can’t work anything invented after about 1750, and even if I could I have all the visual acuity and artistic flair of a toaster. I think I got some good footage of the floor, my left leg, an extreme close-up of Emma sitting next to me, the inside of the lens cap. And when I finally managed to point the camera at something a reasonable distance away I’d been filming for about 10 minutes before I realised I hadn’t pressed “record”. For heaven’s sake.
Anyway, the reason we were attempting to record some of the rehearsal was because the choir was joined by some mystery guests. Any good blog should have an air of intrigue about it, so the identity of our guests (and indeed the titles of the pieces) shall not be revealed at this time! But the choir were very excited to be singing with a genuine rock legend, accompanied on drums and the hurdy gurdy. And there’s a sentence I never thought I’d say. Of course we regularly sing with classical soloists, but singing more popular styles of music with soloists brings a very different set of challenges, as the music tends to be more flexible and open to improvisation. So we have to stay together as a choir but also flex to fit in with the singer’s interpretation of the song. Happily David-the-conductor is practiced at managing this transition, and he wheeled us through the sticky patches with aplomb.
We started by challenging our mystery rock legend to an acoustic sing-off of Mystery Piece Number One, although as there was only 1 of him and 80 of us, the choir had a slight edge. But after a quick game of Hunt the Microphone the balance was redressed, and we began to work together well. We spent most of the rehearsal working on “Mystery Piece Number One” and “Mystery Piece Number 2” – which took us through realms of bluesy folky chorally poppy rocky bluegrassy spiritually celticy fusion type music. It was all a long way away from last week’s 20th century mass settings, but by the end of the rehearsal we were making a fantastic sound and blending effortlessly. We left on a high, congratulating ourselves on our versatility. This is going to be a really exciting season for performances!
Friday 29 January 2010
Friday 22 January 2010
week 2 - settling in
This week we spent some of the rehearsal consolidating and refining the work we’d done last week, as well as sight-singing our way a bit further into the longer pieces. Our conductor David had revised his arrangement of the Mystery Piece from last week, so we went for another recording of that. The Soprano 1s were ready for the entry we’d messed up last week, humming it to each other beforehand with meaningful glances. As it approached we nudged each other, leaned forward in our eagerness, took a collective breath …. and just as we were about to launch confidently into our note, David halted the rest of the choir and told us he’d cut that bit. Thwarted! But we would have been brilliant, I can assure you.
We also spent more time on the Frank Martin Mass, really trying to nail the style and phrasing. It’s such a beautiful piece that we must do it justice when we come to sing it in concert. Frank Martin was an ice hockey player for the Boston Bruins, or so I thought until I realised I’d clicked on the wrong Wikipedia link. In fact he was a Swiss composer with a long career spanning much of the 20th century. The Mass is one of his earlier compositions and shows his love of chromaticism and the influence of Bach, his favourite composer. In the 1930s, after the Mass was written, Martin began to incorporate Schoenberg’s twelve-tone technique into his style, while retaining his sense of tonality. In fact, Wikipedia insists that his preference for lean textures and his habitual rhythmic vengeance are the furthest possible remove from Schoenberg’s hyperromanticism. I don’t think that’s true. I think being one of the few ambidextrous shooters in the national hockey league would have been a bit further away.
We also spent more time on the Frank Martin Mass, really trying to nail the style and phrasing. It’s such a beautiful piece that we must do it justice when we come to sing it in concert. Frank Martin was an ice hockey player for the Boston Bruins, or so I thought until I realised I’d clicked on the wrong Wikipedia link. In fact he was a Swiss composer with a long career spanning much of the 20th century. The Mass is one of his earlier compositions and shows his love of chromaticism and the influence of Bach, his favourite composer. In the 1930s, after the Mass was written, Martin began to incorporate Schoenberg’s twelve-tone technique into his style, while retaining his sense of tonality. In fact, Wikipedia insists that his preference for lean textures and his habitual rhythmic vengeance are the furthest possible remove from Schoenberg’s hyperromanticism. I don’t think that’s true. I think being one of the few ambidextrous shooters in the national hockey league would have been a bit further away.
Wednesday 20 January 2010
Start of a new year
Welcome to the inaugural Oriana blog! We all hope that this is going to be a fantastic year for the choir, with lots of great music covering a vast range of musical styles, from Monteverdi to choral arrangements of pop songs. The variety and quantity of the music we perform, and the flexibility this asks of us, is one of the reasons Oriana is such an exciting choir. And although when I first joined the “excitement” regularly tipped over to some frantic rehearsing as the concerts approached and yet more pieces appeared, I’m now very used to us pulling it out of the bag by the time the concert arrives!
In true Oriana style, we're still finalising the programme for our early spring concert - largely because we're still being inundated with invitations to sing. So last week, our first rehearsal back after Christmas (and an unscheduled snow break), we tried out a lot of music, ranging from Frank Martin’s glorious Mass for two choirs, to our conductor’s own arrangement of a Beth Neilsen Chapman song. The sight-reading of the choir has really improved since I joined, and we were singing so well that our conductor spontaneously decided to record a piece – his arrangement of A Mystery Piece by A Mystery Author – to refer to while programme planning. Which is of course where it all went wrong, and much as I hate to admit it, it was us in the Soprano 1s that let the side down! We were fine until the last page, when we got an entry so gloriously wrong we had to stop and try again. And again. And again. While the little electronic “recording” light shone at us in a censorious manner. If the recording ever sees the light of day we’ll just have to blame the snow. But by next week, of course, we will be note perfect!
In true Oriana style, we're still finalising the programme for our early spring concert - largely because we're still being inundated with invitations to sing. So last week, our first rehearsal back after Christmas (and an unscheduled snow break), we tried out a lot of music, ranging from Frank Martin’s glorious Mass for two choirs, to our conductor’s own arrangement of a Beth Neilsen Chapman song. The sight-reading of the choir has really improved since I joined, and we were singing so well that our conductor spontaneously decided to record a piece – his arrangement of A Mystery Piece by A Mystery Author – to refer to while programme planning. Which is of course where it all went wrong, and much as I hate to admit it, it was us in the Soprano 1s that let the side down! We were fine until the last page, when we got an entry so gloriously wrong we had to stop and try again. And again. And again. While the little electronic “recording” light shone at us in a censorious manner. If the recording ever sees the light of day we’ll just have to blame the snow. But by next week, of course, we will be note perfect!
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