Very often, in the session the week before, or even sometimes in the rehearsal on the day of the concert, it appears that everyone in the choir has forgotten what songs they know, which parts they sing, and what they’re supposed to be doing. It’s as if some group amnesia has spread like a virus, as well as knocking the energy out of everyone.
Directing the choir in these situations is like climbing uphill through mud and always makes me despair, even though I know it’s just part of the process and everything will (probably) be all right on the night.
But that doesn’t stop me from despairing and wishing that I was somewhere else and really worrying if we’re ever going to pull the concert off. In fact, I even worry if people are ever going to remember how to sing again at all!
Then the concert arrives and (usually) everything goes swimmingly and we all forget the awful rehearsal the week before.
Afterwards, on a high and like a dog with a short memory, we start looking forward to the next concert and hope that everything will go smoothly, until that is, we get to the dreaded rehearsal the week before and it all happens again.
Then we remember: “Ah, yes, this is what happened last time”. But there is nothing we can do, and we despair again and we plod on again and we pray that it will all turn out fine. And it usually does.
Going to conventions are always refreshing for me. I learn, I hear, I get ideas-it's great. I just came back from the ACDA Western Division Conference and had a blast!
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There were some great memories made this week, and I gained a lot of advice/wisdom/introspection about this career and my game plan. Don't get me wrong, there were lots of "receptions" and "teacher therapies" too :) If I learned anything this conference it is: This line of work is grueling, hard and emotionally draining, but with supportive friends who believe in you and God's wisdom and guidance, it can be done (and with a little passion and understanding, it can be done well). I'm ready for the future.
I'm preparing a concert of all misattributed works for my next program, and it's been lots of fun. There are so many pieces to choose from! The BWV is full of bogus Bach works, and unscrupulous publishers in the 18th and 19th centuries claimed that all kinds of stuff was by Mozart, Pergolesi, etc., so it would sell better. Well-known fakes like "Mon coeur se recommande à vous" as well as PDQ Bach are in the program too. I got the inspiration last year after we sang a not-really-by-Buxtehude Magnificat, which we always referred to as the "pseudo-Buxtehude."
It's been amazingly liberating to work on this music. A bass raises his hand and asks if that note should be a G-sharp rather than a G. Or the sopranos find the text underlay awkward and wonder if they can adjust it. The current orthodoxy is to treat composers as gods, so all questions like that always come down to determining the composer's intent. What would Mozart have wanted? we ask, ignoring the question of what Mozart's (or our) audience would want. The composer's score is treated as holy writ, and any deviation treated as blasphemy.
With this bogus music, the will of the composer can be freely ignored. Who cares what Jean-Baptiste Weckerlin (the composer of "Mon coeur") wanted? He's not even a demi-god. Who knows what loser wrote Bach's supposed St. Luke Passion? Whoever he was, he's a pretender to divinity. At last, I can make decisions based on what will make the most sense to the audience, without worrying about the high priests of Historically Informed Performance breathing down my neck.
I like to think I went into music because I had some musical sense and good musical instincts, and I trust my instincts when making musical decisions. It always galls me to have some hierarch of authenticity tell me I'm violating the basic spirit of music when I'm determining what's best for my audience. The cult of the composer is widespread in our era, and I think it's led to a generation of conductors and performers whose highest aspiration is to be technicians, not musicians.
This month the Choral Arts Society of Philadelphia, my choral alma mater, will present a concert that epitomizes the kind of music making that went on in Philadelphia when I was a student there in the 1980’s. The occasion is the 20th anniversary of the premiere of Joseph Castaldo’s extraordinary work for narrator, chorus and orchestra Ancient Liturgy, which was originally commissioned and premiered by the Music Group of Philadelphia under Seán Deibler, who also happened to be Choral Arts’ founding Artistic Director.
As previously mentioned here, Joseph Castaldo was my undergraduate composition teacher for four years. He and Seán Deibler were both tremendous personal and musical influences on me. As I also mentioned here in the past, Seán passed away last year, and this Choral Arts concert is being presented in his memory.
Composers often complain that choirs don't perform enough new works. Here's a choir dedicated to only doing new works by Connecticut composers. Composers pay a fee for a fixed amount of rehearsal time with paid singers. They make a recording and a public performance.
Maybe it's not the wave of the future, but it's an interesting idea for composers who want more exposure (and decent recordings of their works to submit to publishers).
We brainstomed ideas for the future for ChoralNet and ACDA - what might be possible - what might be dreamed - and how we might accomplish it.
I wondered - where would you like to see ChoralNet and ACDA head in the next few years? What is possible? What might you do with this space and our collaborative efforts as a community?
Gloria Y. Gadsden, an associate professor of sociology at East Stroudsburg University of Pennsylvania, was escorted off the campus on Wednesday because of jokes she had made on her Facebook page about wanting to kill students.
On Monday the professor posted this update: "Had a good day today, didn't want to kill even one student.:-) Now Friday was a different story ..." In another comment, on January 21, she wrote: "Does anyone know where I can find a very discrete hitman, it's been that kind of day."
But it may not be that simple:
However, Ms. Gadsden said she believes her suspension stems from a racial-harassment complaint she filed with the university last month and from an op-ed article she wrote for The Chronicle in 2008 about the challenges of being a black faculty member.
And a little later:
After her opinion piece was published in The Chronicle, she said she faced disapproval of it on the campus. She said her life was made difficult by administrators, and she encountered so much hostility from one colleague that she filed a racial-harassment complaint with the university last month.
Now I know this isn't about choral music, but it is about teaching and technology. We talk about that alot here!
The Bank of England is withdrawing the older style £20 notes that show a portrait of Sir Edward Elgar. Holders of these notes may continue to use them until the end of June 2010.
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I'm preparing a 
Composers often complain that choirs don't perform enough new works. 
