You enter the field in times of turbulent change. Many of the traditional bases for choral music are being eroded away, have been reduced to mere tokens, or have been supplanted altogether. The media revolution of the last 50 years has reshaped the purposes and activities of anyone who seeks to communicate anything, which (as I used to drum into you) is one of the choral director’s most basic obligations. You already know how floods of “communication” have musically preconditioned choir singers toward the particular musical styles their personal environments steeped them in: commercials, Rock, Musak, pop tunes, symphony not to mention vocal styles so far from anything they can do themselves as to make for frustration when they start to sing. It’s a safe bet that all the singers in your groups will be affected by this to some degree, which means they may tend to pre-judge what you do in terms of what they understand to be “music”, and even “choral music”.
We tried to make your training realistic: to develop your musicianship, sharpen your skills, broaden your knowledge, deepen your insight into and your empathy for all the human values, steady your poise and lengthen your perspective. You have already given evidence that the interaction of these ingredients is producing taste, that priceless essence that produces more right answers than almost anything else. Unfortunately, there are too many in the field who have never acquired its benefits, and so cannot tell meaning from banality, or “the precious from the worthless, and whose entire measurement of musical value lies between the cent and the dollar. They only do us all a great disservice, for their activities feed the petulant impatience of ignorance with any musical value which is not immediately and obviously saleable. I suspect that it is just those values, in the long run, which will supply you with your most memorable and satisfying moments as a choral director.
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