“Before everything else, getting ready is the secret of success.” Henry Ford
We begin Choral Ethics 2017 with a January’s worth of letters (emails) concerning Four Rs; Being Ready, Being Reliable, Being Respectful and Not Being Revengeful. Each blog will present several writers problems and a bit of our email conversations concerning them. The New Year is always a good time to get things off your chest so there is still time to get your questions and dilemmas addressed this January. Please email me at: with “Choral Ethics” as the subject line. Your situation will be disguised as much as possible to keep the kernel of the problem but not to reveal who you are. I always respect your privacy and may ask follow-up questions to clarify if need be.
I hope you all had a wonderful holiday season and your choirs did well in concert or in worship. I bet you spent quite a bit of time planning for whatever you did. Did you feel ready?
Ruth* plans quite far in advance in her position as a high school choral teacher. She has a good idea who will be singing in her top choirs and begins her repertoire selections for the next school year sometime in April or May. Her Freshmen ensembles are usually a bit of a surprise as to singing ability but she gets their repertoire and alternatives ready at the same time. She spends the summer readying choir folders and generally getting her choir room in tip-top shape to begin a new school year.
Her new Band Director/Department Chair colleague is NOT a planner. This caused a somewhat unpleasant situation for Ruth last fall. She was expected to have her top choirs sing with his top band at their joint Winter Holiday concert. But they did not know what they would be singing until just before Thanksgiving. The Band Guy had no idea how to look for band/choral winter holiday material and felt “strange” (his words) allowing Ruth to do it. He found something at the last minute Ruth felt was “cheesy” but she sucked it up and prepared her choir anyway. Ruth felt her choirs were not ready or rehearsed enough to do their best. The combined piece was not exactly a failure but it wasn’t exactly a pleasant experience either. And she had to field parents’ negative comments about it too.
She doesn’t want to be known as a Prima Donna but does not want this situation to happen again. I asked if this was a new thing, for the top band and choirs to sing a combined piece. She said no, it was not, but they haven’t done it for a few years and Band Guy wanted to resurrect the tradition. I asked if the school owned any of the combined pieces they had done at past winter concerts with the previous band director. She said they did. I told her to drag them out in the spring and have Band Guy chose one. That way she’ll know which piece so she will be able to get in enough rehearsal and Band Guy won’t feel “strange.” Trying not to be too nosy, I asked why he he told her he felt “strange.” Ruth told me he feels instrumentalists are musicians and singers are singers. That’s why he thought it didn’t matter how soon he picked the combined piece. Oh. I give Ruth props for not blowing up. She’s quite the professional.
Roger* feels his church choir is never ready to sing on Sundays. They stumble over words. They muff entrances. Their intonation is off. When they sing anthems with more than two parts, they sound muddy. It’s been this way since he began this position five years ago. He chalked it up to being a “typical church choir” since his Pastor never complains and the congregation seems happy.
Roger is not a trained choir director; he’s a pianist and organist. While he’s done plenty of accompanying, he’s not done much leading of rehearsals until he was hired in this position as a choir master/organist. He attended a church music conference last summer and heard other church choirs who sounded much better than his choir, despite having fewer people. And he wonders why.
When he contacted me, I told him becoming a ChoralNet User was a good place to start to learn about directing. I also told him attending choral conferences of all sorts would help him improve his choir, but most importantly, would help improve him. We must always be improving if we want our choirs to improve. And sometimes, meeting our choirs where they are right now is the first step to their improvement. His repertoire expectations for them might change and that’s okay. We have to be willing to begin at the beginning if need be to be ready for the next step.
Being “ready” is more than picking repertoire or having a productive rehearsal; it’s a mindset. Are you ready for the New Year?
*Name Withheld
Bart Brush says
I see Ruth’s experience as a typical result of the all-to-common situation in which someone other than the music instructors are in charge of the music department.
1. Why would a NEW band director also be appointed Department Chair? Ruth or another continuing member of the department should be the Chair, at least until the new band director has completed one year in the district.
2. This policy–that you can’t be Chair until you’ve been in the district for at least one year–should be a priority for music departments, and added to the written school policies. Existing music teachers should also be part of the interview team for new hires.
3. Putting on a joint concert such as this with choir and band should be a cooperative project. Why does the band director get to set the schedule and the repertoire? Ruth was very polite and helpful to her new colleague, but should have said something like, “In order for the choir and me to be ready, I have to know your decision by September 15th.” Ruth is not a Prima Donna, she is the department’s and the school’s expert in choral music.
Being clear and firm about our minimal requirements helps us be Ready and Reliable, can be done in the same Respectful manner with which we expect to be treated, and need not cause anyone to feel a need to Be Revengeful.
Finally, for any readers who are on the faculty of college music education programs: Do you prepare graduates in YOUR specialty to see only themselves as musicians, but not those in other musical disciplines??
Marie Grass Amenta says
Dear Bart,
I agree with you 100% about Ruth’s situation. In a perfect world, a current member of the faculty would become the new department chair, everyone would have a say for material in a joint concert and NO ONE would think to make off-hand comments about singers vs. musicians. But we don’t live in a perfect world.
At my own sons’ high school, when the long time orchestra director (who was also department chair) retired, a new orchestra director/department chair was hired and it was a disaster! She lasted two years. The Music Parents group was up in arms to get her out–thank goodness my boys had already graduated. They hired an orchestra director to replace her and then promoted someone in the department. It has worked well, according to my friends with children still in the program.
Back to Ruth. She asked how she could make things work in the situation she was in. We can all wish for your “Perfect World”–and it’s a good one–but we have to live in this one. The committee is still out on how the Band Guy is working out as a department chair. Ruth still has to work with him. It’s up to her to change his mind about singers/musicians. Why should it be Ruth, the choir director, to do it? Because if she doesn’t do it, who will?
Bart Brush says
I love your thought-provoking essays, Marie. I agree completely that we have to cope with the world we have, but the point I am trying to make in my response above, is that we don’t have to be–we MUST NOT be–content with the world we have. Our music world will never be perfect, but it can be–MUST be–improved. It is our professional responsibility to do this.
At your sons’ school, too, the Music Parents group and the music teachers should have used what happened to advocate for a permanent change in official school policy, so that the department chair will ALWAYS be promoted from within the department, unless the music staff agrees otherwise.
These problems within our music programs have been written about in many of the forums here on ChoralNet over the years, and in various chapters of many books on choral and music education. The common cause in most cases is: Decisions Made By Administrators Who Are Not Music Educators And Do Not Consult Their Music Educators.
Here are two contrasting experiences from my own past experience.
#1: Each school in our district was assigned to put on a public performance at a new outdoor, county-wide festival celebrating school music– during the 3rd week of the school year! We–the experts–politely (and independently) pointed out to our principals that that date was too early in the school year for our student groups to be properly prepared. Our principals agreed, but said this was a directive from the superintendents throughout the county. Of course, we rose to the occasion as best we could, despite many other logistical problems (access, schedules, setting up, taking down, moving equipment, multiple groups performing within earshot). After the 2nd year, the festival was cancelled because dissatisfaction had increased and been conveyed up the chain from music teachers to principals to superintendents.
Turns out this festival had been proposed by an arts-supporting community member who had volunteered to do all the organizing, and our superintendents saw it as an opportunity for positive publicity. We music teachers agreed–but could not understand why we–the experts–were not consulted in order to make it run properly!
#2: Another outdoor festival was initiated by one of our high school art teachers, to be held in May. She sent emails out requesting participation AND asking us what our needs were! She had requested I bring my student Marimba Band, so I replied with my simple but firm requirements: 1) I must be able to drive up to our performance spot because the instruments are numerous and bulky. 2) We must be out of range of the local radio station booth and any other booths or activities using amplification. No problems; this festival is still going on, and we performed each year until my retirement last spring.
Administrators ask electricians how to solve electrical problems; why don’t they ask US how to solve musical problems?? (Of course, some do, and here’s my nod of sincere appreciation to them!)
Marie Grass Amenta says
Ho-Boy, do I agree!
I think–and I’ve said this more than once in the last few years especially–people think music and other arts as “magic.” (I have a visual arts friend who calls us all “Rock Stars”) And folks don’t understand “magic,” which is why department heads are routinely chosen by the higher ups.
Don’t get me started about the “why should we pay you for singing when your voice is a ‘gift from God’ ” attitude. My late Mom’s (a coloratura soprano) answer to that was “but God doesn’t want me to starve!” 🙂