Beginning the 26th Year: It’s All in the Words

This week on GBW and ACDA Radio/ChoralNet host Stan Schmidt takes a moment to tell you how Going Beyond Words got started and how he goes about putting each show together. He then gives you an opportunity to listen to “A Song of Praise” by Beethoven conducted by Robert Shaw;  “A Prayer by Padre Pio” sung by The Sixteen with Harry Christophers;  “A Song of Praise for Female Voices and Bells” by Samuel Adler;  then the “Magnificat in D Major” by Johann Sebastian Bach;  concluding with the Gloria Patri from “Dixit Dominus” by Georg Friedrich Händel with the Chor des Bayerischen and Concerto Köln.

First of all I appreciate all of you that take the time to listen.  When I first began Going Beyond Words in 1993 it was because of a call from the program director from KVNO FM, a 24 hour classical station in Omaha. He noted that the city had nine choirs but that fact was unexpressed on local radio and asked if I would develop a show.

Well, I did and over the past 25 years have gathered tremendous knowledge in programming by watching out for key duplication, speed, voicing, and language, with various composers from different countries and style. I was directing a chamber choir in Omaha and had shared with my singers our theme for the year, which was Going Beyond Words. Ten years earlier my wife and I began sharing our time with Collegium U.S.A. and John Rutter. We went to all of the national and some regional ACDA conferences. It was a time of developing a network of friends who sent recordings to our home and today there is a collection of some 500 LPs and 18,000 CDs from which to choose for each show. If you examine the programs you will find that by reading the titles as a list, they usually tell a story. So for this program it is all about feeling being thankful for how this life as a choral director developed. Hope you enjoy this one.

For a look at the CDs used and a complete list of the music heard, go to the blog of WWW.GOINGBEYONDWORDS.COM website and click on show 2501.