By Stuart Hunt Among the necessary, and at the same time, egregious choices in which education (choral education in particular) presently finds itself, perhaps we have (necessarily) focused on the immediate, and, at our own peril, not looked far enough down the road. In our research, nowhere can we find this particular topic being significantly […]
Consonants: Partnering with Vowels – An Eclectic Overview
Vowels carry emotion and music,while consonants carry context, intent, and meaning. This series on vowels and consonants is intended to stimulate you to dig deeper into your own practice with your choir, or your voice studio. At some point, in your conducting or performing, you must decide on basics tenets of where a note begins […]
An International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA): Introductory Primer to American-English
It is not as inscrutable as you might imagine. Sometimes what you’re most afraid of doing is the very thing that will set you free. – Robert Tew There are certainly enough instructional papers, blogs, and seminars about the IPA, but they beg some significant questions: How long does it really take to become proficient […]
An Overview of Vowels (and Consonents) for the Singer, and for the Choir: A Practical Primer
The singer lives or dies on vowels. – Vocal proverb As conductors and artists, it is incumbent upon us to help young or learning performers and students to communicate text, with clarity and expression. That is only possible once the basics of diction, no matter in what language we sing, are mastered agreed upon, so […]