Latest Blog Posts

Who says choral conductors don’t have any fun?  Enjoy this little series of cameos of some of our friends who were in Salt Lake City last week.    

If you’ve picked up the 2015 Conference Program, you may have noticed its size.  Being just shy of 200 pages, this monster is almost as thick as some coffee-table books.  Despite its heft, the Choral Journal publication team was hard-pressed to find space for all of the necessary conference information and advertisements.  Their’s was a […]

Regardless of when one might have attended an ACDA conference, there seems to be a general agreement that the concerts are exceptional.  Folks rave about the “best” performance they heard, and if one listens carefully it becomes clear that those ensembles celebrated as being the “best” tend to be the professional choirs and those from […]

Hmmm . . . is is a wedding, or is it a wake?  That probably depends upon one’s point of view.  If one has the right partner at the alter, then it will be a grand adventure!    

REHEARSAL STRATEGIES OF SIR DAVID WILCOCKS by Carl Smith   Sir David Willcocks, Music Director Emeritus, King’s College Choir, King’s College, Cambridge University, UK, used three rehearsal strategies which differed from rehearsal strategies used by other choral conductors, with whom I have sung.   The first strategy was teaching releases. Many times, in dealing with […]

(An excerpt from the interest session “The Bel-Canto Choral Transformation: Creating the Beautiful Balanced, Blended Ensemble Singing You’re Always Dreamed Of,” presented by Laurier Fagnan during the 2015 ACDA National Conference.)          We must understand that when we sing, there is an ongoing struggle in our body between two opposing forces: the breath – […]

(An excerpt from the interest session “Problems and Possibilities in Choral Methods Courses,” presented by Patrick K. Freer during the 2015 ACDA National Conference.)           One problem is our graduates’ reluctance to use research-based techniques when teaching choral music.  When I attend many sessions at state, regional and national ACDA conferences, the advice given […]

(An excerpt from the interest session “Thirty-Something: New Choral Music from Today’s Hottest Young Composers,” presented by Dominick DiOrio during the 2015 ACDA National Conference.)          New choral music is flowing in many directions these days, with composers borrowing influences from popular music, early music, and folk traditions. This is in no way more […]

(An excerpt from the interest session “Choral Music in the 21st Century: Integrating Technology into Choral Music,” presented by Christopher J. Russell during the 2015 ACDA National Conference.)   One of my goals for this presentation was to focus on strategies that can be instantly adopted in the choir rehearsal.  One of the emerging technologies […]

  Using mobile devices to record audio and video offers some great advantages over using a camera alone: editing can be done on device, the built-in networking makes it easy to move or publish the files, and having a large screen makes it easy to review footage on the scene. The built-in camera and microphone […]