Latest Blog Posts

(An excerpt from the interest session “From the Ground Up: Building a New Student Chapter,” presented by Celeste Morales during the 2014 ACDA Southwestern Division Conference)          The Texas State University ACDA chapter began as a small five member group…it now has 50 national members. You might be asking, “Well how did y’all do […]

(commons.wikimedia.org)   A teacher came to me last week asking if it was copyright-compliant to download a YouTube video to show in an upcoming concert. “After all,” she surmised, “it’s publicly viewable already, and we’re a school, so it’s fair use, right?” Fair Use is that aspect of U.S. copyright law which gives considerable leeway […]

(An excerpt from the interest session “Music Beyond Borders: World Music for Intermediate Treble Choirs,” presented by Brian C. Murray during the 2014 ACDA Southwestern Division Conference)          As gatekeepers and translators of culture (Abril, 2006; Anderson, 1993), it is the responsibility of choral conductors to broaden our students’ musical experience beyond what is […]

(An excerpt from the interest session “Music Beyond Borders: World Music for Intermediate Treble Choirs,” presented by Jennifer Alarcon during the 2014 ACDA Southwestern Division Conference)   Create a lasting memory, reinforce the love of choral music in a singer’s heart, and amaze your audience with an authentic performance of a world choral piece! Performances […]

(An excerpt from the interest session “It’s Not Just Old Music: Discovering Quality and Engaging Music on CPDL,” presented by Ryan Kelly during the 2014 ACDA Southwestern Division Conference)   It is easy to disregard certain pieces on CPDL because their scorings do not exactly match what one’s choirs typically perform. Think creatively, however, and […]

IF YOU DON’T MIND ME ASKING: HAVE YOU TAKEN A VOCAL PEDAGOGY CLASS? by Mary Lynn Doherty          A recent editorial in the International Journal of Research in Choral Singing (IJRCS), written by Dr. James Daugherty, challenges our profession to question our backgrounds in vocal pedagogy.  As the editor of this publication, Daugherty extends […]

(An excerpt from the interest session “Oh Brother! Success With Boy Singers,” presented by Julian Ackerley during the 2014 ACDA Southwestern Division Conference)          Believe it or not, being a boy in today’s world is challenging. Emotions are often shut down in a macho mentality. Boys are generally energetic and curious but also very […]

Awhile back I wrote a post about the dos and don’ts of leaving a conducting or music teaching job. Some interesting discussion was generated from that post, and I think some good things came out of it. The main conclusion I came to was that leaving a job is not a passive endeavor. One must […]

(An excerpt from the interest session “Inspiration: Look Beyond the Page,” presented by Tom Wine during the 2014 ACDA Southwestern Division Conference)          Inspiration.  Where does it come from and how can it be taught to singers in a choir? Defining the element which singers will identify as the source of inspiration is always […]

(An excerpt from the interest session “A Place in the Choir, a Choir in the Place,” presented by Charlotte Kroeker during the 2014 ACDA Southwestern Division Conference)          According to a Chorus America study,  More choirs are found in churches than anywhere else in the U.S., 216,000 of 270,000.  80% of all choirs in […]