Latest Blog Posts

       Consider the baseball pitcher. Human arms did not evolve so that people could throw a baseball as hard and accurately as possible for over 200 times in about two hours. That strenuous and “unnatural” use of arms and shoulders takes a very exacting toll on the nerve and muscle fibers, ligaments, cartilages and skeletal […]

A little Saturday cartoon, anyone?

Perhaps some of you would like to know what happens when you post a query or a classified or an announcement or how a decision to approve or discard by the Moderators is made here at ChoralNet. I have been a ChoralNet Moderator for exactly one year but have been a ChoralNet user since 1995. […]

Conductors communicate a composer’s expressive intention by embodying it, allowing the musical idea in our minds to become manifest and observable in our bodies so that it may influence the ensemble. Tai Chi gives us practice opening the pathways between mind and body, intention and movement, to guide us towards conducting from our truest intuition. […]

     A few years ago I became Music Director of a small Lutheran church in New Jersey.  The choir had dwindled over the years, and now there were only about eight women and one gentleman.  This gentleman, Lou, had Alzheimer’s and his mind was nearly always clouded over with the darkness of this terrible disease.  […]

Among the many reasons given for whyyoung men are sometimes turned off to singing in choirs are: • singing is considered feminine; • there is a lack of repertoire appropriate for young men whose voices are changing; • there is a lack of understanding by adolescent males when it comes to the boy’s changing voice; […]

       When preparing to teach choral music at the secondary level, the conductor must be equipped to help these singers manage their developing voices. Therefore, one of the first steps toward successfully working with adolescents in a choral rehearsal is for the teacher to obtain a thorough understanding of the changing voice.1 With […]