AD Music Notes

Hello Everyone,

I enjoyed our rehearsal last night – I hope that you did, too!

Here are some links that may be of interest to you.

IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) Interactive Pronunciation Chart

Witness the Hour: Conversations with Arab-American Poets Across the Diaspora

She Carries the Weapons; They are Called Words

Pronunciation of [ae] for Banyas (probably more information than you ever thought possible!)

We will continue to work with the tuning exercise that we began last night to help us tune I Sing That My Voice May Be Heard. If you are working with a tuning app (or your piano), practice singing a D major ascending scale: Do-Re-Mi-Fa-So-La-Ti-Do then descending Do-Ti-La-So-Fa-Mi-Re-Do-Ti-La-So then ascending So- La-Ti-Do-Re-Mi-Fa-So then skipping from So to low La and then ascending to Do. Check to make sure that you are high enough for So before skipping down to La and that you return to our hometone, Do.

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Hello Everyone,

I had a wonderful time with you at our retreat. Thanks to all who were able to attend – but we certainly missed those who were not able to be with us.

What a beautiful setting for our music-making!

We began our retreat with Connections and learned some very unique things about one another…we are quite an interesting community!

We then worked through excerpts of our music as we applied Laban’s Eight Efforts, enhancing our ensemble’s expressiveness. If you would like to hear our progress, here are rehearsal snippets from the WVC Retreat.
punch , dab , flick , press , wring , slash , float , glide

I have a hard copy of the Laban information printed for everyone, but if you missed the retreat and want to have a look before Monday evening, I have attached the document.

We then worked with Gwen Hall, our clinician for our retreat. She shared her creative process when composing I Sing That My Voice May Be Heard. We rehearsed the piece with Gwen giving us very helpful feedback and guidance along the way. Her insights helped us to reach a new level of artistry with this piece. You can listen here: I Sing That My Voice May Be Heard. Although we made great progress in expressiveness, we will continue to work on intonation – the opening phrase is not in tune…and then we don’t quite sit in a tonal center throughout….but we will work on this together!

During lunch (which was DE-licious! – thanks to all who brought such yummy food!), we relaxed but also discussed the lyrics of The Valley. Representatives from each of the tables shared their thoughts with the chorus in our afternoon rehearsal. Of course, there are no right or wrong answers in regard to interpreting lyrics. Phrases will have different meanings to each of us and that is FINE! It is the personal connection that we have to our music that will shine through as we share it with others.

We had a very informative business meeting – your membership liaison can share those details with you if you were not present. I’m sure that others can answer questions, as well. Janet looked LOVELY in her WVC outfit – talk to her if you have questions about performance attire.

We also celebrated May, June, July, and August birthdays (and Happy Birthday to Meg who celebrated her 49th with us today!).

The remainder of our afternoon was productively spent drilling pitches and rhythms on The Valley and Let me Fly. Progress!

Thanks to Kay, Debbie, Meg, and to all who contributed to such a wonderful, music-filled day.

Cheers!

Laura

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Hello Everyone,

I had such fun with everyone at rehearsal last night. Thank you for all of your hard work and attention to detail. Once we have our “nuts and bolts” accomplished we can really dig in – and we are already well on our way. I think of “nut and bolts” as all of the information in our written music – but then we have all of the interpretive and expressive work to look forward to.

Great job looking up from your music when we repeated our tuning exercises. The cruise ship analogy is one that I often think of when conducting a chorus. I have never actually steered a cruise ship (surprise!) but I can imagine that it takes more time and distance to make a change in course when compared to steering a speedboat (or Andrew’s little fishing boat!). Really, it’s how well we are communicating with one another. if you look up, I will do my best to give you something worth seeing! A well-known choral conductor, Rodney Eichenberger, gave this advice during a workshop I attended many years ago,  “What they see is what you get!”

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Hello Everyone,

So many birthday celebrations tonight – happy birthday to those celebrating their special days in October!

I loved our WVC celebration on Sunday afternoon. Many thanks to all who made it possible and to all who were able to attend – so much fun! We missed those who were not able to be there in person, but I am sure you were with us in spirit. Thank you for my lovely flowers. My husband, Andrew, really enjoyed seeing/meeting everyone. Everything looked beautiful and the food was delicious. It was wonderful to sing A Path to Each Other.

We have one more rehearsal until our fall retreat and I am looking forward to tackling some of the sections in our music that we have not yet been through and digging into the sections where we have learned the basics.

I have attached the notes that I took at the NC ACDA Conference session regarding breathing for singing (Laura D. was in the session with me). It was a wonderful conference and I have other tidbits to share in the coming days. I am confident that we cannot go wrong with an energized breath!

Here is a link to the Rehearsal Recordings that I made tonight. I think it is really beneficial to listen to our progress so that we can hear what we have accomplished and know what we have yet to do.

Welcome to the world to Baby Spencer – Rachel, we can’t wait to meet your son and look forward to your return to WVC.

My new mantra: DOWN-OUT-OPEN!

Cheers!

Laura

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Hello Everyone,

I enjoyed being with you at rehearsal last night. Thank you for your wonderful energy and hard work.

I will be at NC American Choral Director’s Association Fall Conference this weekend – Laura D. will also be there with a group of her youth chorus singers! :). I always look forward to growing in choral music and I am sure that I will have fresh ideas to bring back to WVC.

I was with the Alto 2 section for their sectional rehearsal and offered to make a voice memo of their part in The Valley because the rhythm is tricky. Please let me know if you would like for me to make voice memos of any measures/pieces that you would find helpful and I will be glad to do so (although I can’t always sing all of the S1 parts if they are above the staff). The practice files are AWESOME but if it helps to have something slower or with the lyrics, just let me know.

I couldn’t send you the recordings as attached files (too large) so I am sending you a link to a Google folder.

WVC Rehearsal Recordings

If I don’t see you Sunday afternoon, I will look forward to seeing you on Monday night.

Cheers!

Laura read more…

Hello Everyone!

I enjoyed being with you at our rehearsal – we are making progress! Thank you for our music making and also for our improved transitions – we moved with better efficiency tonight and that was very helpful.

Please work on your scales and interval exercises as you have time – individual accuracy will improve our ensemble intonation. If you are not already comfortable using sol-fa, hopefully as you become fluent you will begin to connect with how scale degrees (Do, Re Mi, etc.) function in a melody (Ti feels high and leads upward to Do, Re moves a whole step or a Major 2nd up from Do, etc.). Scale degrees have functions within harmonies, too. Do is always our home tone in a major key, La is our home tone in a minor key. There are other modes, of course, but that is for another day.

Please memorize the text for A Path to Each Other. The intonation using sol-fa was very sparkly tonight – brava!

Cheers to all – I am already looking forward to our next rehearsal!

Laura

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Hello Everyone!

I enjoyed being with you at our rehearsal! Please excuse my not sending these notes Tuesday. I was already well on my way to Boone when I realized that my laptop was not in my computer bag. Please accept my apologies as I know this may have negatively impacted your personal practice schedule.

One item that is not specifically musical but does affect our music making…

Let’s give our attention to ensuring that we make the most of our time together each week. I can tell by the number of times that I hear shushing during the rehearsal that members are not always able to hear instructions or notes because of chatter. I ask that collectively we all do our best to minimize conversations that slow us down and that can be a distraction, especially during transitions. Our acoustically live rehearsal space amplifies even soft conversations. I will do my best to keep rehearsal moving at a musically appropriate pace so that we move forward with intention and purpose. I know that the social aspect of our community is very important so we will certainly continue to connect with one another during our mid-rehearsal break.

We will continue to work on strengthening our audiation skills as I feel sure it will help our overall intonation. Please include scales in your individual practice sessions and challenge yourself to audiate pitches. You may want to consider an app for your phone to check your progress. I use an app called Sing In Tuna for my iPhone (so far there is not an android version). This app gives me immediate feedback because it shows the note that I am singing on the staff and indicates whether or not I am singing in the center of the pitch. If you can’t use that app, here is a link to other tuning apps that might be helpful. If you use an acoustic piano, obviously it should be in tune or it won’t be much help with intonation exercises. Forgive my stating the obvious but my own piano is overdue for its tuning so I know how that can happen even with the best of intentions.

Cheers to all – see you Monday!

Laura

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Hello WVC!

My apologies for an extra email this week but clarification is needed on our part splits. Attached is a PDF of your part assignments. Below is our repertoire and the splits we are using. These are all indicated on the practice files that Karla made so you may already have this information. It would be helpful if everyone marked this in their scores. Ask your section leaders if you have questions please – they will know how to best assist you.

Some of you may be wondering about the card system that WVC has used in the past. We will probably use these cards later in the fall.  Right now, as we are in the beginning stages of working through our music, my preference is that we sit high voices to low voices (as you have been sitting) and that you choose your individual seats within your general section area according to where you learn most efficiently.

In the future, we will also use the Square System that divides you into smaller mixed ensembles but we aren’t ready for that quite yet.

Thank you so much for all of your work and dedication to WVC. I am having a wonderful time working on our music together – see you Monday!

Cheers!

Laura

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Hello Everyone,

Than you for a wonderful rehearsal and fun social time! Welcome, again, to our new members, and welcome back to everyone else.

I did not realize that my rehearsal notes in purple (last week) did not translate well to our website so I am changing my rehearsal feedback to paragraph/bulleted form. Since you have the rehearsal plans now for the coming week (you didn’t have them last week because it was our first rehearsal) I won’t include them again, but you can refer to them as needed.

I am already looking forward to next week.

Cheers!

Laura

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Dear WVC Singers,

Thank you for your hospitable welcome and for your amazing energy. Thank you for your passionate singing and attentive listening…and thank you for singing through our break. We won’t make that a habit because breaks are important not only for our personal needs but also for us to connect with one another socially. An enormous thank you, once again, to all who worked so hard to prepare for our first rehearsal and for our auditions last night.

Attached is the voice memo recording of The Path to Each Other that I made at the end of our rehearsal last night. It is a wonderful start on the path of our musical journey. You can hear what we have already accomplished and what we have yet to accomplish!

Below are the rehearsal notes with my post-rehearsal comments in purple. The rehearsal notes for 9/9/19 follow so that you can prepare for our next rehearsal. I look forward to our music-making.

Cheers!

Laura

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