A really great rehearsal, I'm so pleased with the progress we're making with it all. Just a few things to note below, so please read carefully.
What we did on Tuesday 28th February
We began by working on Crossing the Bar, and put in a lot of work to tuning, blending, and the arcs of each phrase. I know I've said it before, but as it's such as simple work (musically), we've got to be so accurate with consonants, vowel colours, and musical phrasing in order to sell the piece - it's coming along brilliantly.
We then split off for sectionals on the Mäntyjärvi, with T/B working on pages 14-17, ensuring all the notes are correct and the balance works. S/A worked with James on the notes of pages 10-12, with most focus done leading up to bar 31. After the break, S/A rehearsed the fun rhythms on pages 13-16, and T/B did pages 10-12 with James. After this we put it all together from pages 10-17, in a very good sing through!
We've done so much good work on these sections, so please do consolidate it all at home, sing through with the recordings of the piece, and practice with the audio tracks.
We ended by working on pages 9-14 of the Sumsion, getting real contrast in the character of the music, reflecting the text, and ensuring the rhythms are all accurate such as "wits' end" on page 11 with the quaver off, and the intensity and ferocity of page 12 dying into the serene and reflective page 13.
What we'll do on Tuesday 7th March
I'd like to start with Letter F (page 19) of the Stanford Movement III, confirming the notes are all there and working on the blend and performance of the end of this movement.
After this we'll do the opening and ending of the Mäntyjärvi, with our wonderful soloists Sian and Forrest.
After the break we'll look at pages 12, 18 & 19, looking at the notes of those sections.
And finally, if there's time, we'll sing through the last movement of the Stanford.
Marked Scores
These should be in every one of your scores by now, so thank you for your time putting them in!
Spotify Playlist
As with every term, you can find most of the music on Spotify (or YouTube). Here's the Spotify Link.
The Vivian is available HERE.
The Arbo is available HERE.
Mäntyjärvi Learning Resources
Nick Watkins, member of Chipping Norton Choral Society, North Cotswold Chamber Choir, and friend of newCHOIR, put together some learning tracks for Canticum Calamitatis Maritimae when NC3 did it last year. He's very kindly allowed me to share them with you. Below is the link to a folder of each part, highlighting your notes, beginning on page 6.
It'll be incredibly useful going forward in learning the piece, particularly as we can focus in rehearsals on putting it together, rather than 'note-bashing'!
In this updated folder, Brian has also put them into MP3 format too, so everyone should be able to access them. Check them out HERE.
Poster and Event Link
Brian has designed this beautiful poster - please share far and wide, as well as the link to the concert HERE.
Librarian Role
As you know, Judy unfortunately won't be singing with us for the foreseeable, and so we need someone to very kindly fill the shoes of Librarian for the choir. I promise it doesn't involve too much, though you can find out more about the role from Judy or myself.
Please do consider it, and help keep the choir running smoothly!
Cherwell Singers Concert
Our friends over at the Cherwell Singers have their concert in a couple of week's time, so go and support them as they sing a great programme of music by Zoltán Kodály. Poster below and a link to the tickets HERE.
See you on the 7th.
- Ben