CONTENTS August 2015/ Volume 56, Number 1 FEATURES
8 Fleeing War, Composing Peace: The Evolution of Jean Berger by Zebulon M. Highben
28 Notes for Success: Advice for the First-Year Choral Teacher, Part 2 Compiled by Amanda Bumgarner
38 Connection, Communication & Context: Improvisation in a Choral Setting by Carole J. Ott
ARTICLES 49 Technology and the Choral Art Evernote for Every Choir, Composer, Classroom, and Conductor by Philip Copelandg g g
57 Life after Retirement by James Gallagher
59 Repertoire & Standards Managing the ACDA Student Chapter Leadership Transition
by Bryan E. Nichols Student Chapter Update
Nineteenth-Century Choral Repertoire for Male Voices by Mark Ramsay
69 Student Times On the Cover Jean Berger’s flight from Germany is represented Feeding the Choirs: The Beginner’s Recipe Guide to in the passport-like image of this month’s cover. Featured from Selecting Repertoire by Jessica Rikard top to bottom is an entry stamp to Paris, Rio de Janeiro, and finally New York City, where Berger quickly established himself 73 Rehearsal Break as a composer of choral music. The How of Rehearsing by Hilary Apfelstadtg Annual dues (includes subscription to the Choral Journal): Active $95, Industry $135, Institutional $110, Retired $45, and Student $35. Library annual subscription rates: U.S. $45; Canada $50; Foreign $85. Single Copy $3; Back Issues $4. Circulation: 19,000. REVIEWS Main offi ce: 405-232-8161 77 Book The Choral Journal (US ISSN 0009-5028) is issued monthly except for 83 Recorded Sound July by the American Choral Directors Association. Periodicals postage paid at Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, and additional mailing offi ce. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to Choral Journal, 545 Couch
Drive, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma 73102. NEWS 7 2016 Division Conferences Since 1959, the Choral Journal has been the refereed, international journal of the 55 2014 Julius Herford Prize Call for Nominations American Choral Directors Association. Each issue features: three scholarly articles, 67 Raymond Brock Student Composition Contest Information anonymously peer-reviewed by the editorial board; refereed articles on pedagogical or scientifi c issues for the choral conductor; refereed articles with practical advice 87 America Cantat 8 and ideas for the choral conductor; reviews of books, recorded sound, and choral works by choral experts; and editorials from association leadership. The January and February issues preview each year’s divisional or national conference off erings. Articles from the Choral Journal can be found in the following online databases: EDITORIAL JSTOR (Arts & Sciences XI Collection); ProQuest (International Index to Music Periodicals); University Microfi lms International; NaPublishing; RILM (Répertoire 2 From the Executive Director International de Littérature Musicale); EBSCO music index; and WorldCat. Ad- 4 From the President vertising options are available for members and nonmembers. Cover art by Efrain 5 From the Editor Guerrero. Interior art by Tammy Brummell. Musical examples by Tunesmith Music
NATIONAL TREASURER 2) observe the current challenge, 3) visualize the Jo Ann Miller North Dakota State University innovation, 4) evaluate and refi ne the innovation, [email protected] and 5) implement the innovation. These fi ve basic Executive Director Tim Sharp steps can be applied to the major breakthroughs we Tim Sharp 405-232-8161 call innovative. IDEO, the award-winning design [email protected] and development fi rm that brought the world the Apple mouse, has dem- Central Division President Gayle Walker onstrated that this deceptively simple methodology works for everything Otterbein University 614-823-1508 from creating simple children’s toys to launching e-commerce businesses. [email protected] The American Choral Directors Association has used this process as we Eastern Division President have confronted our membership’s mandate to restructure the way we do David Fryling Hofstra University our work in the twenty-fi rst century. 516-463-5497 [email protected] So we have the method, but what is the “secret sauce” or the “key” to
North Central Division President innovation? The key to innovation was given to us clearly by Leonardo Bob Demaree University of Wisconsin-Platteville da Vinci, who kept a notebook (as did Galileo, Darwin, and other innova- 608-342-1446 tors) and wrote his ideas down, no matter how trivial or inconsequential. [email protected] He tied his notebook around his waist, and it served as his constant com- Northwestern Division President Patrick ryan panion. (Illustration found at http://quovadisblog.com/2010/01/guest- Great Falls High School 406-268-6370 post-leonardos-notebook/.) Da Vinci knew that focused observation was a [email protected] powerful pathway to innovation. In one margin, he wrote he was taking a Southern Division President Alicia Walker break from work perche la minestra si fredda (because the soup is getting cold). University of South Carolina Really? Sure, it is a great reason to stop working, but why write it down? 706-542-4752 [email protected] But that was what he did. Seemingly no idea or observation was trivial. Southwestern Division President His famous notebook reveals hundreds of sketches, musical notes, Mark Lawley Drury University doodles, and other refl ections. Not only did he observe, he intentionally [email protected] observed. His most often-used word was perche? (why?). This word can be Western Division President Anna Hamre found over and over again in his writings. One entry begins, Perche li cane…? California State University-Fresno (Why does a dog…?) It was not enough to observe; he also questioned why. 559-278-2539 [email protected] As we investigate his notebooks, we learn that he went beyond why and Industry Associate Representative sought to explore “Why not?” In this process, da Vinci reveals that the Brad Matheson Harmony International “secret sauce” of innovation was his questioning of “Why?” and “Why [email protected] not?” He would then interpret shades of meaning to divine their underly- Chair, Past Presidents’ Council Jo-Michael Scheibe ing motivations or needs. University of Southern California The inventor posed diffi cult challenges to himself and confronted tough [email protected] tasks. For example, he tried to describe the tongue of a hummingbird and National Past Presidents the experience of thirst. He was not afraid of problems and might even be † Archie Jones † Hugh Sanders described as a problem creator, but those problems he created were for him † Elwood Keister David O. Thorsen † Warner Imig Diana J. Leland to ponder and for his own disciplined study of the challenges of life. The † J. Clark Rhodes William B. Hatcher † Harold A. Decker John B. Haberlen evidence demonstrates that once he identifi ed the problem through obser- † Theron Kirk † Lynn Whitten † Charles C. Hirt James A. Moore vations, sketches, and experimentation, he sought an innovative solution. † Morris D. Hayes Milburn Price † Russell Mathis David Stutzenberger We are tempted to think of these achievements and say, “Yes, but he † Walter S. Collins Mitzi Groom H. Royce Saltzman Michele Holt † Colleen Kirk Hilary Apfelstadt Maurice T. Casey Jerry McCoy
The 12 Purposes EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR'S was Leonardo da Vinci!” True, but of ACDA LOG he was also a very real person who came from humble and ordinary • To foster and promote choral circumstances. He was raised be- What's on singing, which will provide Tim's daytimer? tween two homes. His famous prac- artistic, cultural, and spiritual tice of writing backward has been experiences for the participants. Aug 1 - 2 Europa Cantat explained as a possible symptom Pecs, Hungary of dyslexia or evidence of being • To foster and promote the finest types of choral music to make SSepep 5 - 6 GALAGALA ChorusChorus ConferenceConference self-taught in reading and writing. these experiences possible. Da Vinci did not complete some Denver, CO of his innovative projects; in fact, • To foster and encourage SSepep 10 -14 Swedish Choral Festival he started a lot of things he never rehearsal procedures conducive Stockholm, Sweden fi nished. But what is important to to attaining the highest possible SSepep 23 - 27 Hawaii ACDA me as a student of innovation is level of musicianship and artistic performance. Honolulu, Hawaii that he started them. Leonardo da Vinci’s vocational • To foster and promote the What's on title on any given day could have organization and development Tim's Ipad? been military contractor, inven- of choral groups of all types in tor, painter, or musical performer. schools and colleges. Half Moon Rising: He loved people, work, play, food, • To foster and promote the Choral Music from Mainland China and life and traded in doubts and development of choral music in John Winzenburg questions. He signed his work, the church and synagogue. Leonardo Vinci discepilo della sperentia Practical Vocal Acoustics: Pedagogic (Leonardo da Vinci, disciple of • To foster and promote the Applications for Teachers and Singers experience). He asked “Why?” and organization and development Kenneth W. Bozeman “Why not?” and sought answers of choral societies in cities and communities. and solutions. Making Musical Meaning: The secret to innovation is really • To foster and promote the Unlocking the Value of Music Education no secret at all. The beginning of understanding of choral music in the Age of Innovation as an important medium of innovation engages a mind-set of Elizabeth Sokolowski contemporary artistic expression. questioning “Why?” and system- Andrew Keen atically moving through a process •To foster and promote significant What's Tim's of discovering “Why not?” This is research in the field of choral Latest App? the innovative process that ACDA music. leadership has taken to the task of restructuring the work of our •To foster and encourage choral ForScore standing committees. You will have composition of superior quality. Carus Music the opportunity to study and vote • To cooperate with all on the restructuring later this fall. organizations dedicated to the What's Tim I hope you will agree that the pro- development of musical culture Listening to? posed changes will better address in America. the challenges we face as an asso- ciation in the twenty-fi rst century. • To foster and promote Rheinberger’s 3 Sacred Songs, Op 69: No 3 international exchange programs Stuttgart Chamber Choir; involving performing groups, conductors, and composers. Frieder Bernius
• To disseminate professional news Tarik O Regan’s A Light Exists in Spring and information about choral Wells Cathedral School Choralia music. Hear more at
From the When the calendar turns to August, National Chair Amy Johnston Blosser I start thinking about the new school Bexley High School PRESIDENT year. Most of us in the choral music fi eld 614-579-9346 [email protected] operate on this cycle of endings and be-
Boychoirs ginnings: school years, liturgical year, concert seasons. Craig Denison Florida Singing Sons There are times I weary at the end of the semester trying 954-529-8412 to fi nish everything, but then I enjoy the fact that we can [email protected] have a fresh start at the beginning of the next semester. Children and Community Youth Choirs Cheryl Dupont As I take the offi ce of ACDA’s National President, I New Orleans Children’s Chorus feel the same anticipation and look forward to a fresh 504-833-0575 [email protected] Mary Hopper start. We wrapped up ACDA 2015 in February in Salt College and University Choirs Lake City with great success. Now I enjoy thinking about the Joey Martin Texas State University—San Marcos next two years and opportunities for ACDA moving forward. I am very thankful [email protected] for the leadership and vision of Karen Fulmer. She has been instrumental in
Community Choirs gathering input, listening to our constituency, and shaping our mission state- Ron Sayer Marshall Community Chorus ment. The Executive Committee will continue to work as a team to carry out 660-831-5197 the mission of ACDA, which is to inspire excellence in choral music through [email protected] education, performance, composition, and advocacy. Ethnic and Multicultural Perspectives JosÉ Rivera We are at a very important point in the life of ACDA where new initiatives University of North Carolina 910-521-6290 are blossoming and our membership is taking leadership at all levels. Here are [email protected] some of the things that will be happening over the next year. Junior High/Middle School Choirs Jennifer Alarcon Blalack Middle School 1. You will have the opportunity to vote on a revamp of our committee struc- 972-968-3616 [email protected] ture. The Executive Committee and National Board have proposed some changes that will help our leadership carry out the four pillars of our mission. Male Choirs Christopher Kiver Look for that announcement this fall. Penn State University 814-863-4400 [email protected] 2. We also are proposing a restructuring of our Repertoire & Standards Com- Music in Worship mittee, allowing for more freedom at the state level and less bureaucracy at the Thomas Vozzella St. Andrew's Episcopal church division level. Also look for that announcement. 816-888-9033 [email protected]
Senior High School Choirs 3. The Mentoring Program is in full swing, and those of us more experienced Daniel Bishop conductors have the opportunity to enter into relationship with young conduc- Clovis East High School 559-478-1785 tors and share our wisdom. This is the future of the choral art. [email protected]
Show Choirs 4. There is no doubt the world has become smaller, and we are certainly not in Randi Carp Phoenixville Area High School an isolated choral world. ACDA is exploring ways to work with and support our 484-927-5145 [email protected] friends in countries without the luxury of a large choral organization, and we continue to create experiences for conductor exchanges throughout the world. Two-Year College Choirs Dianna Campbell Seminole State College of Florida 407-708-2644 5. Finally, ACDA is committed to reaching out to diverse communities within [email protected] our own country, especially in the urban areas. Vocal Jazz Patrice Madura Ward-Steinman Indiana University These seem like big projects, but we have so many committed members who 812-855-7738 [email protected] are willing to work together. If you are not involved in leadership at your state,
Women’s Choirs division, R&S, or any other level of ACDA, I encourage you to get involved. Iris Levine Vox Femina Los Angeles [email protected]
Youth and Student Activities Amanda Quist Westminster Choir College, Rider Univ. 616-901-3846 [email protected] Editorial Board
From the “If I were not a physicist, I would probably Editor be a musician. I often think in music. I live Amanda Bumgarner ACDA National Offi ce EDITOR my daydreams in music. I see my life in terms 405-232-8161 (ex. 205) of music.” [email protected] –Albert Einstein Managing Editor Ron Granger ACDA National Offi ce 405-232-8161 [email protected] Every August issue of Choral Journal rep- resents two new beginnings: the fi rst issue of Board Members Hilary Apfelstadt Amanda Bumgarner the new volume year and the start of the new University of Toronto 416-978-0827 school year. Many of our members are facing [email protected] dramatic life changes—approaching their fi rst year as a full-time choral edu- Terry Barham cator in the classroom, their fi rst year as a new retiree, or one of many other University of Missouri - Kansas City transitions that take place in the life of a choral director. No matter where [email protected] you fi nd yourself, we all have common ground in our love of music and the Kristina Boerger way in which it impacts how we view the world. University of Illinois [email protected] My hope is that this publication will inspire excellence in choral music in all our members across the country and around the world in some ca- Philip Copeland Samford University pacity over its fi fty-sixth volume year. As always, feel free to contact me at 205-588-4794
Finally, we continue the advice for fi rst-year choral teachers with part two Jason Paulk of the three-part article that was introduced in the May 2015 issue. This ar- Eastern New Mexico University 575-562-2798 ticle explores answers to questions on dealing with fi rst-year surprises, relating [email protected] the choir to other subjects within the school, and suggestions for assessment Magen Solomon in the classroom. The third and fi nal part will appear in next month’s issue. San Francisco Choral Artists 415-494-8149 [email protected]
Richard Stanislaw [email protected]
Stephen Town Northwest Missouri State University 660-562-1795 [email protected] Editor, The question concerning women conductors was asked of male and female conductors to discern the I want to thank you and views of both at that time. Some men admitted that they everyone who contrib- had not given it much thought but would do so after be- uted to “Notes for Success: ing posed with the question. To have asked the question Advice for the First-Year only of women conductors would not have recognized LETTERS Choral Teacher.” It was the awareness and high ideals of many of our outstand- TO THE exactly what we all needed ing conductors of both genders. Conductor Michael A. to hear both now and dur- Miller (Trinity Lutheran College) and I are collaborating EDITOR ing our fi rst year of teach- on the second volume of In Quest of Answers. It will be ing! Every important idea most interesting to see how this particular question is was touched—from working toward better classroom answered in this decade. management to creating balance in our personal lives. I totally disagree that the Choral Journal should have I am in my twenty-third year of teaching, and I will either censored the article or presented a disclaimer. Dr. never forget my fi rst year. I felt utterly alone and like a Wolverton reported the thoughts and words of Vytautas complete failure. I almost stopped teaching as a result. Miškinis with honesty. To do otherwise would diminish There needs to be so much more support for fi rst-year the integrity of the interviewer and the interviewee, as teachers. Your article represents the type of work about well as that of the Choral Journal and its readers. Yes, we which all of our music organizations need to do more wish the answer to that particular question had been and for which we should advocate to leaders who make diff erent in this day and age. However, the author has decisions that impact education. So many wonderful, the right to speak his truth, just as Ms. Dietrich has passionate, talented people stop teaching because they the right to speak hers. And the editorial board of the don’t receive the support they should get and that they Journal has an added responsibility to present the truth deserve. for choral musicians throughout the world. Thank you so much for creating such a useful article As Elaine Brown (Temple University & Singing City) that helps people of all experience levels and age groups said, “I’m sure that I have [been aware of diffi culties as a who are in the trenches every day working to help in- woman conductor]. I’ve never stopped to think about it, spire children to sing. but I know that many times it’s been very subtle. And too many times I’ve had to be better than the men around Sincerely, me in order to keep going. Of course, the strength, the energy, the tenacity, and the emotional balance require Dale Duncan a great deal of all of us.” (Unpublished interview, 1971.) Henderson Middle School Dekalb County, GA Cordially,
Carole Glenn In response to the Letter to the Editor in the May Certifi ed Music Practitioner issue of Choral Journal from Gabrielle Dietrich, I would Hospice of Kitsap County like to share some background and some thoughts. I was Silverdale, WA pleased that Vance Wolverton used the interview ques- tions that came from my 1971 MA thesis at Occidental College titled “Choral Practices in the United States.” I am writing to you in response to the May 2015 The chapters of the thesis were published over a two- Article “About the Music—An Interview with Ann year period in the Choral Journal a few years later and Howard Jones” by Sean Burton. While reading her in the book In Quest of Answers: Interviews with American comments on “how perceptions and assumptions con- Choral Conductors, published by Hinshaw in 1991. For the cerning gender might be barriers or contributing factors book and for the Choral Journal articles, conductors were to advancement opportunities for conductors,” I found encouraged to make any changes in their responses to I was greatly moved to tears by her candid remarks, the 1971 thesis questions, and many did. especially when recalling some “unfortunate situations
6 CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 that are painful to recall.” Many of my female colleagues how she “feels a responsibility to help the next generation and I have experienced times when we left a job and a of women...successfully navigate the deep waters toward male replacement was given a much higher salary with career success.” She is a true role model to not only less duties (many times possessing lesser credentials), or women but to all choral conductors as we move forward have been told things like “we know you are interested together in this profession. in directing the adult choir, but we think you’d be better suited for working with the children’s group.” Anne Saxon But what struck the most resonant chord within me Founder, Managing Artistic Director, and Conductor was when she stated that she believed she “had been hired Central Carolina Children's Chorus because of her ability, not because of her gender,” and
2016 ACDA DIVISION CONFERENCES
✪ Seattle,S WA March 2 -6, 2016 Boston, MA FebruaryFe 10 - 14, 2016 ✪ Sioux Falls, SD ✪ February 17-20, 2016 ✪ Chicago,Ch IL February 24 - 27, 2016 Kansas City, MOO ✪ March 7 - 10, 2016 Pasadena,Pa CA ✪ Chattanooga, TN FeFFebruaryb 23 - 28, 2016 ✪ March 9 - 12, 2016
CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 7 FLEEING WAR, COMPOSING PEACE THE EVOLUTION OF JEAN BERGER
ZEBULON M. HIGHBEN
• • •
Zebulon M. Highben • Assistant Professor of Music and Director of Choral Activities Muskingum University [email protected]
8 CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 Jean Berger (1909-2002) was a leading fi gure in American choral music in the latter half of the twentieth century. Both as a musician and person, Berger seemed to personify cosmopolitanism. His name was French, his music was infl uenced by the South American sounds he encountered during a year in Brazil, and within his adopted homeland he was both a successful composer and a highly regarded teacher and lecturer on the choral art. Few people are aware, however, of the details of Berger’s origins: • he was born into an orthodox Jewish family in Germany, under a diff erent name, and was later persecuted by the Nazis. Yet that narrative had a dramatic impact on the course of Berger’s life and the eclectic character of his music. This article examines Berger’s evolution as a choral composer, particularly the eff ect of the Nazis’ rise to power and World War II on his life and work. Two war-era compositions, In a Time of Pestilence and Vision of Peace, will be analyzed in detail as exemplar of the connection between Berger’s biography and compositional syntax.
CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 9 FLEEING WAR, COMPOSING PEACE
Early Life and Education dentally attended a lecture by the musicologist Heinrich Besseler on the works of Pérotin. In a self-described state Jean Berger was born in 1909 in Hamm, Westphalia, of “amazement and wonder” at what he heard there, as Artur Schlossberg. (Artur adopted the name “Jean Artur abandoned philology and turned to musicology, Berger” in 1934. This article refers to “Artur” until 1934 eventually studying under Besseler.4 Artur’s primary area and to “Berger” thereafter, demarcating his youth in Ger- of study was the Italian Baroque; in 1932 he completed many from his adult years as a refugee.) Artur’s parents his dissertation, “The Italian Sonata for Several Instru- were Orthodox Jews who immigrated to Germany—his ments in the 17th Century.”5 Besseler was pleased with mother from Poland, his father from Austria. His father Artur’s work and promised him a musicology position at was conscripted into the Austrian army during World Heidelberg as soon as it became available. Meanwhile, War I. When the war ended, the Schlossbergs settled in Artur took a job as répétiteur and assistant conductor to the city of Mannheim and opened a furniture store.1 As Hans Schmidt-Isserstedt at the Hessian State Theater in a child in Mannheim, Artur was exposed to theatre, lit- Darmstadt.6 erature, and music, taking his fi rst piano lessons with Else Landmann. Else’s husband, Arno Landmann, was can- tor at Mannheim’s Christuskirche and introduced Artur Flight from the Nazis to Baroque-era organ literature and choral repertoire.2 As a teenager, Artur read books about music, studied During the fi rst three months of 1933, the Nazi Party orchestral scores, and composed chamber music for the successfully seized control of the German government. Schlossberg family’s private use. But Artur was generally On January 30, German President Paul von Hinden- more captivated by languages and literature than music, burg appointed Adolf Hitler as Chancellor. In February, so he decided to study philology and medieval French at Chancellor Hitler and the Nazis successfully blamed a the University of Heidelberg.3 fi re in the Reichstag legislative chambers on an attempted In 1928, intending to attend a presentation by his (though imagined) Communist takeover. Prompted by the advisor, Artur went to the wrong lecture hall and acci- panic that followed, von Hindenburg signed the Reich- stagsbrandverordnung (“Reichstag Fire Decree”), giving the government unprecedented powers and suspending most National Repertoire & Standards Chair Vacancy civil liberties. Weeks later, under pressure from the Nazis and von Hindenburg, the Reichstag passed the Enabling The National Vocal Jazz R&S Chair is Act, granting Hitler authority to pass laws without the being vacated. Reichstag’s approval.7 Outright persecution of Jews began immediately after If you are interested in applying for the Nazis wrested control of the government, and Artur this position please send a resume quickly experienced such abuse. In March 1933, he and and short Statement of Intent (your vision for the future of several young colleagues at the Hessian State Theater had Vocal Jazz and R&S) to: received permission to mount their own production of Amy Blosser, Monteverdi’s L’incoronazione di Poppea in the Kleine Haus, National R&S Chair the smaller of the facility’s theaters.8 During rehearsals
10 CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 THE EVOLUTION OF JEAN BERGER
appropriate language of which “Jew swine” was the least off ensive, threw me out of the Hessische Landestheater. I was unconscious for a while, then picked myself up, apparently without any really serious injuries.9
A few days later, Besseler called Artur to a late-night meeting to tell him that, under the new political circum- stances, he would not support Artur’s dissertation for publication. Besseler had joined the Nazis. The two men never spoke again.10 These personal events and the broader horrors of the war that followed turned Artur’s “fl aming passion” for all things German into a “fl aming hatred.”11 He resolved to leave Germany immediately, and by early April 1933 Jean Berger had said farewell to his family in Mannheim and fl ed to Paris. Artur made a meager living there performing as a programs.”16 In November 1938, Berger’s parents were pianist and accompanist. While accompanying a vocalist among the victims of Kristallnacht, the now infamous se- in Bois-Colombes in 1934, the emcee for the performance ries of violent attacks on Jewish citizens, businesses, and refused to announce Artur’s name. There were veterans synagogues. During the attacks, the Schlossbergs took of World War I in the audience, tensions with Germany refuge with their former maid and her husband on the were rising, and “Artur Schlossberg” sounded much too uppermost fl oor of their apartment building. The next German. After some quick thinking, Artur took the stage day they fl ed Germany for Palestine, where their daughter as Jean Berger and shortly thereafter adopted this stage Claire had already relocated after spending three years in name permanently.12 Paris with Berger.17 In 1939, as Nazi forces continued to Berger gradually settled into his new life in Paris. By advance toward France, Berger decided to leave Europe the mid-1930s he had become known as an accompanist altogether. He secured a one-year (non-citizen) passport and had broadened his work to include reviewing books and visa and on May 19 departed for Rio de Janeiro, and concerts, as well as some editing, arranging, and com- Brazil.18 posing. Berger’s fi rst published composition dates from this period—a “strict, ‘classical’ twelve-tone song” à la Schoenberg on a Charles Baudelaire text, De Profundis Cla- Berger in the Americas mavi13—as does his burgeoning interest in choral music. In 1935, Berger started a small chamber choir of factory Though Berger remained in Rio for just over a year, workers for whom he arranged a number of French folk Brazilian music and culture had a lasting impact on him. songs. Shortly thereafter, he entered and won a choral He later described how a fellow pianist helped him learn composition contest in Zurich with Le Sang des Autres, a the “particular rhythm that to them [Brazilians] is as setting of an anti-war poem by the poet René Arcos.14 natural as breathing.”19 Berger’s fi rst position in Rio was a The decision to set such a “powerfully antimilitaristic” fi ve-month engagement as a vocal coach and accompanist text suggests that events in Germany were not far from with the Opéra-Comique at the Teatro Municipal. That the composer’s thoughts.15 Berger’s other activities at the position led to similar engagements and connections with time bear this out. In 1936, Berger took part in a political important Brazilian fi gures such as composer Heitor Villa- protest ignited by German forces entering the Rhineland, Lobos, conductor-composer Oscar Lorenzo Fernández, and also cofounded a workers’ theatre (for which he and socialite Helena Figner. Figner wanted to become served as composer) that presented “overtly anti-German a professional singer and hired Berger as her personal
CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 11 FLEEING WAR, COMPOSING PEACE
accompanist. In November 1940, following a year of dif- troupe embarked on an overseas tour, playing engage- fi culties with his passport and visa, Berger left Brazil with ments in military hospitals for wounded soldiers. It was Figner on a performance tour to New York City.20 during one such engagement in Oxford 1945 that Berger By March 1941, Berger had resolved to take up per- wrote the choral work In a Time of Pestilence.29 manent residence in the United States. He spoke little English but had some relatives living in New York, and the “professional opportunity and a more familiar style of In a Time of Pestilence and Vision of Peace life” appealed to him.21 Just as in Brazil, Berger landed quickly on his feet, professionally speaking. Within months In a Time of Pestilence is a setting of the poem “Litany he was acquainted with several signifi cant musicians, in- in a Time of Plague” by sixteenth-century English poet cluding singers Alice Tully and Garfi eld Swift, and John Thomas Nashe (1567-c.1601). Nashe was a satirist and Finley Williamson, founder of the Westminster Choir playwright; the poem was contained within the play A and Westminster Choir College.22 Williamson and the Pleasant Comedy Called Summer’s Last Will and Testament, per- Westminster Choir were about to embark on a tour to formed for the Archbishop of Canterbury in 1592 and South America; Williamson wanted to meet with Berger published in 1600.30 The poem is a commentary on the to discuss “suitable repertoire and the like” for the trip.23 inevitability of death. The plague referred to in the title In anticipation of the meeting, Berger wrote a choral and second stanza of the poem is not a specifi c malady but piece to present to Williamson. He found Jorge de Lima’s rather a common experience of life in sixteenth-century “Salmo” in the New York Public Library and in a single England: plagues, like death itself, were dangerous and day crafted the Brazilian Psalm on Lima’s text. Williamson unstoppable enemies immune to race, class, or socio- loved the piece and asked his contacts at G. Schirmer economic status. to publish it immediately.24 This was not the last time Berger’s setting of the poem is faithful to its content Berger’s experiences in Brazil furthered his compositional while taking substantial liberties with its structure (Figure career. He would spend two years working for CBS and 1). He eliminates the third and fourth stanzas altogether NBC, arranging Brazilian music for radio broadcasts.25 and separates the fi rst two verses of the initial stanza from Yet even this third relocation to the United States the rest, eff ectively creating a new fi rst stanza. He fi lls out could not free Berger from the shadow of Germany and this new stanza with a series of chromatic sighs on the the escalating war. On December 7, 1941, the Japanese syllable “Ah” and repetitions of “Adieu, farewell.” Berger attacked Pearl Harbor and America entered the confl ict. uses this sixteen-measure stanza as both an introduction Since Berger was a German immigrant (having never and a refrain, reusing portions of it on three occasions and established citizenship in either Brazil or France), accord- bringing it back once almost in its entirety (mm. 164-174). ing to US law he was now an enemy alien and subject to The opening sighing fi gure in the soprano solo (Figure 2) deportation. Berger quickly obtained resident status and also serves as a melodic motive, coming back in diff erent was drafted by the US Army less than a year later. He was guises with various texts. assigned to an army band based at Fort Dix, New Jersey, What is most unusual about the refrain Berger con- to help the director develop a “Latin American sound.”26 structs is that the poem already has a refrain that con- Four months later, Berger was honorably discharged to cludes each stanza: “I am sick, I must die / Lord, have work for the Offi ce of War Information, who needed mercy on us!” But Berger undermines that refrain, setting his fl uency with languages, particularly Portuguese.27 In it diff erently almost every time the text occurs. The eff ect August 1943, he offi cially became a US citizen and ap- of these decisions shifts the textual emphasis away from plied for transfer to the performance division of the USO sickness, death, and a plea for mercy toward a focus on (United Service Organizations). Berger was assigned to a death alone. Perhaps that is why Berger changed the title troupe with fi ve other performers, including Rita Holzer, of the piece from “Plague” to “Pestilence.” While plague whom he would later marry.28 In autumn 1944, the small is directly associated with illness, pestilence can be more
12 CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 THE EVOLUTION OF JEAN BERGER
Litany in a Time of Plague, Thomas Nashe In a Time of Pestilence, adapted by Jean Berger
Adieu, farewell earth's bliss, Ah, Adieu, adieu, Ah, Adieu, farewell, Ah…. This world uncertain is: Adieu, farewell earth's bliss, Fond are life's lustful joys, This world uncertain is: Death proves them all but toys. Ah, adieu, farewell, farewell, earth’s bliss, None from his darts can fl y: Ah, Adieu, adieu, Ah, Adieu, farewell, Ah…. I am sick, I must die. Fond are life's lustful joys, Lord have mercy on us! Death proves them all but toys. Rich men, trust not in wealth, None from his darts can fl y: Gold cannot buy you health; I am sick, I must die. Physic himself must fade, Lord have mercy on us! All things to end are made; Ah, Adieu, adieu, Ah, Adieu, farewell, Ah…. The plague full swift goes by: Rich men, trust not in wealth, I am sick, I must die. Gold cannot buy your health; Lord have mercy on us! Physique himself must fade, [ Beauty is but a fl ower, All things to end are made; Which wrinkles will devour; The plague full swift goes by: Brightness falls from the air, I am sick, I must die. Queens have died young and fair, Lord have mercy on us! Dust hath closèd Helen’s eye: Ah, Adieu, adieu, Ah, Adieu, farewell, Ah… I am sick, I must die. Wit with his wantonness Lord have mercy on us! ] Tasteth death's bitterness; [ Strength stoops unto the grave, Hell's executioner Worms feed on Hector brave, Hath no ears for to hear Swords may not fi ght with fate, What vain art can reply. Earth still holds ope her gate. I am sick, I must die. Come, come, the bells do cry, Lord, have mercy on us! I am sick, I must die. Lord have mercy on us! ] Haste therefore each degree To welcome destiny; Wit with his wantonness Heaven is our heritage Tasteth death's bitterness; Earth but a player's stage, Hell's executioner Haste, Haste, Haste, Haste, Haste, Hath no ears for to hear Mount we unto the sky: What vain art can reply. I am sick, I must die. I am sick, I must die. Lord have mercy on us! Lord, have mercy on us! Ah, Adieu, adieu, Ah, Adieu, farewell, Ah…. Haste therefore each degree Adieu, farewell earth's bliss, To welcome destiny; This world uncertain is: Heaven is our heritage Ah, adieu, farewell, farewell, earth’s bliss. Earth but a player's stage, Mount we unto the sky: Fond are life's lustful joys, I am sick, I must die. Death proves them all but toys. Lord have mercy on us! None from his darts can fl y: I am sick, I must die. [ ] = omissions by Berger Ah, Ah, Ah, etc. Lord, Lord, Lord, etc. Italics = additions by Berger Lord, have mercy on us, etc. Underline = alterations by Berger
Figure 1. Text Comparison: In a Time of Plague/Pestilence. FLEEING WAR, COMPOSING PEACE
broadly defi ned as anything devastating or malicious. not including returns to previous tempi), meter signatures, Pestilence is also frequently associated with the blight of key areas, and textures (antiphonal sections, solo lines, and war on human and natural life. homophonic versus imitative passages). The harmonic These confl icting refrains—one that is musically con- shifts between parallel fourths, parallel fi fths, and heavy structed and one that is textually present but musically ig- chromaticism create a bold aural contrast. The aggregate nored—contribute to the feeling that In a Time of Pestilence of all these diverse characteristics is an overwhelming has an elusive structure and no discernible form. Further- sense of musical chaos—like the chaos that pestilence and ing the sense of ambiguity, Berger employs a variety of war leave in their wake. The only stability is death and the tempi (there are at least nine diff erent tempo markings, mournful refrain of sighs and adieus that accompany it.
14 CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 THE EVOLUTION OF JEAN BERGER
Considering the text of In a Time of Pestilence, the jarring is explicit. In 1948, three years after his USO tour to war- and violent way in which Berger sets it, and the circum- torn England, Berger was commissioned by conductor T. stances of the composition, it seems likely that this work B. Lawrence and the Fleet Street Choir of London to write refl ects Berger’s own feelings about World War II and the a piece for the choir’s use. Lawrence had discovered Berg- devastation he witnessed. er’s Brazilian Psalm two years prior and had programmed it If the anti-war sentiment of In a Time of Pestilence is with the ensemble.31 For this new work, Berger’s fi rst choral merely implied, in Berger’s later work, Vision of Peace, it commission, he turned to the biblical book of Isaiah for
Berger and Religion
Artur Schlossberg’s childhood had been “steeped in Or- Europe—particularly the relationship between Christian- thodox Judaism.”1 As an adolescent he participated in the ity, literature, music, and architecture—had a signifi cant Youth Congregation, a Jewish alternative to the German impact on him.7 In later years he articulated his attraction Jugendbewegung, founded by liberal rabbi Max Gruenewald to Christianity as a composer, describing the “insatiable in 1925.2 Yet a “gradual but unstoppable detachment” urge for an ever renewed musical substance” that is intrin- from the religion of his birth had already begun: sic to the Christian liturgical framework.8 This “insatiable urge” resulted in many sacred compositions from Berger’s I even remember the fi rst stirrings of doubt when, hand, beginning with the motets requested by Augsburg during the…Yom Kippur service the first stab of Publishing House in 1959 (Berger did not consider Brazilian disbelief struck. I was twelve or thirteen years old yet Psalm or, presumably, his other early works to be sacred in I recall vividly at perhaps the twelfth repetition of the nature despite their texts).9 Myriad commissions followed, words “ss’lakh lanu” [sic] (“forgive us our sin of…”), from both church-affi liated publishers and individual con- the inner little voice which kept asking: “To whom are gregations. you talking…?” From that day on it was a long, painful, Berger deeply appreciated the openness and welcome he 3 gradual process of detachment from my religious roots. experienced in American churches, and even felt a personal connection to many New Testament passages (including the By the time he arrived in the United States in 1940, parables and the Magnifi cat).10 However, he never consid- Berger had “severed himself from all Jewish traditions,” ered himself Christian and would not set some traditional with the exception of fasting on Yom Kippur, which he gave liturgical texts: “I would not set to music words which are 4 up in the 1950s. Nevertheless, he retained a strong cultural totally alien to my formation, texts for example such as attachment to Judaism throughout his life: ‘Gloria Patri et Filio et Spiritui Sancto’: neither the Son of God nor the Holy Spirit belong to my world.”11 While I no longer consider myself a Jew—in the truest sense of the word—I am aware of the monumental 1 Berger, Memories, Musings, and Meanderings, 67, 12 December 1991. heritage that Judaism represents. I know Hebrew 2 Geidl, “A Biographical Chronology,” 3-4. well enough to spend many hours reading the Old 3 Berger, Memories, Musings, and Meanderings, 68, 12 December 1991. Testament in the original [language]. Even though the 4 Ibid., 49, 24 November 1991. words of the Hebrew tradition no longer correspond 5 to a religious stirring in me, I sense them in my soul…5 Ibid., 73-74, 15 December 1991. 6 Ibid., 118, 25 February 1992. I do admire the genius of the Jewish tradition which has 7 Ibid., 68, 12 December 1991. erected this edifi ce of a faith which, from its beginnings, 8 Ibid., 69, 12 December 1991. was unique among mankind.6 9 Ibid., 120, 4 March 1992. 10 Ibid., 74, 15 December 1991. Berger’s relationship to Christianity was similarly com- 11 Ibid. plex. From a young age, the cultural history of Western
CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 15 FLEEING WAR, COMPOSING PEACE
inspiration. Rather than using a single passage, Berger feature mixed meter, numerous tempo changes, and per- pulled together a number of verses spanning the entire sistent parallel fourths. Just as in the earlier work, Berger book, freely combining and altering them in fi ve musical begins Vision of Peace with a series of haunting sighs on movements that off er a poignant and personal commen- the syllable “Ah,” gradually giving way to the fi rst line of tary on war and peace (Figure 3). text (Figure 4). From this opening motive, the melodic Structurally, the fi rst movement of Vision of Peace bears material for the remainder of the movement develops. a marked resemblance to In a Time of Pestilence. Both pieces The sigh fi gure returns three times in abbreviated form
I. IV. Ah…. Let all the nations be gathered together My dwelling is removed and let the peoples be assembled! and is carried away from me as a shepherd’s tent. Come near, ye nations, to hear; My country is desolate, assemble yourselves and come, my cities are burned with fi re. and hearken, ye peoples! The highways lie waste, no one passeth by the road. Cry aloud, lift up your voice like a trumpet. The grass is withered away, there is no green thing. Give ear, all ye lands afar off , The land mourneth and languisheth. let the earth hear, and Peace, peace to him that is far off ! (Isaiah 37:12, 1:7, 33:8, 15:6, 33:9) Peace, peace to him that is near!
II. (Isaiah 43:9, 34:1, 45:20, 58:1, 8:9, 34:1, 57:19) Woe to them that destroy and they were not destroyed. V. Woe to them that despise Violence shall no more be heard in the land, and they were not despised. wasting nor destruction within the borders; Their thoughts are thoughts of iniquity, The land that was desolation desolation and destruction are in their paths! and the dry land shall be glad; The way of peace they know not, the desert shall rejoice and blossom as a rose. and there is no justice in their doings. A man shall be more precious than gold When they have ceased to despise, And my people shall abide in the beauty of peace. they shall be despised. They shall not build and another inhabit, The fi re shall burn them, they shall not plant and another eat. and their fi re shall not be quenched. They shall not labor in vain. When they have made an end of destroying, They shall build houses and inhabit them. they shall be destroyed! There shall be peace. Woe to them! Nation shall not lift up sword against nation! And the ransomed shall return, (Isaiah 3:9, 33:1, 59:7-8, 33:1, 47:14, 33:1, 3:9) and everlasting joy shall be upon their heads. They shall obtain gladness and joy, III. and sorrow and sighing shall fl ee away. Ah…. My dwelling is removed. (Isaiah 60:18, 35:1, 13:12, 32:18, 65:21-22, 2:4, 35:10) Ah….
(Isaiah 37:12) Figure 3. Text of Vision of Peace. © 1949 Broude Brothers Ltd., New York, New York. Reproduced with permission and by arrangement with the publisher.
16 CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 THE EVOLUTION OF JEAN BERGER
and a fourth time in its entirety (mm. 45-56). The musi- marking (m. 70) that closes the movement. cal aff ect is haunting and unstable, perfectly depicting The second movement’s series of “woes” pronounces a the bleakness of the text, which describes a war-ravaged harsh judgment on all those who wage war. Here Berger’s landscape from the viewpoint of an exile or refugee. The harmonic language is chromatic and angular, emphasiz- fi nal return of the sigh motive gradually fades and slows ing the righteous anger of the text from the very fi rst into three measures of octave B-naturals in the soprano notes: open fi fths on G and D, marked fortissimo with an and alto voices before gently dissolving into a morendo accent, and set high in the tessitura for all voices (Figure 5).
CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 17 FLEEING WAR, COMPOSING PEACE
Each recurrence of the word “woe” is identically scored begins fortissimo followed by a long crescendo with the and similarly marked. Likewise, dynamic markings in the indication tutta forza (“full force”). second movement are consistently loud, ranging from The second movement leads directly into the third mezzo-forte to fortissimo. The tempo is fast (quarter note = movement via an attacca subito marking (Figure 6). The 152) and steady, without the numerous fl uctuations that third movement is a brief, seventeen-measure recapitula- mark the other movements. The only exception comes in tion of the fi rst movement (see Figure 4), incorporating the movement’s fi nal measures. In measure 160, having only the chromatic sighing fi gures and a single recurrence sequentially repeated the text “Woe to them” three times, of the text, “My dwelling is removed.” The quiet, haunt- Berger alters the fourth and fi nal restatement (Figure 6). ing emptiness of this music is even more pronounced in He marks the tempo Molto largo, accents every word, and contrast to the second movement’s force and energy. The revoices the chord on “woe,” making it a G6 chord with third movement ends identically to the fi rst, except for an additional high B in the soprano. The dynamic here an F-sharp added to the octave B-naturals as the morendo
18 CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 THE EVOLUTION OF JEAN BERGER
begins. tional and a musical structure: The refugee’s lament over These fi rst three movements of Vision of Peace are the devastation of war leads to righteous anger and con- almost a complete composition unto themselves. The demnation of the war-makers until collapsing, exhausted, rounded binary form (A-B-A’) Berger employs is an emo- into lament once again. Given this narrative, the commis-
CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 19 FLEEING WAR, COMPOSING PEACE
sioning party for Vision of Peace, and the British audience desolate,” “my cities burned with fi re” as opposed to the who would have heard the premiere, it seems logical to biblical “your country,” “your cities.” The story that Vision posit that Berger drew upon his own feelings and war- of Peace relates is simultaneously personal and universal. time experiences for inspiration—just as with In a Time The horrors of war aff ect all people alike. of Pestilence. While in London on his USO tour, Berger If the fi rst three movements of Vision of Peace are a witnessed a modern version of Isaiah’s “cities burned with musical and narrative unit lamenting the horrors of war, fi re” and the desolation caused by the German Blitz of the fi nal two movements comprise a single unit rejoicing 1940 and 1941. That his native country was responsible in the prospect of peace. Both movements are strikingly for this devastation was certainly not lost on him. It is no diff erent from their predecessors. The fourth movement is coincidence, then, that Berger changed the pronouns in almost entirely homophonic, beginning and ending with Vision of Peace from second to fi rst person—“my country is a trumpet-like fanfare and declamatory speech rhythm
20 CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 THE EVOLUTION OF JEAN BERGER
that calls all nations and peoples to gather and hear its meditation on what a world at peace might look like: “And message of peace (Figure 7).32 That message begins with the ransomed shall return / And everlasting joy shall be two loud statements of the word “peace,” fading into a upon their heads / They shall obtain gladness and joy treble quartet that sustains the word at a pianissimo dy- / And sorrow and sighing shall fl ee away.” These four namic (mm. 207-210). The gentler statements win out, lines, repeated several times, are set in one tremendous and the full choir proceeds softly with the remainder of crescendo-decrescendo that simultaneously grows and the text, “Peace to him that is far off and peace to him diminishes in its texture (Figure 9). The last thirty mea- that is near” (Figure 8). sures of Vision of Peace serve as the fulcrum of the work’s The fanfare returns to close the fourth movement, message, a message central both to Isaiah’s vision and leading directly into the ethereal fi fth movement. Here Berger’s: that a land destroyed by war and violence would an alto soloist joins the choir in a sinuous and enchanting know peace, and that those dwelling in exile would fi nd
CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 21 FLEEING WAR, COMPOSING PEACE
stability and a home. panying, and continually looking for work to make ends meet. But in 1948 all that began to change. After meeting the chair of the music department at Middlebury College Becoming a “Choral Man” in Vermont, Berger accepted a position teaching musicol- ogy and piano. Five years later, the college would add cha- Berger had found his own home, if not yet his own pel organist and choir director to his teaching load, giving stability, in the United States. He returned from his USO him the opportunity to compose for his own ensemble.33 tour in 1946 and for two years resumed his life as it had As previously mentioned, Berger received the commis- been prior to the war—performing, composing, accom- sion for Vision of Peace in 1948, but it was his Brazilian Psalm
22 CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 THE EVOLUTION OF JEAN BERGER
that had a bigger impact that year. Although John Finley enthusiastic, and almost overnight the name Berger Williamson had convinced G. Schirmer to publish Brazil- appeared on programs throughout the country. ian Psalm in 1941, the Westminster Choir never performed Greatly encouraged by Christiansen’s support as well it: Their tour to South America had been cancelled due as by the interest shown by other conductors and a to the escalating war, and the score was shelved.34 For wide audience, Berger began to turn his attention more seriously and eventually almost exclusively to seven years it remained unperformed in the United States choral music.38 and sold few copies until its discovery by Olaf Christian- sen, the conductor of the St. Olaf Choir.35 Christiansen programmed the piece in 1948 and later “separated the While this description may sound hyperbolic, it is not. second half, largely based on the word ‘Alleluia’ from the Berger himself claims that commission requests began body of the score and added it to the choir’s programs.”36 to pour in, and he became “‘a choral man’ overnight.”39 Performed in this fashion, Brazilian Psalm became a staple Relationships with publishers other than G. Schirmer of the St. Olaf Choir’s repertoire for several years.37 developed during the 1950s. The Boston-based R. D. Row Christiansen included it on the choir’s 1950 touring pro- Music Company picked up In a Time of Pestilence in 1953. gram, and the piece was enormously successful: In 1959, Augsburg Publishing House (publisher of the St. Olaf Choral Series) contacted Berger and asked him to The response to the Psalm was immediate and write new sacred works for their catalog. Berger agreed,
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CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 23 FLEEING WAR, COMPOSING PEACE and at his request the music editor at Augsburg sent two the modal harmonies of sacred polyphonic music (both prospective texts, both from the Old Testament.40 This Christian and Jewish); and Berger’s studies as a musicolo- correspondence was the beginning of a long and fruitful gist.47 To that list should also be added the tonality and relationship that would result in numerous best-selling style characteristics of the Les Six composers—especially motets, including The Eyes of All Wait Upon Thee, A Rose Arthur Honegger—and American popular music of the Touched by the Sun’s Warm Rays, and I to the Hills Lift Up My 1930s and 1940s. Berger frequently wrote about the trans- Eyes.41 Although Berger founded his own publishing house formation he experienced after hearing Duke Ellington’s in 1964, John Sheppard Press, he continued to publish band in Paris, and later, Gershwin’s “Summertime” from choral works with Augsburg and other publishers.42 Porgy and Bess.48 Elements of all of these infl uences can Throughout the 1960s, Berger’s involvement with be variously observed in Berger’s works. Gerald Lynn choral music continued to grow. Late in 1959, he ac- Moore, in a doctoral dissertation analyzing Berger’s cepted a two-year position at the University of Illinois at choral oeuvre, called him a “conservative contemporary” Urbana-Champaign; although the position was on the or neo-classical composer, since Berger’s overall use of musicology faculty, by 1960 he was also placed in charge harmony, melody, rhythm and counterpoint have their of the university’s DMA program in choral studies.43 roots in the common practice period.49 Thanks to Warner Imig, Berger assumed a nearly identi- But of equal importance to Berger’s musical syntax cal position—overseeing the choral DMA and teaching was his exposure to and involvement with amateur cho- musicology—at the University of Colorado Boulder in ruses in the United States. His long correspondence with 1961.44 In addition to his ever-increasing compositional music critic Henry Pleasants depicts a growing fascination work, Berger began to guest conduct his pieces and to with the vitality of amateur music-making, coinciding write and speak about choral music.45 These activities, with a marked distaste for the German distinction be- as well as the management of John Sheppard Press, tween “serious music” (ernste Musik) and “entertainment would occupy Berger full time after his resignation from music” (Unterhaltungsmusik). Consider Berger’s description UC-Boulder in 1969. With other composers like Randall of conducting an Ohio honor choir in 1970: Thompson and Cecil Effi nger, Berger became part of the fi rst generation of American choral composers to achieve Instead of performing Sing Ye, the fi rst motet of an almost cultish popularity. He continued to compose, Bach, for double choir, in concert, I suggested that conduct, and ruminate on the importance of the choral we make a “workshop” experience of it and so art until his death in 2002. we did. The honors choir, some 80 kids…formed Chorus I, the “adults,” i.e. choral directors from all over Ohio, some 110, formed Chorus II.…I made some musikwissenschaftliche [musicological] Defi ning a Musical Language and a Life remarks to the gang…and then we sang. No stopping, no interruption, from A to Z, with, yes, It is diffi cult to defi ne Berger’s musical syntax, largely some wrong notes and yes, a pretty rough manner because of his numerous musical infl uences and his of interpretation but all this was unimportant. eclectic approach to composition. Early in his life Berger When we were done, there was a moment’s silence, had experimented with serialism but quickly abandoned and then the 190 or so stood up in their pews, and it, convinced that it was not “the road to [compositional] clapped their hands off . Applauded whom? What? salvation” and that tonality was still very much alive.46 What I had been doing was no more than wave my W. Douglas Pritchard, a doctoral student of Berger’s at arms around. Applauded themselves? And came by, UC-Boulder and a former faculty member at the Uni- tears in eyes, young and old, gee that was great. No versity of Arizona and Iowa State University, described concert, but music. four primary musical infl uences, presumably delineated …You know, as I do, that no such thing could happen by Berger himself: folk songs from the Alsace-Lorraine in Germany, France, Italy, possibly not in Britain. It provinces; South American melodic and rhythmic devices;
24 CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 THE EVOLUTION OF JEAN BERGER
can and does here. It involved people to the very core culture of his adopted homeland. It is a historical irony of their soul.50 that this musical evolution resulted from Berger’s frantic fl ight from Germany in 1933, a chapter of his biography This anecdote hints at another of Berger’s musical that few people now remember. But Berger himself may opinions: That the formal “concert experience” born have appreciated such forgetfulness—or, at least, appre- in nineteenth-century Europe had devolved into a ciated that his Jewish heritage and refugee status did not pseudo-religious rite, full of ritual action but devoid of matter much to people in the United States. As he wrote spiritual or emotional meaning. Where, then, could such in his autobiography: meaning be found? Only at that point where a society’s cultural climate enabled the creation of a vital musical I have no illusions about America. We are not angels aesthetic connected to the cultural forces at work in that in this country…. But in the U.S., to be diff erent or society. Berger called this the “living idiom” of music, to disagree does not necessarily engender hostility. and he found it not in academia or the symphony hall This is what sets America apart from the Western world in general and is not merely something that but rather in the fusion of popular and classical styles sounds eff ective in a politician’s speech: minor little that existed in the amateur choral singing of the United incidents not withstanding, I have felt accepted from States. The modern composer, from Berger’s perspective, the beginning, not only with my music, but I, the was not called to be a “god” whose music was realized by person.53 performers for the edifi cation of a passive audience but rather to be a collaborator with performers and listeners in an interpersonal musical venture.51 Note: This article is adapted from the author’s DMA Jean Berger believed that a composer should be a man document: Zebulon M. Highben, “World War II and Its of his time, and that statement certainly applies to his Impact on Sacred Choral Music: The Lives and Works own career.52 His adult life brought him into contact with of Hugo Distler, Jean Berger, and Heinz Werner Zim- many of the prominent people and movements within the mermann” (DMA document, Michigan State University, twentieth-century musical landscape, shaping him into a 2012), 27-48. composer who was cosmopolitan yet deeply rooted in the
Choral Works of Jean Berger Discussed in This Article
Title Date of Composition (Publication) Voicing Publisher
Le Sang des Autres 1936 (1937) SATB Editions Henn (Geneva, POP) Brazilian Psalm 1941 (1941) SATB divisi G. Schirmer In a Time of Pestilence 1945 (1953) SATB divisi R. D. Row (POP) Vision of Peace 1948 (1949) SATB divisi Broude Brothers The Eyes of All Wait Upon Thee (1959) SATB Augsburg A Rose Touched by the Sun’s Warm Rays (1962) SATB Augsburg I to the Hills Lift Up Mine Eyes (1978) SATB Augsburg
For a complete list of Berger’s works, see the American Music Research Center’s online guide to the Jean Berger Collection (compositions are listed on pages 5 through 22): http://www.colorado.edu/amrc/collections/berger-jean
CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 25 FLEEING WAR, COMPOSING PEACE
NOTES Music Research Center Journal 10 (2000): 11. See also Geidl, “A Biographical Chronology,” 6-7. 1 Very little biographical information about Jean Berger has been 14 The contest was sponsored by the Häusermannsche Gesang- published. He has no entry in the New Grove Dictionary of Music Verlein. Berger wrote “…the jury had unanimously rejected and Musicians and only a brief mention in the Oxford Dictionary my score but…an ex-offi cio member of the jury named Arthur of Music. The notable exception is Linda L. Geidl, “Jean Berger Honegger had insisted that it be given a fi rst prize.” Berger (1909-2002): A Biographical Chronology,” American Music also mentions that some months later, he met Honegger at a Research Center Journal 18 (2010): 1-37. Geidl, a former student concert of Maurice Ravel’s music, where Honegger encouraged of Berger’s, draws upon his two unpublished autobiographies, him to continue composing. See Berger, Memories, Musings, and numerous correspondences, and various other sources to create Meanderings, 21, 7 November 1991; and Geidl, “A Biographical a reliable timeline of Berger’s life. The fi rst and third sections of Chronology,” 7-8. this article draw largely upon her fi ne work. 15 Berger, Memories, Musings, and Meanderings, 20, 7 November 1991. 2 Geidl identifi es Arno Landmann as principal organist at the 16 Geidl, “A Biographical Chronology,” 7. Christuskirche. According to the church’s website, Landmann 17 Berger, Memories, Musings, and Meanderings, 38, 22 November 1991. was cantor (i.e. director of music, including organ and Claire Schlossberg arrived in Paris shortly after Berger himself conducting duties) there from 1911 to 1943. See http://www. and left there in 1936. christuskirche.org/geschichte. 18 This decision was fortuitously timed, since Paris was taken by the 3 Geidl, “A Biographical Chronology,” 3-4. Germans just over a year later. In 1944, Berger paid a visit to his 4 Ibid., 4. former Parisian home, where he was told by the concierge there 5 Ibid., 5. that the Gestapo “had come for me at 2 AM within 48 hours of 6 Ibid. the occupation of Paris in [ June] 1940.” Memories, Musings, and 7 The major events in the Nazis’ rise to power, the persecution of the Meanderings, 20, 7 November 1991. Jews, and World War II are well documented in an interactive 19 Geidl, “A Biographical Chronology,” 9. The quote appears to be timeline on the website of the US Holocaust Memorial Berger’s, but an exact citation is not provided. Museum. See http://www.ushmm.org/learn/timeline-of- 20 Ibid., 8-11. events. 21 Ibid., 10. 8 Jean Berger, “Composer Meets Critic, Part Two: Selected Excerpts 22 Ibid. of the Jean Berger/Henry Pleasants Correspondence 1971- 23 Berger, Memories, Musings, and Meanderings, 51, 24 November 1991. 1981,” American Music Research Center Journal 18 (2010): 58. See 24 Berger, Memories, Musings, and Meanderings, 51, 24 November 1991. also Geidl, “A Biographical Chronology,” 5-6. See also Carol A. Hess, “Jean Berger: A ‘Good Neighbor’ in the 9 Jean Berger, Memories, Musings, and Meanderings, unpublished United States,” American Music Research Center Journal 18 (2010): memoir (1991-1993): 8, 28 October 1991. Memories, Musings, 48; and Geidl, “A Biographical Chronology,” 10. and Meanderings is a typescript found in the American Music 25 Hess, “A ‘Good Neighbor,’” 43-44. Research Center’s Jean Berger Collection. The pages of 26 Geidl, “A Biographical Chronology,” 11. Memories, Musings, and Meanderings are not reliably numbered, 27 Ibid. though each entry is dated. Dates will be cited in addition to 28 Ibid. page references. I am indebted to Eric Harbeson of the AMRC 29 Ibid., 12. for making this memoir available to me. 30 Stephen Greenblatt, ed., The Norton Anthology of English Literature, 10 Artur’s dissertation was fi nally published in 1935 after his father Eighth edition, Volume 1 (New York: W. W. Norton and Company, paid for its publication, and his PhD was mailed to him. See 2006): 1232-33. Geidl, “A Biographical Chronology,” 6. 31 Geidl, “A Biographical Chronology,” 12. In Memories, Musings, and 11 Geidl, “A Biographical Chronology,” 6. Berger wrote, “The border Meanderings, 21, 7 November 1991, Berger says that the Fleet was crossed at Saarbruecken. Once out of Germany, I spat out Street Choir also performed his Le Sang des Autres in an English of the window. Goodbye to the Vaterland.” Memories, Musings, translation, Other Men’s Blood. and Meanderings, 8, 28 October 1991. 32 W. Douglas Pritchard compares the declamatory speech style of 12 Geidl, “A Biographical Chronology,” 6-7. this movement to Monteverdi’s Sfogava Fon Le Stelle and claims 13 Jean Berger, “Composer Meets Critic: Selected Excerpts of the that Berger admitted the infl uence of Monteverdi in his Jean Berger/Henry Pleasants Correspondence,” American compositions. See W. Douglas Pritchard, “The Choral Style of
26 CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 THE EVOLUTION OF JEAN BERGER
Jean Berger,” American Choral Review 8, no. 1 (1965): 4-5. Jean Berger. 33 Geidl, “A Biographical Chronology,” 13-15. 43 Geidl, “A Biographical Chronology,” 16. Geidl points out that one 34 Hess, “A ‘Good Neighbor,’” 48. Berger wrote, “As it turned out, the of Berger’s DMA students at Urbana-Champaign was Kenneth ‘Brazilian Psalm’ was more than even the Westminster Choir of Jennings, who would succeed Olaf Christiansen as conductor 1941 could handle. After a number of rehearsals, it was shelved, of the St. Olaf Choir. I stood in a corner, covered my head in shame and promised to 44 Ibid. do better next time.” Memories, Musings, and Meanderings, 51, 24 45 See Geidl, “A Biographical Chronology,” 18-32, and both November 1991. “Composer Meets Critic” compilations, which frequently 35 Pritchard, “The Choral Style of Jean Berger,” 4. Numerous other describe Berger’s various choral activities. sources, including Memories, Musings, and Meanderings, cite the St. 46 Berger, “Composer Meets Critic,” 11. Olaf Choir’s 1948 performance as the fi rst US performance 47 See Pritchard, “The Choral Style of Jean Berger,” 4. Presumably of Brazilian Psalm. The earlier performance by the Fleet Street this last item refers to the medieval music he studied under Choir was probably the fi rst European performance of the Heinrich Bessler, who was an expert in that area, and/or the work; how and when the piece traveled overseas is not entirely Baroque-era music he explored on his own. clear. 48 See Berger, “Composer Meets Critic,” 11; Geidl, “A Biographical 36 Berger, Memories, Musings, and Meanderings, 51, 24 November 1991. Chronology,” 6, 10; Pritchard, “The Choral Style of Jean 37 Similarly, there is a tradition amongst Lutheran college choirs of Berger,” 4. performing only the last two movements of Vision of Peace in 49 Gerald Lynn Moore, “A Musical Analysis of Selected Choral concert. It is likely this tradition began with Olaf Christiansen. Compositions of Jean Berger,” (Ed.D. dissertation: University 38 Pritchard, “The Choral Style of Jean Berger,” 4. of Oklahoma, 1970), 233ff . 39 Berger, Memories, Musings, and Meanderings, 51, 24 November 1991. 50 Berger, “Composer Meets Critic,” 20. 40 Berger, Memories, Musings, and Meanderings, 120, 4 March 1992. 51 This ideological position can be glimpsed throughout the Berger/ 41 According to Berger, The Eyes of All Wait Upon Thee became so Pleasants correspondence, and in Pritchard’s article. For the successful that “in a relatively short time after its publication, most thorough and detailed exposition, however, see Jean Miss [Ruth] Olson [of Augsburg] wrote to tell me that The Berger, “The Composer of Choral Music in Our Time,” Eyes of All had outsold Augsburg’s all time best-seller, Beautiful Response in Worship, Music, and the Arts 8, no. 3 (1967): 138-145. Savior, in the setting of F. Melius Christiansen.” Berger, Memories, 52 Berger, “The Composer of Choral Music,” 145. Musings, and Meanderings, 120, 4 March 1992. 53 Berger, Memories, Musings, and Meanderings, 120, 4 March 1992. 42 “John Sheppard,” i.e. “John Shepherd,” the English translation of
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CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 27 º
JENNIFER ALARCON Years Teaching: 6 NOTES Southwest Division Director of Choirs, Blalack Middle School FOR [email protected] SUCCESS (PART 2) ELIZABETH BATEY Years Teaching: 9 ADVICE FOR THE Northwestern Division Director of Choral Activities, FIRST-YEAR Sawtooth Middle School Idaho ACDA JH/MS R&S Chair CHORAL TEACHER [email protected]
Compiled by Amanda Bumgarner, Choral Journal editor
DESIREE BONDLEY Years Teaching: 11 North Central Division Choir Director, Wachter Middle School West Region Choral Representative, North Dakota MEA [email protected]
“It is the supreme art of the teacher to awaken joy in creative expression and knowledge.”
—Albert Einstein
28 CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 º
SETH BOYD JENNIFER SENGIN Years Teaching: 9 Years Teaching: 5 North Central Division Eastern Division Elementary School Teacher, Director of Choirs, Minnetonka Public Schools East Brunswick High School [email protected] [email protected]
DAVID BURTON PHILIP SILVEY Years Teaching: 8 Years Teaching: 22 Northwestern Division Eastern Division Choral Director, Boise High School Assistant Professor of Music Education, Idaho Music Educators Eastman School of Music District III Vice President [email protected] Idaho ACDA Ethnic & Multicultural Choirs R&S Chair [email protected]
DARLA ESHELMAN JACOB TRUBY Years Teaching: 34 Years Teaching: 4 Southwestern Division North Central Division Oklahoma ACDA Vice President Vocal Music Teacher, Professor of Music Education & Beloit Memorial High School Coordinator for Vocal Music Education, [email protected] University of Central Oklahoma [email protected]
ELIZABETH MCFARLAND BRANDON WILLIAMS Years Teaching: 10 Years Teaching: 10 Southwestern Division Central Division Division R&S Chair for DMA Student in Choral Conducting, Youth & Student Activities Michigan State University Deputy Director, [email protected] The St. Louis Children’s Choirs PhD Candidate in Music Education, The University of Missouri [email protected]
CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 29 NOTES FOR SUCCESS (PART 2)
After years of school and at least one semester of stu- 7-10 and will appear in the September 2015 issue. dent teaching, choral education majors make the transi- tion from student to fulltime teacher of their own choral classroom. As the excitement and anticipation of a new QUESTION #4: school year intersect with the fear of all the unknowns for the months ahead, it can be easy to feel overwhelmed. Dealing with First-Year Surprises This three-part article is a fi rst for the Choral Journal: eleven choral teachers with decades of teaching experi- How should I approach dealing with ence between them answer ten questions on topics geared administration, other teachers, and parents? specifi cally to the concerns of a fi rst-year teacher. Each How do I navigate school policies and question has answers from at least four and no more than traditions? six respondents, and answers are listed in alphabetical order by last name. Part 1 (May 2015) addressed:
#1: Setting Expectations for the First Year Elizabeth Batey
#2: Classroom Management and Structuring First-year surprises happen the fi rst year of Rehearsals teaching and the fi rst year at a new school. Sometimes you have fi rst-year surprises in #3: Balancing a Successful Work and Home Life the second and third years as well. The reality is, you will have surprises; it is the nature of the beast we call teaching Part two will answer the following questions: choir. When approaching your administration, it is always the best policy to be honest and frank. Remember that #4: Dealing with First-Year Surprises they are your bosses, they are interested in your success, and they are your best resource when you have serious How should I approach dealing with administration, other doubts. If your administrator puts you on the spot or teachers, and parents? How do I navigate school policies surprises you in any way, it is okay for you to ask for time and traditions? to process what was discussed and ask if you can revisit the discussion the next day. Before the next meeting, write #5: Relating Choir to Other Subjects/Activities down all of the questions or concerns that you have. Do your best to work with your administrator to fi nd a resolu- How can I make sure my choir is valued and supported tion or compromise. by the school system? Sometimes working with other teachers can be chal- lenging. When there is a confl ict that comes up with #6: Assessment in the Classroom another teacher and myself, I try to imagine where they are coming from. It helps to stay positive and keep emo- How do I best establish a grading strategy? tions out of the conversations. Do your best to resolve issues face-to-face and in private so that students are not It is the editor’s hope that this article is encouraging, involved. If you feel that a compromise cannot be reached inspiring, and most importantly helpful to Choral Journal or the issue cannot be resolved, it is wise to contact your readers who are in their fi rst few years of teaching. Of administrator and fi ll them in on the situation. course, educators with a decade or more of experience Parents can be very kind or very abusive depending will likely still enjoy reading the comments of their col- on the circumstance. In my experience, the tone can be leagues and perhaps even be inspired and encouraged set in the communication I establish at the beginning of themselves. Part three will present answers to questions the year. When working with parents, communication is
30 CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 ADVICE FOR THE FIRST-YEAR CHORAL TEACHER
the key. I send home a fl yer with information on the pro- ing a healthy regard for tradition and predecessors while gram and myself as well as how to contact me by phone, delicately introducing your unique approach to the “same e-mail, and the school website. I also send home regular phrase” is critical to musical success and emotional growth e-mails to parents updating them on choral activities. for both you and your students. You will fi nd yourself At concerts, I provide a list of upcoming events, I make unpleasantly surprised if you imply “out with the old and myself available to chat with parents before and after the in with the new” through your planning, actions, and concert, and sometimes I organize after-concert dessert programming decisions. parties where I personally thank the parents for all they Another fi rst-year surprise may be the amount of your do for the program. I fi nd it important to make myself choral budget. Just as musical experience between diff er- available and approachable. ent students and schools will vary, so will the amount of Navigating school policies and traditions can be the money designated for purchasing music. In my fi rst year of most diffi cult aspect of a new teaching position. It is im- teaching, I was shocked to be handed a budget that could portant to read all documents and implement as many pay for about thirty copies of three octavos for the entire policies as you can in your classroom immediately. Ask year, for all choirs. Coming up with alternative ways to for help. I recommend asking for a building mentor you place music in my students’ hands became an immediate can go to before bothering your administrator regarding priority. Considerations can include PTO or community policies and expectations. If you fi nd you have made a donations, fundraisers, borrowing music from colleagues, mistake, acknowledge it, assure your administration you and applying for grants of various kinds. will never do it again, and move forward. Everyone makes mistakes; it is how you choose to resolve it that matters. Adopt as many of the traditions of the school as you can. Jennifer Sengin Learn the fi ght song and sing it immediately. If there is a tradition that goes against everything you believe in Your fi rst year will be challenging regardless as a music educator, talk to your administration. If they of your music teacher training. Even if you support you and your vision, it should not be an issue. If are as prepared as possible, diffi cult situations they loved the tradition, perhaps you can compromise will arise. Accept that this will happen and take every op- and turn it into something you do like. If they love the portunity to remain calm and learn from the inevitable tradition and want to keep it as is, remain positive, work mistakes you will make. In most teaching situations, you hard, and do your best to complete the task. will encounter some resistance and phrases that begin with, “Last year we…” Listen to all of these responses, avoiding responding defensively, and apply the ideas that Darla Eshelman will work for you. Take note of school traditions and try not to make many signifi cant changes in your fi rst year. I strongly believe that a general plan of ac- Instead, observe the community and the importance of tion for a new teacher is to enter the class- the traditions to current and former students. If changes room/rehearsal with respect for who was need to be made, begin in the following year. For example, there before you and regard for all existing components if choirs sing “Hallelujah Chorus” every year, keep it for of the school itself. If there is a long-standing tradition at least one year and consider all possible outcomes before of choral excellence at a school or if your predecessor making any decisions. It is also important to be prepared was particularly held in high regard, students will likely for anything. For example, my choir is often called upon be musically and emotionally attached to their former to sing “The Star-Spangled Banner” at various school director. This is a precious and loyal relationship and events. Therefore, I teach that piece early in the year so I should be handled with care. Your new presence should am prepared at a moment’s notice. be a respectful refl ection of the past. Just as a beautiful Approach everyone with kindness all of the time. This musical phrase is carefully shaped and conducted, balanc- concept is especially important when you are not met with
CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 31 NOTES FOR SUCCESS (PART 2)
kindness. In the same way that you are focused on your the principal matters, yes, but so does your relationship program, others have their own priorities. Keep that in with the front offi ce secretary, with the person who cleans mind when you speak to people and consider their points your room, and with the cafeteria staff . Take time to get of view. You can often resolve a tense situation if you are to know everyone who touches the life of the school. calm and considerate. When working with administra- People talk to one another, and their view of you and tors, keep in mind that they are running an entire school; how you are perceived as a newcomer will be shaped your issue might not be a priority. When I encounter a by the impressions you leave with each of them. When challenge, I try to fi nd several solutions to present to the unexpected challenges arise, these people will serve as administration. I receive the best outcomes using this important advocates. method, and the administration often provides an addi- Despite your best eff orts to anticipate any issues, at tional solution. Professionalism is key when dealing with times you may feel blindsided. A parent objecting to a diffi cult situation. a grade you have given her child or a principal siding Kindness is important when dealing with parents, since with cheerleaders who claim they cannot attend your they can be your greatest support system. Make positive concert scheduled on a game night can undermine your phone calls home so parents do not only hear from you confi dence. These are delicate matters. Your ability to when something is wrong. Parents really appreciate hear- communicate in a calm, clear manner will serve you ing positive information. This simple gesture will also help well. Whenever possible, arrange face-to-face meetings you to win students over in your fi rst few years of teaching. to discuss and resolve any confl icts or misunderstandings. Student “buy-in” is critical, so taking the time to recognize Represent yourself with clarity, ask questions, and listen. students who are doing well is helpful. If someone does something nice for you or your pro- gram, thank those individuals each and every time. People QUESTION #5: will be more inclined to help you out again if they feel their eff orts were appreciated. Relating Choir to Other Subjects/Activities
How can I make sure my choir is valued and Philip Silvey supported by the school system?
Your fi rst year is a period of “information gathering.” It takes time to fi nd out how everything in a school system works. Be pa- Elizabeth Batey tient. It’s impossible to immediately know and understand everything. At the beginning, you will tend to operate on While working on my masters, I wrote an in- assumptions or expectations (typically based on your own tensive paper on why music educators seem past experience) that may not apply in this new setting. to burn out at a faster rate than educators of This happens to all people in their fi rst year at a new job. many other subjects. One of the reasons that came up in The moments when you suddenly learn you overlooked or the research was that music educators felt as if they were contradicted an important custom can be embarrassing. “second class” teachers, not valued by their administrators Your students, colleagues, and superiors will understand, and the rest of the staff . This is a problem I think many as long as you acknowledge and admit your misunder- of us face daily within our school walls: how do I create a standings in a forthright manner. sense of value for my program within the school? While The way you treat people matters. Every person you I am not sure there are any defi nitive answers, I can share encounter in the school plays an important role in the what has worked for me and the schools I’ve worked for. functioning of the entire school. Your relationship with As much as I would like the opposite to be true, the
32 CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 ADVICE FOR THE FIRST-YEAR CHORAL TEACHER
music teacher is the face of the music program. How sing at graduation, perform at parties, and make record- you present yourself to the school, the staff , the parents, ings. Make them ambassadors of your school district. the administration, and the district will dictate how your That said, do not send your choirs out before they are program is perceived. If you are happy and positive, they ready. While they do not have to be perfect, you want to will most likely view your program as positive. If you are convey to the audience that the students sound good and overly aggressive and negative, they will most likely view enjoy what they do. If your administrators hear about your program as negative. You are in public relations, and good things the choir is doing, they are more likely to be you must remember that if you would like your program supportive of your program. to thrive, you must have a strategy to sell it. Now that you Getting other teachers to value your program is a bit know you are the face of the program, you must make more complicated, particularly other teachers who are your program visible and valuable. Look for openings competing with you for your students’ time and energy. or needs that your choir can fulfi ll musically within your The fi rst rule is to be fl exible when you can. If you play building. Need a February fundraiser to help the National nice with the coaches, the band and orchestra directors, Junior Honor Society? Team up with them and split the and the theatre director, you have the right to expect them profi ts from singing valentines. Off er to have the choir to do the same with you (and they probably will). Also, sing carols before the December district meetings at the keep your ears open for interesting opportunities to col- district offi ce. It will make your principal look good and laborate with other disciplines. Can your choir perform your program look better. Very rarely do I turn down an a poem being studied in an English class? Can you invite opportunity to have my choir participate in any school the German teacher to help your choirs with the pronun- event. ciation of a song? I have never taught at a school with an auto shop, but I have always thought it would be fun to write a song in collaboration with an auto shop class where Desiree Bondley the sounds that a car makes could be part of the music. Also, show up at other events if at all possible. This will I like to have home-base performances so pay dividends with students and teachers. You may even that the rest of the student body and staff fi nd you are having a good time! can see and hear the choir’s accomplish- ments. I save some time at the end of the performance to do some large group singing that includes the audience. Elizabeth McFarland If you are thinking bigger, volunteer to have your groups perform at school activities. This could be something as Try to maintain a global, or school-wide, small as a staff meeting where you have the choir sing a perspective on your program and its needs; selection from an upcoming concert. Finally, get involved! remember that there is a fi nite amount of Do not sit to the side with an “I’m just a music director” resources that your principal is working within. Always ask mentality. Volunteer within the school to show you are a for what you want and need, and be understanding if you well-rounded and team-playing educator. are told no the fi rst time. However, keep asking! If you feel that your administration does not understand or value the work that you do in class, put those teaching skills to good Seth Boyd use and help them learn! Help them see the good that is going on in your classroom by inviting them in to witness If you want your choirs to be valued by the lessons that you feel exemplify the choral experience. school system, get your students out in the Do your best to contribute to the positive climate of community whenever possible. Have them your school by participating in assemblies or preparing perform “The Star-Spangled Banner” at sporting events, your students to sing the national anthem, hallway carols
CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 33 NOTES FOR SUCCESS (PART 2)
in December, or the school fi ght song as needed. Ask your QUESTION #6: colleagues and your students about what is going on in other areas of their lives and show support. When you Assessment in the Classroom hear students say good things about other teachers, pass along the compliment. Remember to help your students How do I best establish a grading strategy? and community connect to opportunities and resources outside of the school that are related to choral music. Set an example of active community engagement for your students by fostering musical relationships with colleagues Jennifer Alarcon and neighbors. Prior to school starting, sit down with a cal- endar and make an assessment plan. First, Brandon Williams create a rubric for daily or weekly rehearsal technique. These are the behaviors that need to be shown Choir should not be related to other subjects during rehearsal. Behaviors include tall choral posture for the sake of establishing its value; it has while singing, refraining from talking during transitions, value in itself. It is good, however, to link use of appropriate vowel shapes, positive attitude, and subjects in an interdisciplinary manner to foster enhanced using solfège or number hand signs. learning. The best way to promote the value of the choir Second is pitch and rhythm assessment. Perhaps every program is to make people aware of what it is you teach week or every other week, assess pitch and rhythm. This and how students learn from your instruction. Many of can be as simple as having students clap and count a 4-8 your parents, administrators, and colleagues will have a measure rhythmic pattern in groups of three or more or limited idea of what takes place in your classroom. Uti- having students echo back a pitch pattern of four pitches lize concerts, “meet the teacher” nights, parent/teacher on a neutral syllable. Remember that assessment is a tool conferences, awards ceremonies, or other events to dem- to see where your singers are so that you can scaff old onstrate some of the specifi c things you teach. Those future rehearsals to help build their skills. It should not gatherings could allow observers the opportunity to not be so diffi cult that they are unable to be successful. Also only see you interact with your students but also hear remember that singing alone can feel very vulnerable. growth from the ensemble. Work them up to solo singing by allowing them a partner In my experience, administrators typically only attend at fi rst, which may help to build their confi dence. fi nal performances. Consider inviting them into your classroom so they can experience instruction throughout the concert cycle. Additionally, get your students out of Desiree Bondley the classroom to serenade the halls. This allows them addi- tional chances to share their singing throughout the build- The middle school level in my district is in ing and experience the challenges presented by diff erent the process of transitioning to standard- acoustic environments. Most importantly, let everyone see based grading. Eighth grade is still graded how passionate you are about the choral art. As Robert traditionally, while the sixth and seventh grades see Henri said, “Everything depends on the attitude of the standard-based grading on their reports. Regardless, artist toward his subject. It is essential.” the standards remain the same. Reporting out just looks diff erent. My colleagues and I decided on three to four “Need to Know” standards. From there, we created profi ciency scales to use in our assessments. We asked ourselves, “What does a student need to demonstrate in
34 CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 ADVICE FOR THE FIRST-YEAR CHORAL TEACHER
order to reach a 1, 2, 3, or 4 score?” Or, in grades, “What but on whether or not the student improved. At the end of does a student need to demonstrate in order to reach an assessing about four or fi ve kids, I ask the choir to identify A, B, or C?” individuals who improved by name and give them an extra Next, we created a rubric-type of assessment. This round of applause. If they accidentally identify someone allows us to keep a record of how each student is doing. who did everything perfectly right away, I say, “You’re It may take some time to assess, but this one-on-one time right that the person met the standard, but they did it allows us to see our students’ current abilities and their right the fi rst time. People who can do that get applause progress and give us the opportunity to meet individually. at other times. [To the identifi ed student], I hope it doesn’t Working individually with the students helps the entire hurt your feelings, but we’re not going to clap for you right group. I also keep a daily record of points. Each student now because we are focusing on improvement, not instant begins with ten points. Participation, attitude, etc. can success.” I have never had a student react badly. aff ect the number of points they earn by the end of the Finally, after a concert I break my students up into day. At the end of the week, I report the total points in small groups and make them sing the music for me for a the gradebook. Eighth grade sees percentages on their grade. It is more than fair to expect that after a concert reports, while the sixth and seventh grades receive a grade students know how to perform the material you have for “Respect” and “Responsibility” in the form of an M been teaching for weeks. If they don’t, you have every (meets expectations), P (partially meets expectations), or right to mark a low grade down. Just make sure the size N (needs improvement). of the group is right when you assess. With my elementary students, I make sure that there are two people on every part so no one sings alone. I might not be that forgiving Seth Boyd in a college-level ensemble.
Directing a choir and prepping for a concert does not give me much time to teach things David Burton that fi t within a pencil and paper test. If I have to have something on paper to grade, I make it prac- I will be honest: this is something that I tical. My students are beginning singers, and I often ask am always reevaluating in my teaching. I myself, “What would I want my students to know about have found that when I sit down with the music if they grew up to be an accountant and decided standards and look at what I am doing, as long as I am to sing in their church choir?” I think in that case, I want staying true to the principles of teaching solid technique them to know a little bit about musical style and history to build well-informed musicians using quality literature, so that they will understand performance practice, how I am reaching the goals of the standards. It is important to fi nd a measure on a page, and which staff to read (or to remember that in regard to grading we need to assess which staff to look below to fi nd the words they sing). My their skill and ability and the traditional participation por- tests focus on those basic facts and skills. tion. Both elements are important. What we do is a skill I also think grading things like matching pitch and tone that must be practiced consistently, and therefore partici- production are perfectly acceptable, even with my young pation is a valid component to grade. However, we need singers (ten- and eleven-year-olds). The key is giving posi- to also assess their understanding of music concepts and tive feedback that helps them improve (i.e., try again but skills. This is most authentically done through some sort this time use a little more air) rather than a statement that of performance review, like a part check, and/or through off ers no hope (i.e., you can’t match pitch) and to celebrate the creation of a portfolio of some kind. improvement over perfect achievement of a goal. In pitch- matching assessments, I ask the choir to listen to a student sing and judge not on the basis of how well he or she sang
CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 35 NOTES FOR SUCCESS (PART 2)
Elizabeth McFarland Brandon Williams
Ask what expectations are at your new school You cannot assess something you do not and in your district. Other performing arts teach. We teach vocal technique, and stu- teachers and those who came before you can dents should receive a level of feedback on provide a great starting place for setting up your grading their individual performance. Some programs have a system. Consider moving your grading away from atten- system for calculating choir grades based solely on char- dance- or participation-only points. If you assign a daily acter traits such as being on time, being prepared, actively grade, you can grade on a specifi c skill each day rather participating, and behaving well. Those are important than just participation. Students who perform in a concert and necessary skills, but the performance component is demonstrate audience and performer etiquette, mastery usually nonexistent. I implemented an assessment where of musical ideas, choral skills (watching the conductor, each student used his or her phone or tablet device to singers posture, poise on stage, etc.), and more. Help record themselves while the entire ensemble performed parents understand what students are learning and why a passage from our concert literature. Students can email choir should be considered an in-school academic subject the fi les with or without a personal assessment of their by grading on specifi c, learnable skills! In doing so, you performance, and then I listen or read and assign a teach students and parents what to look for in a successful grade. Grades are based on tone, pitch, rhythm, diction, choir singer and choral program. and musicality. It is important that your students have a thorough understanding of the rubric you have in place. I have found that this method requires much less prepa- ration and class time, is less threatening, and provides an opportunity for students to refl ect on their work.
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36 CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 graduate study at yale institute of sacred music and yale school of music program in program choral conducting in voice: degrees offered early music Master of Music • Master of Musical Arts • Doctor of Musical Arts and oratorio
Special Emphasis on Art Song and Chamber Ensemble
Marguerite L. Brooks, yale camerata Jeffrey Douma, yale glee club and yale choral artists David Hill, yale schola cantorum Masaaki Suzuki, yale schola cantorum James Taylor program adviser, oratorio and voice David Hill Full tuition scholarships guest conductor 2015–2016 yale schola cantorum for all admitted students. Matthew Halls Additional merit-based Masaaki Suzuki recent ensemble repertoire yale schola cantorum awards available. Ample Judith Malafronte podium time with Ludwig van Beethoven: Symphony No. 9 vocal coach, performance practice choral and instrumental Johannes Brahms: Requiem ensembles. Yale Ted Taylor vocal coach, art song International Choral James Whitbourn: Annelies Festival opportunities. Gabriel Jackson: Passion Avi Stein Ralph Vaughan Williams: Dona nobis pacem vocal coach, early music Roderick Williams: O Brother Man Gustav Mahler: Symphony No. 2 recent student recital repertoire Full tuition scholarships plus awards for eight singers selected to form an octet. J.S. Bach: Cantatas 186a, 150, 106, 82, 67 Numerous opportunities for solo work with Dominick DiOrio: A Dome of Many-Coloured Glass Yale Schola Cantorum and elsewhere. International tour and recording possibilities. David Gompper: An Elm We Lost G.F. Handel: Dixit Dominus Jean Langlais: Messe solennelle Office of Admissions Francis Poulenc: Concerto in G major for organ Yale Institute of Sacred Music 409 Prospect Street • New Haven, CT 06511 John Tavener: Ex Maria virgine tel 203.432.9753 • fax 203.432.9680 Richard Wagner: Siegfried Idyll ism.yale.edu [email protected] William Walton: Coronation Te Deum
CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 37 CONNECTION, COMMUNICATION & CONTEXT IMPROVISATION IN A CHORAL SETTING
Carole J. Ott CAROLE J. OTT Associate Director of Choral Activities University of North Carolina at Greensboro [email protected] an interview for Harvard Magazine in May of 2000, pianist Robert Levin commented, In“Our performing system has been geared toward perfection of execution and polish. That pro- duces consistency, but not necessarily creativity.”1 In the context of university music programs, improvisa- tion is largely absent unless the primary area of study is jazz. Pedagogical emphasis in classical training is placed on building technical skill, learning repertoire and stylistic traditions, and gaining confi dence in a variety of performance settings. This produces the consistency Levin acknowledges but leaves musicians unaware of their innate ability to create music as individuals. While exploring play theory, I was introduced to the writings of Stephen Nachmanovitch and became interested in experimenting with improvisation as play in rehearsal. Nachmanovitch describes improvisation as “the free play of consciousness as it draws, writes, paints, and plays the raw material emerging from the unconscious.”2 I was drawn to this idea and sought ways to facilitate improvisatory experiences for students in a structured way by using improvisation with a small chamber group dedicated to the music of Josquin des Pres. This ensemble of ten singers spent a semester exploring multiple aspects of chamber music techniques, including singing without a conductor, rehearsing independently, and improvising together. They were expected to journal the process, keeping detailed rehearsal notes and refl ections on rehearsing and performing in this way while I kept a blog of my thoughts and refl ections.3 In processing the experience, one of the singers wrote of improvisation, “This was probably my favorite aspect of the project preparation and execution, and interestingly, this was my greatest source of anxiety at the start of the project. These exercises allowed me to grow so much as a musician. They invoked in me a sense of creativity and ownership that some environments within the music school perhaps don’t encourage.” This small ensemble’s experience and success with improvisation encouraged me to expand the process into larger ensembles and consider these questions: How can connection and communication with other members in a large ensemble be enhanced? In what ways can the individual vocalist explore the creation of musical ideas alone and with others?
CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 39 CCONNECTION,ONNECTION, CCOMMUNICATIONOMMUNICATION & CCONTEXTONTEXT IMPROVISATION IN A CHORAL SETTING
To address these questions, free improvisation was Variations incorporated into the regular rehearsal cycle with the University Chorale, a fi fty-member select mixed ensemble • Game of Tag – singers in the outer circle can “tag” of upperclassmen and graduate students at a large state into an improvisation experience by switching with university in the Southeast. A portion of rehearsal and an improvising singer. This keeps everyone more performance time throughout the year was dedicated to actively involved while maintaining a smaller group. creating music together and openly discussing discoveries made during this process. The specifi c sequence used was • Imitation of musical ideas from the outer circle. modifi ed from a presentation on teaching improvisation given by Nachmanovitch at the College Band Directors • Development of improvisation to include the National Association Conference in New York City in entire room. 2005.4 b. Improvise in sections; improvise in mixed-voice part groups. Improvisation Sequence5 Members who were not improvising were expected to 1. Ensemble members form a circle. actively listen to the sounds being created. Over the course of the year, the students refl ected on and responded to the 2. Sound meditation: Play a note on the piano or ring a experience of improvisation in rehearsal and performance bell and have the group listen for the end of the sound. by verbally discussing the experience, writing refl ections, and completing a short survey. Discoveries made through 3. Independent improvisation: Each person indepen- this process were divided into musical and behavioral dently improvises a vocal line around the circle. outcomes.
Variation: All singers hum a drone while one impro- vises. Note: Including a drone made some students Musical Outcomes feel more comfortable and others feel more restricted. Musical outcomes had two components: musical ele- 4. Small group collaborative improvisation: ments of the improvisations themselves and the eff ect of improvisation on the rehearsal and performance of • Improvise duets, trios, quartets. traditional choral music. Musically, the improvisations had clear form and structure that evolved organically • Groups choose a voice to start, and the rest join in as the singers engaged with one another. The harmonic response. It is helpful to begin with a starting pitch language was created together unless the singers were or key. directed to explore a specifi c style. A variety of vocal colors were explored, from traditional bel canto singing 5. Large group collaborative improvisation: to Tuvan throat singing. The singers often drew from soundscapes with which they were most familiar. For a. Inner/Outer circle: Volunteers create a small example, those involved with campus a cappella groups circle of six singers within the larger circle of the often used a pop idiom with vocal percussion while im- whole ensemble. This allows those who feel more provising. Those exploring Josquin would adopt similarly confi dent to explore creating music together, while long lines, duetting voices, and cadential movement. As those who feel less confi dent contribute by listening they became more comfortable, the singers explored with attention. nonvocal sounds, including use of breath (sighs, hissing, and simple breathing), snapping or clapping, whistling,
40 CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 CONNECTION, COMMUNICATION & CONTEXT IIMPROVISATIONMPROVISATION IINN A CCHORALHORAL SSETTINGETTING
hitting chairs and stands, and shuffl ing feet or stomping. felt while improvising together or listening to their peers Increased parameters resulted in more focused and inten- improvise. tional improvisations. The same reaction was observed when introducing Throughout the year, the improvisations became more improvisation to classically trained musicians in diff erent musically complex and could be sustained for longer pe- settings. For example, when introducing improvisation to riods. The ensemble found that smaller groups required a large symphony chorale, there was great resistance to more commitment and participation by individual mem- participation at fi rst. Instead of following the improvisa- bers. This resulted in more specifi c structure and form, tion sequence, I started by creating a duet between myself regardless of the musical language that evolved between and one of the strongest singers in the choir. Our duet was the singers. Improvisations that utilized the entire en- successful and the group responded well, so I asked for semble simultaneously had less defi nite form but resulted volunteers to join us. Some were excited to participate, in a wash of sound, energy, and breath. In performance, some reluctantly willing, and some completely opposed. smaller group improvisations (groups of fi ve to ten singers) Upon refl ection, I believe certain factors were at play: were more successful. Sometimes improvisations started the same fear of improvising shown by the students, the well but lost direction or never developed. The element fear of singing alone in front of others, and the set-up of risk and exploring the unknown made the process of the room. Even with these challenges, fear gave way more exciting. to curiosity and exhilaration, and I felt a greater con- In the second musical outcome, the rehearsal and nection to the singers with whom I improvised when we performance of traditional choral music was positively af- moved into a regular rehearsal format. Singers in the fected by the incorporation of improvisation. Elements of symphony chorale also experienced this rush of energy. choral singing such as matched vowels, text stress, and ar- Over the next few rehearsals, I shifted my language from ticulation became unifi ed more quickly. Compositional el- “improvising” and “singing” to “making things up with ements of notated music were more easily understood and our voices” and made sure the ensemble was standing processed. For example, after experiencing spontaneous in a circle, supporting each other. This shift in language dynamic shifts in improvisation, the ensemble’s approach allowed ensemble members more freedom to engage in to dynamics became much more organic. Improvisation the process of improvisation. also created a more connected and focused atmosphere The progression from fear to curiosity to exhilaration when moving to a traditional choral rehearsal. seems to be a common reaction to improvisation by clas- sically trained musicians unfamiliar with creating music in this way. Violinist Hilary Hahn, for example, described Behavioral Observations similar feelings when discovering her ability to improvise. She relayed her fi rst experience of improvising with Over the course of the year, there was a clear pro- singer-songwriter Josh Ritter in a 2012 interview for the gression from fear to curiosity and fi nally exhilaration in Washington Post: “I walked on stage with a few ideas and students’ attitudes toward improvisation. At fi rst, students my knees knocking, and I played something. I didn’t break showed apprehension about their ability to create music the song, and he was happy enough. It was exhilarating.”6 that was not already written. One student wrote in a Hahn went on to explore improvisation with German refl ection, “One day we were all terrifi ed of this stuff .” experimental pianist Hauschka in her 2012 album, Silfra, Apprehension gave way to curiosity and a willingness to and describes her continued exploration of improvisa- explore. “My favorite moments during improvisation were tion as coming from “a certain creative impulse” that she the moments when something new or unexpected hap- compares to the same creative impulse she had as a child.7 pened.” Finally, many students experienced exhilaration Other classical musicians who engaged in improvisation at creating together. These observations were supported have similar thoughts. Robert Levin said, “The greatest in student comments during open discussion and in writ- benefi t to me in [learning to improvise] is not what hap- ten refl ections. Many wrote about the rush of energy they pens in the two or three minutes of the cadenzas, but
CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 41 CCONNECTION,ONNECTION, CCOMMUNICATIONOMMUNICATION & CCONTEXTONTEXT IMPROVISATION IN A CHORAL SETTING
what happens in the rest of the piece.”8 Classical pianist invited to join in. It didn’t feel like we were thinking about Gabriela Montero says of improvisation, “It’s spontane- what to do next; the music was coming freely from our ous creation. It’s spontaneous music making. And is it centers.” Verbal comments during open discussion often perfect? I don’t know… It’s something that is just born focused on the physical sensation of an improvisation that and dies.”9 These responses to the experience of impro- was particularly successful. Students commented about visation resonate strongly with my students’ refl ections on elevated heart rates, a sense of breathlessness, and feel- their experiences. ing their hair stand up while either actively participating After improvisation sessions, time was allowed for open in improvisation or by listening to their peers improvise. discussion of the experience and discoveries made during There was a collective sense of joy and anticipation dur- the process. Students were prompted to write refl ections ing these exercises. and to complete a short survey evaluating their confi dence At the end of the 2013 fall semester, students were with improvisation and their perception of individual given the opportunity to complete a short online survey creativity, musicianship, listening, connection, and com- to assist in self-refl ection. Twenty-three students in the munication throughout the fall semester. The following University Chorale responded. They were asked to check themes emerged from these refl ections: personal and col- areas in which they perceived individual growth through lective growth, stronger human connection, appreciation the improvisation process. Table 1 contains a summary for each other as creators, and a sense of transformational of responses. The written-in response under “other” energy. indicated that improvisation aided in stress relief for that In describing growth, one student wrote: “This past singer. Of the students who responded, just over half semester has been especially moving for me with all of (57%) had some prior experience with improvisation, and the work on play, connecting, and improvising. I have all who responded experienced some degree of growth never experienced anything so profound in an ensemble in comfort with improvisation throughout the semester. before.” The sense of connection and appreciation for one another as creators was intertwined in student re- fl ections. A student commented, “I really enjoyed when Ideas for Performance I felt connected with my group. There were several times that this happened, and those times made the improvisa- The experience of performing improvisation was tion particularly enjoyable!” Another wrote, “I loved the equally as important as exploring these ideas in rehearsal adrenaline rush and the expression. I enjoyed hearing my and was easily incorporated into concert programs. In classmates and their creative juices fl owing... So much tal- fall 2013, the University Chorale concert explored Johan ent, so much variation in approach and perception and Huizinga’s elements of play: order, tension, movement, perspective!” change, solemnity, rhythm, and rapture.10 This created Students wrote about the vulnerability of improvising a natural way to incorporate free improvisation within together. “It brings people out of their shells, makes them a traditional concert setting. The ensemble was broken dare to try something that they haven’t entirely thought down into several groups of fi ve or six singers. A lead voice through yet. It exposes a truer part of ourselves than we was chosen to start the improvisation while the rest of normally show in traditional rehearsing and perform- the group responded and developed the initial idea. The ing. That vulnerability is simultaneously terrifying and groups followed each other seamlessly without applause. exhilarating!” Vulnerability and risk taking contributed In spring 2014, the theme of the fi nal concert program to the transformational energy stimulated by improvisa- was based on nature. Members of the ensemble submitted tion. This energy is diffi cult to describe but profound to poems about nature that were meaningful to them, and I experience. A student wrote: “My favorite experiences [of chose descriptive lines from these poems. In performance, improvisation] are when I feel the music coming from my the choir was split into fi ve sections: Soprano 1, Soprano core. A group of six or so was standing in the center of 2, Alto, Tenor, and Bass. Each section improvised in re- the larger circle improvising, but the outside group was sponse to the poetry that had been chosen. They did not
42 CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 CONNECTION, COMMUNICATION & CONTEXT IIMPROVISATIONMPROVISATION IINN A CCHORALHORAL SSETTINGETTING
know which lines would be read before the performance. interpreted in a traditional rehearsal setting. Elements of I also incorporated improvisation into a concert with the choral singing such as matched vowels, text stress, and Women’s Glee Club by contrasting improvisation with ensemble balance became more nuanced. The quality of chants of Hildegard von Bingen for a performance at listening across the ensemble rose considerably, and com- the Weatherspoon Art Museum as a prelude to the fi lm munication of musical interpretation was executed in a Samsara, which explores the natural wonders of our world more unifi ed way. Through improvisation, the students in and human spirituality and experience. In these concert this ensemble experienced the importance of communi- settings, improvisation was very successful and created cating with and responding to each other as performers. conversation with other faculty members about the pro- This concept transferred to communicating musical ideas cess and importance of improvising. to an audience in a traditional performance setting. Explorations of free improvisation in a choral context have become an important part of the rehearsal process in Creative Exploration the University Chorale and Women’s Glee Club. Guiding students to explore the creation of musical ideas alone and Free improvisation in rehearsal and performance was with others has infused the choral program with greater an eff ective way to enhance both connection and com- creativity, freedom, and risk-taking. Many students did munication with other members in the University Chorale not know that vocal improvisation was possible outside during the 2013-2014 academic year. Observation and of jazz. Many did not know they were capable of creat- student refl ections revealed that the ensemble members ing music themselves. Like Hilary Hahn, they have had experienced a greater sense of connection with one an- an opportunity to explore music coming from their own other and the music. Initial fear of improvisation gave way creative impulse and respond to the creative impulse of to the exhilaration of creating something new. The impro- other members in the ensemble. Encouraging the creative visation sequence, with directed meditation and attentive exploration of each singer’s musical knowledge into some- listening by the whole ensemble, created a supportive thing new through improvisation has enhanced the syn- and energized atmosphere from which an experience of thesis of existing music in the traditional choral rehearsal. growth, appreciation for one another as creators, stronger During the 2015 spring semester, I built on the previ- human connection, and transformational energy arose. ous year’s foundation and explored diff erent modes of Exploring improvisation had a positive eff ect on music improvisation with the performance of written music.
Table 1
Answer Response Percentage
Creativity 22 96%
Communication 20 87%
Active Listening 20 87%
Connection 19 83%
Ability to take risks 19 83%
Musicianship 15 65%
Other 1 4%
CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 43 CCONNECTION,ONNECTION, CCOMMUNICATIONOMMUNICATION & CCONTEXTONTEXT IMPROVISATION IN A CHORAL SETTING
During rehearsal, students were asked to create and the entire ensemble. I took these responses, added them improvise stories, arias, and incorporate instrumentalists to my own ideas, and created a structure that involved with the choir. This provided advanced vocal students an everyone at their level of comfort. The basic structure opportunity to explore improvising as soloists. The choir was as follows: would be invited to provide a story on which to improvise, and the improvising singers would use this story to create Opening Improvisation with Piano/Violin arias, duets, and small ensemble pieces with the piano. The Light of Stars To explore expanded forms of improvisation in a concert Improvisation A setting, the University Chorale presented a performance Solo of three pieces by Randall Thompson (The Light of Stars, Trio Two Worlds, The Happy Shore). These were used as a ba- Piano/Violin sis for a large form improvisation inspired by the texts. Quartet Rather than create theatrical scenes, the choir created an Ensemble extended mediation on the concept of a journey inspired Two Worlds by Thompson’s music and texts. In order to explore the Improvisation B addition of instrumentalists in the improvisation process, Solo an accompanist improvised with the singers and a violinist Ensemble was added.11 Piano/Violin To lay the groundwork for the performance, I created Solo a journaling exercise that asked the following questions: Ensemble The Happy Shore • Which modes of improvisation are you comfortable exploring in performance? Some of the improvisations were based on specifi c frag- ments of text and others on a specifi c emotion. I moved • Is there a mode of improvisation you would enjoy ex- throughout the improvisations providing direction with ploring in this concert? small cards that had text fragments or instructions such as “improvise with Julia” or “piano/violin duet.” This • What are some connections between the three poems? kept a sense of continuity and motion to the performance. The experience of extending improvisation to last • What are some themes/texts/ideas that stand out to thirty-fi ve minutes, blending various forms of improvisa- you? tion with written music, and performing in front of an audience was exhilarating. Many unexpected things hap- • What ideas do you have for exploring the idea of a pened. For example, a singer misunderstood an improvisa- journey with these texts? tion cue and performed a beautiful solo improvisation in an unexpected place. Some singers didn’t see the cues or • How would you build a story with these poems? Are cards, which forced me to stay in the moment with them there characters? and accept what was happening rather than trying to control the energy. After the performance, singers were • Talk about a journey in your own life. What did you given another chance to refl ect on what was meaningful encounter? to them and what was challenging. On using improvisation with written music, one student Giving the students a chance to be involved in creating said: “The blending of interpretation and creating was the framework for the improvisation by providing ideas incredibly powerful, especially in such an uninterrupted and feedback brought a greater level of commitment from form. Also, using soloists with accompaniment was in-
44 CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 CONNECTION, COMMUNICATION & CONTEXT IIMPROVISATIONMPROVISATION IINN A CCHORALHORAL SSETTINGETTING
credibly powerful, as it allows the audience to focus on Further scientifi c study could include neurological the powerful emotions of a couple of people, rather than research on creativity and the brain while using free im- a collective group’s expressions.” Another wrote: “The provisation techniques with singers. The techniques used complexity in planning and structure was new for me. It to introduce improvisation in the university setting could didn’t limit us in any way but instead kept the story mov- be modifi ed for younger students by creating more specifi c ing forward and kept us on our toes.” guidelines. Elements of music such as melody, harmony, Adding instrumentalists was a successful element of and rhythm could be explored through improvisation, this kind of improvisation, and the students responded giving younger students a chance to create and learn. At favorably: “There was a moment in my group’s impro- any age or level of training, the opportunity to explore visation where I really connected with the violin and we free improvisation and to experience the exhilaration of started trading off melodic lines. I really enjoy having our own innate ability to create is invaluable. other instruments with voice. It adds a deeper aspect that was not there when we fi rst started.” Diffi culties reported by students included feeling ex- NOTES posed improvising with an audience present, not knowing exactly who would lead in their group, and fi nding it dif- 1 Daniel Delgado, “Lost Art,” Harvard Magazine (May-June 2000), 36. fi cult to balance listening and singing. These refl ections 2 Stephen Nachmanovitch, Free Play: Improvisation in Life and Art. (New have been valuable as I continue to think about future York City, Penguin Putnam, Inc. 1990), 9. 3 directions and projects that include improvisation. www.thejosquinproject.blogspot.com 4 Stephen Nachmanovitch, “Free Improvisation for Ensembles” (College Band Directors National Association. Manhattan Ideas for Continued Research Room, Park Central Hotel, New York, NY, February 24, 2005). 5 For more ideas and extended improvisation games, resources such as Improvisation Games for Classical Musicians by Jeff rey Agril and There is great potential for continued research in this The Mind’s Ear: Exercises for Improving the Musical Imagination for area. Information gathered during this process could Performers by Bruce Adolphe are both excellent. assist in creating an entirely improvisatory performance 6 Anne Midgette, “Concerto on the fl y: can classical musicians learn experience or more performance experiences that blend to improvise,” Washington Post, June 15, 2012, accessed October improvisation with traditional choral compositions. Im- 1, 2014.
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Evernote for Every Choir, Composer, Classroom, and Conductor by Philip Copeland
Choir directors lead complicated plications sync with each other, and it position. After preparing the choir, lives; many have one primary job creates an almost seamless experience my most important task each week and an additional part-time job for of information creation and retrieval. is planning the anthem and solo for fi nancial and artistic reasons. Keep- Users can download Evernote for each service of the week. Evernote ing up with the details and manag- free and have full access to most fea- assists me in that task in the follow- ing responsibilities is a challenge for tures of the program. Under the free ing ways: everyone, whether they have one job program, one can upload up to 60 or three. Evernote is one of the best MB of data each month with unlim- • Archive of pastor’s yearly worship digital solutions to help tame the ited storage. Premium users are able planning. My senior pastor complexity of our lives. Many choral to upload 4 GB of data per month does not use the lectionary, conductors, composers, and teachers with unlimited storage. By structur- but he is excellent at planning have found the program to be an in- ing their price structure this way, all out his sermons throughout dispensable tool for managing their users have the ability to fully experi- the year. At some point each work, hobbies, and personal interests. ence Evernote before they commit to summer, the pastor sends me becoming paying customers. At the a document of his plans for present time, the premium version each Sunday from August until Overview of Features of Evernote costs $5 a month, but May. His planning becomes my Evernote is marketed as a way to hardly anyone pays for Evernote in source material for the music “remember everything,” and it does the fi rst month they download the each Sunday, and one Evernote a fantastic job at helping users man- program. After a year, 5% of the us- note is dedicated to hosting his age their responsibilities and interests. ers pay, and over 30% pay after they Capturing information can occur in have been using the program for six many ways, including typing notes, years. With users that number over creating audio fi les, taking pictures, 100 million, it is a good bet that the internet web clipping, forwarding program will not be vanishing any- emails, and scanning. Evernote is time soon. available on most of the digital plat- forms that you own or use. Powerful desktop applications on Windows and Using Evernote Macintosh computers are supple- for Church Jobs mented with versions for tablets and smartphones. All of the Evernote ap- My church job is a part-time
CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 49 yearly plan. day have to be turned in to the for Lent, and even a note where I church secretary for worship worked out the text and translation • After receiving his plans, I begin bulletin each week. Ideally, I of Fauré’s “En Prière” for an upcom- work on my own by matching would have had time to fi nd the ing soloist. his themes with the choir’s text of the anthem and solo and library of anthems and newer also store it in Evernote. anthems. Eventually, I create a Using Evernote list of each Sunday’s anthem, Example 1 displays a screenshot of in the Classroom and then I work to schedule my working Evernote notebook for solos and soloists that match the church. The note I consult most Evernote helps instructors across or enhance the theme of the often is at the top, because it is often the world organize their lessons and sermon and anthem. These the note that I edit the most. In my projects for the classes they teach. It notes are stored in the Evernote notebook, the notes are ranked ac- can also be used as a powerful tool church notebook and are rou- cording to “most recently used,” but of collaboration and information dis- tinely updated with the chang- there are many ways of organizing tribution from one person to groups ing situation of each particular each collection of notes. Other pieces of people. For me, this comes in the Sunday. of information that you see are notes form of creating shared notebooks for where I organize my handbell group, classes, choirs, and assistants. Sharing • Eventually, the plans for each Sun- meetings with the pastor, planning notebooks in this manner off ers many advantages:
• It is economical. Instead of pho- tocopying multiple copies of a syllabus, articles, rubrics, calendars, and other informa- tion, one can put all of the information into an Evernote notebook. I then publish the notebook and provide a link to the students, usually by email. Evernote allows an instructor to supplement, or even replace, a textbook very easily.
• It is always current and easy to update. If class is canceled or there is a need to make a change in the planning, the notebook is easily updated. Students always have the most up-to-date ver- sion of the planning once they synchronize their Evernote. Example 1. Evernote for the church
50 CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 • It is simple to capture a variety of content that oc- curs in each class or rehearsal. Examples of this include photographs from notes drawn on the board, pictures of student work, or spoken instruction from the professor. It is possible to capture recordings of lectures.
• The notebook becomes an archive for each class taught and therefore serves as a likely template for future classes. With a little bit of editing and reorganization, the notebook is ready to be shared with the next class.
Examples 2 and 3 show two types of notes that I use for classroom teaching. Example 2 is from my choral conducting class, an intermediate course in conducting at Samford University. In this class, I use Evernote as a textbook replacement and distribute all of the course material that I need. From this ex- ample, you can see that I use Evernote to distribute a variety of materials, including PDFs of public domain Example 2. Choral Conducting Class music (featured in the main window), web clippings, powerpoint presentations from class, and rubrics that I created to grade as- signments. With Evernote, I am not bound by the textbooks or websites, and I can easily incorporate a large number of resources to enhance my teaching. In Example 3, the primary window shows a note containing photographs from a diction class taught at Samford University. In most classes, information that is written on the board is lost after each class. Photo- graphs like this can be inserted into notes, so information created during classes can be captured, saved, and distributed to the rest of the class.
Using Evernote for Choirs
With its sharing capabilities, Evernote can be a powerful tool for the conductor to Example 3. Whiteboard
CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 51 manage his or her choir. Conductors can easily transfer a large amount of information, including:
• Calendar for the year and poten- tial calendar for the following year
• Texts and translations of choral music
• Concert planning, directions
• PDFs of handbooks, music, pro- grams
• Choir rosters
• Rehearsal plans Example 4. Carmina Burana • Recordings, part help, language recordings ration. This project, a three-choir emailed a link to the notebook to all collaboration of Carl Orff ’s Carmina of the singers. The singers were asked Example 4 shows one of the ways Burana, involved about 200 singers. to copy the IPA translation into their that I have used Evernote to commu- Instead of photocopying the pronun- score. (Example 4) nicate information to large numbers ciation for all of the text, we loaded it Other ideas for the Carmina Burana of people in a large-scale collabo- into an Evernote public notebook and notebook include:
• Provide an audio recording of the correct pronunciation of the text in each movement. magine … Sing Where Inspiration Was Born. I singing in the venues of the great composers, in awe • Provide a photo example of how inspiring cathedrals and the IPA text should be written charming village churches, for appreciative audiences in each choir member’s score. around the world. Let us take you there. • Include articles about the composi- tion so students can explore the composition in a more scholarly way CULTURALULTURA TOUR CONSULTANTS It Starts With An Idea...
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52 CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 Example 5. Doeble
How ACDA Members of my conference sessions, clin- are synced and available to me Use Evernote ics, my commission schedule, whether I’m on my phone, at the and a collection of poetry/texts offi ce, traveling with my laptop, ACDA members of all types use that I love and can use for future or at home. Evernote for a variety of tasks and projects. I also share a notebook projects. As a part of my research with my assistant that includes a for this article, I posed a question to-do list, fi les, links, processes, Michael Kaulkin, composer and teacher: to ACDA’s Facebook group. Choral and other vital information. musicians weighed in on how they I use Evernote to great eff ect. I utilized the program: keep all of my lesson plans and Andrea Ramsey, conductor and composer: materials in Evernote and can Jake Runestad, composer: refer to anything I need on the I got hooked on Evernote while fl y. I also collect homework by I use Evernote every day. Each organizing my dissertation, but scanning written assignments commission has its own note- now I have notebooks for ev- and grade them using the anno- book in which I can create notes erything: commission schedule, tation feature. I can also capture for the contract, text ideas, audio guest conducting programs, past a student’s work and put it on clips, information about the programs, repertoire I’d like to the overhead projector within ensemble, and other important program and texts I’d like to seconds. fi les. I have notebooks for each set. I love how all the notebooks
CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 53 Alexa Doebele, conductor:
Evernote has become indispens- able for me in dealing with the logistical aspects of my work as a conductor and teacher. At fi rst, I used it for relatively simple things: I created a notebook for each class I teach, and I used notes mostly to keep track of announcements I give, students I need to track down for items, and things that students tell me, like missing class on a certain day. Soon, I started to realize the full capabilities of Evernote when I started using it to plan my an- nual spring choir tour. Within my tour notebook, I have created Example 6. Skitch Names various notes for each stop (see Example 5). browser. The program will then direct Then That.” This application is a a. One with contact information you to link to your current account or tool for automating tasks by linking for our hosts create a new one. Then, use the web diff erent web applications to work clipper anytime you are compiling together toward a specifi ed end result. b. One with all the particulars of information for program notes, choir These conditions, or recipes, often the concert tours, or other research. use Evernote. One popular Evernote In recent years, Evernote has de- recipe is called “Save Starred Gmails c. One with hotel information veloped a relationship with a number to Evernote.” of other companies, either through Evernote is a superb tool for man- d. To-do lists mutually benefi cial agreements or aging our complex lives. It helps us acquisition. These programs work manage the many details and mul- with Evernote and sync across your tiple responsibilities we face in our Other Evernote devices. diff erent choirs, classrooms, and class- Productivity Tips: Skitch is a screen capturing appli- room obligations. The application is cation that helps the user capture and as simple or complex as you want it The Evernote Web Clipper en- annotate images. It is a free download to be; it can be a tool to aid in your ables you to clip any part of any and works seamlessly with Ever- own organization or a vehicle to share webpage to Evernote for future use. note. Choir directors and classroom your work with others. It is optimized for use with the most teachers can use Skitch as a tool for popular internet browsers, and it can learning and referencing the names clip information from any website. To of their students, like I have done in fi nd it, simply search for “Evernote Example 6. web clipper” and install it in your IFTTT is an acronym for “If This,
54 CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 J J J J Herford Prize Julius Herford Prize JuJ lius Herford Prize Julius Herford Prize JuJ lius Herford P Herford Prize JuliusJulliuius HerfordHeH rforrd Prize JuliJuliususus HerfordHererford PrizePrir zez JuliusJulius HerfordHeH rfr orord Prize JuliusJuliu Herford P Herford Prize JuliusJulliuus HerfordHeerfrforrd PrizePrrizze JuJuliusuliliusu HerfordHerrfoforrd PrizePririzez JuliusJulu iuius HerfordHeerfr oro d PrizePrPrizze JuliusJuJulliiu Herford P Herford Prize JJuliusuluuliusius HHeerfordrford PrPrizeize JuHerforduliusllius Herfoerfordrdd Prize Jululiusiuu s HHePrizeerfordrford PPrrizizee JuJuliliusu Herford P Herford Prize Julius HHeerfrfordfSponsoredoro d Prizeize Ju byliuslil usu Classical Hererfordrfoord P rirrizeMovements,zez Jululiusliuus Herfrford Inc.forord PPrrize Juliusliu Herford P Herford Prize Julius Herford Prize Julius Herford Prize Julius Herford Prize Julius Herford P Herford Prize Julius Herford Prize Juuliius Herrfofordd Pririzeze Julius Herford Prize Julius Herford P Herford Prize Julius Herford Prize Juliusuliiusus HerfordHerrfofordd PrizePririz Julius Herford Prize Julius Herford P Herford Prize Julius Herford Prize Julius2014 Herford Prize Julius Herford Prize Julius Herford P H Call for Nominations
The Julius Herford Dissertation Prize: Each year the Julius Herford Prize Subcommittee of the Research and Publications Committee accepts nominations for the outstanding doctoral terminal research project in choral music. Projects are eligible if they comprise the principal research component of the degree requirements, whether the institution defi nes the project as a “dissertation,” “document,” “thesis,” or “treatise,” etc.
When a dissertation may be nominated: The prize name indicates the year in which the relevant doctoral degree was conferred. Dissertations must be nominated in the calendar year following the year in which the degree was conferred. The prize is awarded in the calendar year following the year of nomination.
The award: The winner will be awarded a $1000 cash prize and a plaque. The committee reserves the right to award two prizes or no prizes in any given year.
Nomination Requirements and Procedure: 1. An institution may submit only one document for that year’s prize. In the event that there are two nominations of equal merit from one school, the letter from the dean, director, or chair of the music school (described below) must justify the additional nomination.
2. To nominate a dissertation, send, by US mail: A) A signed letter from the dean, director, or chair of the music school recommending that the dissertation be considered for the Herford prize. (Letters from the chair of the choral area are not acceptable.) The letter must include the following information: the name of the student, the year in which that student’s degree was granted, the full title of the dissertation. B) An abstract of the dissertation, from which any material identifying the student or institution has been removed. C) An unbound copy of the dissertation (it may be double-sided). Excepting the title page, any material that identifi es the student or the institution must be excised from the document before it is submitted. D) The full name, title, and contact information for the faculty member making the submission and the full name, current position(s), and contact information for the dissertation’s author (USPS address, email address, and phone number).
3. The dissertation and accompanying materials must be received at the national offi ce (address below) by the date announced below (and in the Choral Journal and on the website). Faxed material will not be accepted.
4. All materials must be submitted together in one envelope.
If one or more of these requirements is not met, the dissertation will be eliminated from consideration.
Nominations for the 2014 Julius Herford Dissertation Prize must be received by June 1, 2015. Note that this deadline is earlier than in previous years.
Mail applications to: Craig Gregory, ACDA National Offi ce, 545 Couch Drive, Oklahoma City, OK 73102-2207 phone: 405/232-8161 x 203; e-mail: [email protected] THE SONG OF THE STARS
Wells Cathedral School Choralia Christopher Finch 8573427 • 747313342778 HERBECK | GROSSE MESSE
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AVAILABLE AT: DISTRIBUTED BY: LIFE AFTER RETIREMENTENT
by James Gallagher
There are certain times of the is life after teaching full time. I can tor a fi rst-year teacher and found it year when I am especially reminded still remain active musically, but now enjoyable to observe his rehearsals. of many friends who are gearing up I totally control my schedule of teach- We discussed the various aspects for the busy preparation time for ing, clinics, workshops, festivals, etc. of the rehearsal and how he might concerts and performances at school, I no longer need to cover classes and make slight changes to improve pac- church, and various civic and social church choir in order to conduct a ing, discipline, and general rehearsal organizations. That was my life for festival or all-state choir, and when technique. We both learned and grew thirty-nine years of teaching in the I return from such a festival, I can from this experience. There are many public schools and at the university rest rather than going directly back opportunities to participate in church level while also conducting a church to a full-time position. I have been or community choirs as a conductor choir. Although it was challenging to fortunate to cover for colleagues or singer, and I know of colleagues have all of the music thoroughly pre- taking sabbatical leave and to teach who conduct choral ensembles in pared so that the singers felt confi dent one-week conducting seminars in retirement centers in order to remain as they performed, it was a challenge the summer. I very much enjoy the active and use their talents to help that was both exhilarating and satis- one-day clinics with high school others enjoy participating in music. fying. After many years of the same choirs, which gives the conductor an If you are still enjoying each day or very similar routine, however, the opportunity to step back and listen of full-time employment, keep work- challenges became more taxing, and to his/her own ensembles in a new ing; but if the spark has dimmed a it seemed to take more and more way. Generally I’m just reinforcing bit, perhaps it is time to consider energy to keep “all those plates spin- what has already been taught, but retirement from a full-time position, ning” while maintaining high stan- hearing it from an outsider solidifi es with the knowledge that there are dards. When I became aware of this the concepts for the students. I have still many activities in which you can fact, I realized it was time to consider covered church choir rehearsals for remain active musically. Even a bad stepping away from the daily/weekly friends who need the time away, and day on the golf course may be better routine of preparation, teaching, re- I also assist with the choir in my own than attending one more staff meet- hearsing, paperwork, and all of the church when called upon. This is par- ing or completing a pile of paperwork other necessary activities required to ticularly enjoyable because it requires for the administration. be a teacher/conductor. no staff meetings, weekly rehearsals, or extended planning; just show up James Gallagher is professor emeri- So what to do for rehearsal and conduct what has tus at The Ohio State University following retirement? been requested. School of Music. jgall0444@yahoo. Through the Ohio Choral Direc- com What I discovered was that there tors Association, I was able to men-
CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 57 Where You Belong...
lizabeth McFarland has been attending ACDA conferences since she was a little girl, traveling with her mom, a music teacher. Now that Elizabeth is a music teacher, too, she feels a strong connection with her friends who are also part of ACDA.
“At this point in my life, my best friends are part of the ACDA community. I love the people I have right around me – family, friends, and so on – but they are not as interested in choral music as I am. It’s through ACDA that I connect with people from all over who care deeply about our art.”
From a small child experiencing a connection through the love of music to a teacher, sharing the craft with a new generation, Elizabeth shows that ACDA is there to support those who broaden and enrich the choral community. Join us today! Reasons Why You Should Join ACDA: Q Choral publications like Choral Journal & ChorTeach Q Develop connections in-state and nationally Q New repertoire ideas Q Classroom resources Q Inspirational conferences Q ACDA Mentoring Program Q ACDA Career Center
Visit us online and start enjoying the benefits of an ACDA membership today!
www.acdasingup.org 5FM t'BY RRepertoireepertoire & STandardsSTandards
(Leadership A), involving planning and weaknesses and to explore the YYouthouth andand and executing specifi c chapter re- kind of leadership they can bring SStudenttudent ActivitiesActivities sponsibilities. These duties generally to an organization. Chapter leaders fall on the offi cers, with the ultimate should explore how to talk about the Amanda Quist role of the chapter within the school National R&S Chair responsibility held by the offi ce of
CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 59 RRepertoireepertoire & STandardsSTandards
mission of the greater organization outreach activities, and fundraising officers. This “passing down” of at the national level. A new team of events. chapter knowledge is important since offi cers should be asked to consider chapter offi cers often leave the cam- many questions together as a team, Transitioning Leadership pus community by way of graduation such as: What is the purpose of the The chapter leadership can serve and job entry. Once elections have local chapter? How do members ben- to support the choral music education concluded in the spring for the fol- efi t from participation? How do the program, expand on the choral music lowing year, offi cers should schedule a campus and community benefi t from teaching curriculum by hosting guest formal or informal leadership retreat our presence? The chapter leadership speakers, aid in program recruitment for outgoing offi cers to refl ect on the should not view the participation of for the school, and raise money for year, which is perhaps a good time to the general membership as an op- annual conference attendance at the draft the annual report. portunity to delegate work; rather, state, divisional, and national meet- The retreat is the advisor’s op- they should use specifi c activities to ings of ACDA. Once this culture portunity to develop leadership for develop leadership skills in all mem- of support has been established, a the new set of offi cers. The current bers. Offi cers can begin by defi ning formal mode of transmission can be offi cers should be asked to refl ect on leadership roles for the members in established so that subsequent offi cers the past year and to write an annual the university’s choral festival, other can continue the work of previous report together. In addition to the
Crescent City Choral Festival A FESTIVAL FOR TREBLE AND MIXED CHOIRS – 2016 Cheryl Dupont, Artistic Director 2016 – June 24-June 28 Guest Artist, Sandra Snow Composer-in-Residence, Andrea Ramsey sponsored by the New Orleans Children’s Chorus Cheryl Dupont • open to all treble and mixed choirs representing school, church, and
community, by audition Andrea Ramsey • accepting applications now • performance in St. Louis Cathedral; hotel near the French Quarter You’ll fall in love For more information: with New Orleans! New Orleans Children’s Chorus Sandra Snow 5306 Canal Blvd. New Orleans, LA 70124 (504) 482-2883 Outstanding music-making and great FUN! [email protected] www.neworleanshildrenschorus.org
60 CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 Repertoire & STandards
report submitted to the national or- ership? Do we tell members ganization, the offi cers should make what to do, or do we invite them notes for the new offi cers. Files (pa- to participate in the decision- per or digital) and materials can be making? transferred from the outgoing offi cers to the new offi cers. Consider the fol- • What did we do last year that should lowing list as a template for outgoing be repeated? offi cers: • What did we do last year that should • What did we learn that we did not be changed? previously know? • Should any events be combined?3 • What communication strategies Exxperienceperience worked well for the offi cers? For • What is the role of the advisor? the Music of the chapter? the Americas • What skills—individually and as a • What were the chapter successes? team—do we bring? August 21-31, 2016 • What could have gone better? • What skills—individually and as a www.america-cantat.org team—do we need to be suc- • Which of our goals did we meet? cessful?
• Did we have contact with others • What is our communication proto- outside the chapter that would col? Who should talk to whom, be important for the new offi - and when? cers to know? (e.g., department or university administration, • What can we do without our ad- community resources, news- visor? When do we need to papers) involve our advisor?
New officers can be asked to establish a short list of goals and a Chapter Activities timeline of activities for the following See a list of possible chapter ac- year. Consider the following list as a tivities at:
CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 61 RRepertoireepertoire & STandardsSTandards
Student Activities. Since then we have grown into a and to hopefully help send members group of students who are extremely to the national and southwest ACDA passionate about choral music. We conferences. As a chapter, we also act NOTES meet for an hour every week and as a service organization for the Uni- spend that time participating in versity of Texas at Arlington choirs. 1 James Kouzes and Barry Posner, The activities to improve our listening, Student Leadership Challenge: Five Practices conducting, teaching, leadership, and IIss youryour studentstudent chapterchapter ddoingoing for Becoming an Exemplary Leader. San musicianship skills. We have created iinterestingnteresting aactivities?ctivities? EEmailmail Francisco, CA: The Leadership games such as “Follow the Score” (a nnewsews updatesupdates aandnd pphotoshotos ttoo Challenge, 2014. game where you must be able to fol- sfl [email protected]@acda.org. U Updatespdates 2 American Choral Directors Association. low a part other than your own) and sshouldhould bbee 225050 wwordsords oorr ffewer.ewer. “Membership Tips for ACDA IIncludenclude thethe nnameame aandnd emailemail Leaders.” http://acda.org/page.asp “Bad Choir” (an activity where one ?page=MembershipTips&id=2003. person teaches a piece while the other aaddressddress fforor tthehe ppersonerson wwee 3 Dame, Nathan, “The Full Plate: Eff ective members are assigned bad habits that sshouldhould contactcontact ifif therethere aarere Leadership in Multiple Student the “teacher” must fi x). qquestionsuestions oonn tthehe iinformation,nformation, Organizations,” Choral Journal 48, no. One month, a graduate student aass wwellell aass tthehe nnameame ooff yyourour 1 (July 2007): 54. taught us how to pronounce Chinese ccollegeollege oorr uuniversityniversity aandnd tthehe for Chinese choral pieces. We were ccityity aandnd sstatetate iinn wwhichhich yyouou aarere also able to chat with people who llocated.ocated. SSpacepace iiss llimited,imited, bbutut wwee have experience with music study wwillill ppublishublish aass mmuchuch aass ppossibleossible Updates from in Vienna and different parts of wwithith a ppreferencereference ggiveniven ttoo ACDA Student Chapters Germany. Every semester we bring ssubmissionsubmissions thatthat areare interesting,interesting, in successful choir directors from the ccreative,reative, aandnd rrelevantelevant ttoo ootherther University of Texas North Texas area to conduct master sstudenttudent cchaptershapters aandnd tthehe wwiderider at Arlington classes and Q&A sessions. We also AACDA.CDA. make an eff ort to go as a chapter to The student chapter of ACDA at diff erent choir performances and re- the University of Texas at Arlington hearsals in the community. We began was restarted in the fall of 2014. fundraising to pay for master classes MaleMale ChoirsChoirs Christopher Kiver National R&S Chair
Nineteenth-Century Choral Repertoire for Male Voices
By Mark Ramsay
The nineteenth century saw a sharp increase in the popularity of the male chorus, particularly in Germany. In response to this development, com- posers seized the opportunity to write The 2015 ACDA Student Chapter from the University of Texas-Arlington
62 CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 Repertoire & STandards
for these ensembles, advancing the art provided may ignite a spark for fur- singers to repertoire from diff erent form and leaving a large collection ther investigation. For conductors, eras, styles, and composers. of quality music written specifi cally this repertoire aligns with our eff orts It also provides a meaningful oppor- for male voices. The list provided to explore previously unknown works tunity to expand our male singers’ below is by no means intended to be and composers, while creating varied, knowledge of the history of the exhaustive. However, the sampling balanced programs and exposing our men’s chorus as a unique ensemble.
*title is available on IMSLP (imslp.org) **title is available on CPDL (www.cpdl.org) ***title is available on both IMSLP and CPDL
Abt, Franz (1819-1885) Über den Sternen / TTBB / a cappella / Tonos
Adam, Adolphe (1803-1856) Comrades in Arms / TTBB / a cappella / Banks Music Publications Comrades’ Song of Hope / TTBB / a cappella / Banks Music Publications
Balakirev, Mily (1837-1910) Angel vopiyášhe / TTBB / a cappella / Musica Russica
Benoit, Peter (1834-1901) *Missa –/ TTB / with organ / Schott
Berlioz, Hector (1803-1869) *Chant guerrier / TB solo, TTB / with piano *Chanson à boire / T solo, TTB / with piano **Le chant des Bretons / TTBB / with piano
Borodin, Alexander (1833-1887) Serenade of Four Cavaliers to One Lady / TTBB / a cappella / Gwynn
Brahms, Johannes (1833-1897) *Fünf Lieder Op. 41 / TTBB / a cappella ***Rhapsodie Op. 53 / A solo, TTBB / with orchestra *Rinaldo Op. 50 / T solo, TTBB / with orchestra / Kalmus
Bruch, Max (1838-1920) *Frithjof: Szenen aus der Frithjof-Sage, Op. 23 / SB solo, TTBB/ with orchestra
Bruckner, Anton (1824-1896) Abendzauber / T solo, TTBB (SSA off stage) / with 4 horns / Universal Das deutsche Lied / TTBB / with brass / Universal Germanenzug / TTBB / with brass / Doblinger Helgoland / TTBB / with orchestra / Bruckner Verlag Träumen und Wachen / TTBB / a cappella / Doblinger
Buck, Dudley (1839-1904) *The Nun of Nidaros, Op. 83 / T solo, TTBB /with orchestra *The Voyage of Columbus / B solo, TTBB / with orchestra
CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 63 RRepertoireepertoire & STandardsSTandards
Busoni, Ferruccio (1866-1924) *4 Poesie liriche, Op. 40 / TTBB / with orchestra
Cherubini, Luigi (1760-1842) *Requiem in D minor / TTB / with orchestra / Kalmus
Cornelius, Peter (1824-1874) **Absolve Domine / TTBB / a cappella / Carus-Verlag *Trauerchöre Op. 9 / TTTBB / a cappella
Delibes, Léo (1836-1891) *Marche de soldats / TTBB / a cappella
Diepenbrock, Alphons (1862-1921) Missa in die festo / T solo, TTBB,TTBB / with organ / Donemus
Dvořák, Antonín (1841-1904) Fünf Lieder, Op. 27 / TTBB / a cappella / Thomi-Berg Sechs Chorlieder / TTBB / a cappella / Thomi-Berg
Elgar, Edward William (1857-1934) Five Part-songs, Op. 45 / TTBB / a cappella / Novello
Foote, Arthur (1853-1937) *The Farewell of Hiawatha, Op. 11 / T solo, TB / with orchestra
Gade, Niels (1817-1890) *6 Gesänge für 4 Männerstimmen, Op. 11 / TTBB / a cappella *Fünf Lieder für Männerchor, Op. 26 / TTBB /a cappella *Fünf Lieder für Männerchor, Op. 33 / TTBB /a cappella *Fünf Gesänge für Männerchor, Op. 38 / TTBB / a cappella
Goldmark, Karl (1830-1915) *Frühlingsnetz, Op. 15 / TTBB / with 4 horns and piano
Gounod, Charles (1818-1893) ***Messe brève #2 in G major / TTBB / with organ / Carus-Verlag *Messe brève #5 in C Major / TTB solo, TTB / with organ / Carus-Verlag
Gretchaninov, Aleksandr (1864-1956) Nïne otpushchayeshï / TTBB / a cappella / Musica Russica Voskliknite Ghospodevi / TTBB / a cappella / Musica Russica
Grieg, Edvard (1843-1907) *Album for Mandssang, Op. 30 / TB solo, TTBB / a cappella ***Landkjending, Op. 31 / B solo, TTBB / orchestra/piano / Edition Peters Den store, hvide fl ok / B solo, TTBB / a cappella / Gehrmans Musikförlag *Sangerhilsen / TTBB / a cappella / Gehrmans Musikförlag **Kongekvadet, Op. 22, No. 1 / T solo, TTBB / with piano ***Kristianiensernes Sangerhilsen / B solo, TTBB / a cappella **Norrønafolket, Op. 22, No. 2 / T solo, TTBB / with piano
Janáček, Leoš (1854-1928) **Láska opravdivá (Die wahre Liebe) / TTBB / a cappella Four Folksongs for Men’s Choir / TTBB / a cappella / Alliance Publications
64 CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 Repertoire & STandards
Josephson, Jacob Axel (1818-1880) **Serenad / TTBB / a cappella / Gehrmans Musikförlag
Kalinnikov, Viktor (1870-1927) Vniz po matushke po Volge / TTBB / a cappella / Musica Russica
Liszt, Franz (1811-1886) *Faust Symphonie, S. 108 / T solo, TTB / with orchestra/organ / Edwin F. Kalmus *Pater noster III / TTBB / with organ / Carus-Verlag *Requiem / TTBB solo, TTBB / with organ / Eulenburg Edition *Te Deum I / TTBB / with organ / Carus-Verlag
MacDowell, Edward (1860-1908) *The Rose and the Gardener / TTBB / a cappella *Three Chorus for Male Voices, Op. 52 / TTBB / a cappella *Two Chorus for Male Voices, Op. 53 / TTBB / a cappella *Three Chorus for Male Voices, Op. 54 / TTBB / a cappella *Two Songs, Op. 41 / TTBB / a cappella Veni creator spiritus / TTBB / with organ / Carus-Verlag
Schubert, Franz (1797-1828) **An die Frühling / TTBB / a cappella Abendfrieden / TTBB / a cappella / Tonos ***Der Gondelfahrer, D. 809, Op. 28 / TTBB / with piano / Schott Die Allmacht, D. 852, Op. 79, No. 2 / T solo, TTBB / with orchestra/piano / Doblinger Die Nacht / TTBB / a cappella / Hal Leonard *Ewige Liebe / TTBB / a cappella / Tonos *Flucht / TTBB / a cappella / Tonos *Gesang der Geister über den Wassern / TTBB / a cappella ***Grab und Mond / TTBB / a cappella / Tonos *Nachtelle / T solo, TTBB / with piano / Carus-Verlag ***Sehnsucht, D. 656 / TTBBB / with piano *Trinklied / B solo, TTBB / with piano *Widerspruch, D. 865 / TTBB / with piano
Schumann, Robert (1810-1856) *Drei Gesänge, Op. 62 / TTBB / a cappella / Edition Peters *Jagdbrevier, Op. 137 / TTBB / with 4 horns / Edition Peters **Sechs Lieder Op. 33 / TTBB / a cappella / Kalmus
Sibelius, Jean (1856-1957) Kullervo, Op. 7 / AB solo, TTBB / with orchestra / Breitkopf & Härtel *The Origin of Fire, Op. 32 / B solo, TTBB / with orchestra / Breitkopf & Härtel
CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 65 RRepertoireepertoire & STandardsSTandards
Stenhammar, Wilhelm (1871-1927) Norrland / TTBB/ a cappella / Gehrmans Musikförlag Soldatsang / TTBB / a cappella / Gehrmans Musikförlag Sverige / TTBB / a cappella / Gehrmans Musikförlag
Strauss, Richard (1864-1949) Drei Männerchöre Op. 45 / TTBB/ a cappella / Schott Drei Männerchöre Op. 123 / TTBB / a cappella / Boosey & Hawkes
Sullivan, Sir Arthur (1842-1900) *The Long Day Closes / TTBB / a cappella / Annie Bank
Sveinbjörnsson, Sveinbjörn (1847-1927) ***Dettifoss / T solo, TTBB / with piano
Svendsen, Johan (1840-1911) *Two Part-songs for Men’s Voices, Op. 2 / TTBB / a cappella
Tchaikovsky, Pyotr (1840-1893) Why Has the Voice of Merrymaking Fallen Silent? / TTBB / a cappella / Musica Russica *Evening / TTB/ a cappella / Musica Russica von Weber, Carl Maria (1786-1826) ***Leyer und Schwerdt, Op. 42 / TTBB / a cappella
Wagner, Richard (1813-1883) *An Weber’s Grabe / TTBB / a cappella / Schott *Das Liebesmahl der Apostel / multiple TTBB choirs / with orchestra / Kalmus **Beglückt darf nun dich / TTBB / orchestra/piano
Wolf, Hugo (1860-1903) Die Stimme des Kindes / TTBB / with piano/ Doblinger Drei Lieder / TTBB / a cappella / Doblinger
The following resources include information about men’s chorus repertoire:
Sarsany, Timothy David. “Robert Schumann’s Part-Songs for Men's Chorus and a Detailed Analysis of Fünf Gesänge (Jagdlieder), Opus 137.” DMA diss., Ohio State University, 2010.
Shrock, Dennis. Choral Repertoire. New York: Oxford University Press, 2009.
Strimple, Nick. Choral Music in the Nineteenth Century. New York: Amadeus Press, 2008.
Trott, Donald, ed. Nineteenth Century Choral Repertoire: An Annotated Bibliography of Music Appropriate for College and University Choirs. Oklahoma City: ACDA monograph No.14, 2009.
Mark Ramsay is currently completing his masters in choral conducting at the University of Toronto under the direction of Hilary Apfelstadt and is the assistant conductor and pianist for the University of Toronto Men’s Chorus and Exultate Chamber Singers.
66 CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 Repertoire & STandards
The RAYMOND W. A ccontestontest ccreatedreated iinn aann eeffortffort ttoo ppromoteromote cchoralhoral mmusicusic aandnd eensurensure iitsts ffutureuture bbyy showcasingshowcasing tthehe talenttalent ofof youngyoung Is your student chapter doing interesting activities? Email news updates and photos to sfl ansburg@ BROCK ccomposersomposers aacrosscross tthehe ccountryountry Memorialacda.org. Updates Student should Composition be 250 words or Contest fewer. Include the name and email address for the person we should contact if there are questions on the information, as well as the name of your college or university and the city and state in which you are located. Space is limited, but we will publish as much as possible—with a preference given to submissions that are interesting, creative, and relevantMany young to composersother student have respondedchapters andto this the opportunity wider ACDA. motivated by the $1,000 cash award and the prospect of having their work premiered at an ACDA National or Division Conference.
Previous Winners include:
1998 Paul A. Aiken Flanders Field 2007 Kristen Walker In Monte Oliveti 1999 Daniel Pinkston Nunc Dimittis 2008 Benjamin Paul May Absalon, fi li mi 2000 Aaron Garber Stabat Mater 2009 Derek Myler Psalm 100 2001 Michael Conti Choric Song 2010 Michael Mills Crossing the Bar 2002 Joshua Shank Musica Anima Tangens 201 1 Joshua Fishbein Oseh Shalom 2003 Brian Schmidt Lux Aeterna 201 2 Julian Bryson Redemption Mass 2004 Kentaro Sato Kyrie 201 3 Matthew Emery Unto Young Eternity 2005 Dan Forrest Selah 201 4 Andrew Steffen Spells of Herrick 2006 Dominick DiOrio The Soul’s Passing
The application and contest guidelines are available at
NDSU CHORAL SYMPOSIUM OCTOBER 22-24, 2015 NORTH DAKOTA STATE UNIVERSITY, FARGO
The NDSU School of Music, the American Choral Directors Association and the American Composers Forum proudly announce the “NDSU Choral Symposium: Contemporary Composition in America.”
Noted composer, conductor and lecturer Eric Whitacre will headline the three-day symposium, presenting sessions on his music and working with NDSU choral
PHOTO: MARC ROYCE ensembles.
The featured choir is Cantus, a nine-member ensemble based in the Twin Cities. It is acclaimed for its engaging performance of music ranging from the Renaissance to the 21st century. PHOTO: CURTIS JOHNSON
FEATURED PRESENTERS Abbie Betinis, Composer Craig Carnahan, American Composers Forum Jocelyn Hagen, Composer Steven Sametz, Composer Tim Sharp, American Choral Directors Association
MORE INFORMATION: contact Jo Ann Miller at [email protected] or visit ndsu.edu/performingarts/choralsymposium. COMPOSITION IN AMERICA CONTEMPORARY
68 CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 Jason Paulk, Editor
Feeding the Choirs: The Beginner’s Recipe Guide to Selecting Repertoire
By Jessica Rikard
Quality Ingredients and their fi rst job is choosing music they composers, genres, cultures, and lan- Healthy Eating performed in college. The music is guages. It is a great responsibility to Choosing great repertoire is criti- usually too hard, which can cause be the only one directing students’ ex- cal to the success of all choral pro- serious frustration for the director posure to choral music, and it should grams, and choosing repertoire is a and the new choir. Instead, choose be a goal to help them experience lot like choosing food. Many college music that fi ts the choirs’ skill level. the “big picture” of choral repertoire students live off of fast and cheap Teaching a piece that the choristers with a mix of all genres and styles. meals. You know the kind I’m talking can fi nd quick success with will give a about—Ramen noodles, popcorn, confi dence boost for the teacher and mac and cheese, and fast food. Al- the students, building trust without Uncovering the though this food is easily attainable, it much eff ort. Standard Choral Canon is neither rewarding nor healthy. Just First things fi rst—choral music The term “standard choral canon” as people “are what they eat,” choirs educators should “feed” the choirs is a term used loosely by many profes- essentially “are what they sing.” For from the various food groups. Just as sionals in the choral music profession. many students preparing to enter one would probably not eat a meal What exactly is this standard choral into the fi eld of choral music educa- consisting of just diff erent fl avors of canon? Why is it important for young tion, the process of discovering and Ramen noodles, choirs should not be choral music educators to know what choosing repertoire is a mysterious exposed to just one type of music. It it is and why they should utilize it one. This article aims to serve as a is the responsibility of the director to when programming music? When “beginner’s guide” to selecting rep- ensure the choir has a well-balanced selecting music, some veterans in the ertoire. With research, experience, diet of meat and potatoes, vegetables, choral music fi eld use the 50/50 rule and a lot of trial and error, young fruits, and desserts. All students of programming: at least 50 percent educators will uncover the ingredi- should be taught a well-rounded cur- from the standard choral canon and ents needed for the perfect recipe. riculum, comprising music from not 50 percent new music. Others be- Choral music education majors just one era or genre. Students should lieve in programming a majority of have encountered mass amounts of be exposed to a variety of cuisines new music. It is important for choral choral music by the time they gradu- over the course of their choral music directors-in-training to keep in mind ate from college and enter the fi eld. experience. The job of choral music that their job is as an educator, not a One of the biggest mistakes new specialists is to broaden students’ professional entertainer. Sometimes educators make when beginning tastes to consist of a mixture of eras, music that is easily accessible loses its
CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 69 ability to retain interest for the entire is an umbrella term that applies to • Repertoire of high and enduring rehearsal process, while music that is pieces mutually accepted by profes- quality interesting and challenging holds the sionals in the fi eld of choral music to attention of singers until, during, and be essential to our “healthy” choral • Repertoire by Bach, Brahms, even after performance. diets. In other words, this could be Handel, Haydn, Mozart, and In the journey to uncover the considered the “meat and potatoes” other important historical com- standard choral canon, choral meth- of our choral cuisine. Here are a few posers ods textbooks were consulted. Then, credentials of pieces that could be various professionals in the fi eld of considered to be in the choral canon: If it is agreed upon that the choral music were interviewed. After standard choral canon is the “meat research and interviews, it has been • A piece over 100 years old that is still and potatoes” of our curriculum, it determined that there is no clear-cut performed today is important that we learn how to defi nition of the standard choral discover more of it so that we might canon. The standard choral canon • Popular, well-known choral pieces implement it into our teaching.
Finding Repertoire Now it’s time for choral music educators to embark on the mission of fi nding repertoire to feed the choir. Here are some suggestions that might help locate quality repertoire for the students’ balanced choral music diet:
1) Colleagues – Perhaps one of the best ways to fi nd repertoire is from colleagues. Make friends with fellow choral educators and plan a time to peruse each other’s choral libraries and share pieces. This sharing should include music that has been successful with the choirs and pieces that have presented challenges. Knowing what has not worked with other groups is just as valuable as knowing what has.
2) Conferences and Workshops – New educators are often told of the im- portance of attending conferences and workshops. National, regional, and state conferences are great ways to discover new music. A conference
70 CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 can sometimes seem like one continu- iTunes, CDs, and other resources. but it is crucial for success. Choral ous concert. During conferences and Music can also be streamed for free directors have the opportunity to workshops, there are often reading using tools such as ACDA Radio, teach, inspire, and sometimes even sessions; the most benefi cial reading Pandora, Spotify, National Public change lives through the music that sessions are typically those “tried and Radio, and Minnesota Public Radio. is selected. For some choristers, this proven” sessions in which educators Many of these resources are available will be their only exposure to choral put together packets containing old to download as applications on smart music for the rest of their lives. This gems and recommendations of newer phones and tablets to make listening is a serious responsibility and chal- pieces that have been found to be to music even more convenient. lenge, one that should be viewed worthy of performance. with a sense of eagerness as opposed 6) The Web and other resources – The to trepidation. The key to success in 3) Concerts – An obvious way to fi nd Web and other resources such as choosing repertoire is to choose it as new repertoire is to attend as many books and recordings are helpful if you are designing a menu to feed concerts as possible. It is wise to keep tools when selecting repertoire. Three your students physically, emotionally, programs from concerts and confer- websites that choral educators should spiritually, and, in this case, musically. ences, circling pieces that appeal to have bookmarked are the Choral With focused attention to the act of you and ordering a single copy of Public Domain Library (www.cpdl. programming, directors can become “must do” pieces to add to your cho- org), ChoralNet (www.choralnet.org), adept choral chefs by building satisfy- ral music library. and YouTube (www.youtube.com). ing and delectable aural menus for The Choral Public Domain Library is their singers and audiences. 4) Publications – Publications such a great place to fi nd free choral music as ACDA’s Choral Journal and state that is under public domain. Much Jessica Rikard recently graduated newsletters are another vital resource. of the music in the standard choral from the University of North Ala- They can be extremely useful in fi nd- canon is old enough that it is now in bama, where she majored in choral ing repertoire for a choir. Many publi- public domain. Choral resources are music education and was president cations contain columns with reviews sometimes just a click away. of the UNA ACDA Student Chapter. of new choral literature. ChoralNet is self-described as “the Internet center for choral music.” 5) Listening – Another helpful tool to It is ACDA’s website that serves as aid in selecting repertoire is listen- an umbrella for choir organizations ing to music. However, the act of and provides a wealth of resources listening to choose repertoire is not and helpful tools that can be of great an easily acquired skill. The young use to choir directors. Various lists choral director must practice listen- provide an important repertoire re- ing to quality repertoire just like they source, such as ACDA’s Repertoire & practice voice or conducting. Make Standards, state music festival, and this listening habit a daily event! It is adjudication contest lists. easy to take for granted having high- quality music literally in the palms of our hands. No more digging in record Conclusion bins hoping to score Mozart’s Requiem. The process of choosing repertoire www.choralnet.org RESOURCES AND COMMUNICATIONS Music can be purchased through is challenging for young directors, FOR THE GLOBAL CHORAL COMMUNITY
CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 71 Help grow new choral singers and develop new choral conductors with a gift to the American Choral Directors Association’s Fund for Tomorrow Your donation to this new fund will help to encourage new children’s choirs, support ACDA student members and chapters, provide national conference scholarships to Honor Choir students, and mentor talented youth into new choral conductors and teachers.
With a gift of $1,000 or more, you become a member of the Podium Society, a very special group of people who invest significantly in our programing for children and youth.
More information at: www.acda.org/fund4tomorrow
Give online or mail your contribution to ACDA, 545 Couch Dr., Oklahoma City, OK 73102-2207. The American Choral Directors Association is a 501(c)3 tax-exempt organization. Your gift to this fund is tax deductible to the extent allowed by law. The How of Rehearsing
By Hilary Apfelstadt
Editor’s Note: This article is a of consideration. They are, however, ….” It was supposed to focus them follow-up to “Taking Your Rehearsal grouped according to two categories: and perhaps remind them who was Temperature” (May 2015, Choral 1) delivery (speech and presentation) boss. As youngsters, they wanted to Journal vol. 55, no. 10) and originally and 2) teaching. please their parents, and it seemed to appeared in the Canadian Music Educa- work, coupled with direct eye-to-eye tor, issue 55 (2), 2013. It is reproduced contact. On the podium, however, “I here with permission of the Cana- 1. Delivery (speech and language” has the eff ect of isolating dian Music Educators’ Association. presentation) Strategies the conductor. Conductors make no sound as we “make music”; the sound • State expectations clearly. Tell us source is the musicians working with Part one discussed six principles where to start (e.g., “bar 4”), what to us. It’s a collaborative endeavour. of eff ective rehearsal: structure, se- do (“everyone sing on ‘tah,’ please”), When we say, “do it for me,” or “I quence, clear strategies, appropriate and how or why (“tall vowels”; “ac- want you to (do something),” it fo- strategies, development of musician- curate pitch and rhythm”). cuses on the conductor rather than ship skills, and encouragement. This the ensemble. Simply saying, “Let’s article will outline a number of spe- • Be assertive in giving directions look at that passage,” for example, cifi c strategies that can be helpful in by using statement infl ection, not implies that we are all in this together. addressing the above. Many of these question infl ection. (In other words, The singers are not there for us; we are common-sense ideas that we try avoid trailing off at the end: “Start on are all there for the music. to address in teaching novice conduc- page 4?”) Sometimes novice conduc- tor-educators but are equally valuable tors do this because they lack confi - • When you have a specifi c answer for those of us with more experience. dence; sometimes we do it because we in mind, ask a specifi c question. From time to time it is good to reex- have a habit of using rising infl ection “What do you notice?” is vague amine how we are teaching. Some at the end of sentences. In either case, compared with “What do you notice of the ideas in the following pages it undermines our assurance. that is diff erent about the rhythm come from my own observations of there?” Questioning should be nei- young conductors, and some come • Be inclusive by avoiding “‘I’ ther a guessing game nor a fi shing from the students themselves as a language.” As a young parent, I re- expedition. result of group discussions. They are member hearing that it was eff ective in no particular order; all are worthy to tell my children, “I need you to do
CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 73 • Use follow-up questions to rein- • Model good singing habits, includ- • When you hear a problem, give force “yes” or “no” questions or ing posture, stance, breathing, etc., a strategy to fi x it. “Tenors, that is “right answer” questions that have and look like the music when you fl at,” does not tell us if it is a vowel only one solution. For example, conduct. There are two ideas here, issue, a vocal production issue, or if we ask, “What is the key of this but they are related. Students will simply a missed pitch. “Brighten song?” and someone correctly an- emulate what they see and hear us that vowel” can be more helpful, for swers “G major,” it is easy to say do, sometimes without really realizing example. (Further examples of this “right” and go on. But there may be it. Often, we are the primary voice appear in the previous article under someone in the group who does not teacher they have and may be the #3, “Eff ective rehearsals incorporate know how the person fi gured that only conductor for whom they sing. clear strategies.”) out, or even worse, the answer might The habits they learn about singing have been a lucky guess. It takes a and expressing music are developed • Consider that learners process few seconds to say, “Good. How do from us. diff erently. Some learners are au- you know?” and fi nd out the person’s ditory, some are visual, some are strategy and to potentially help some- kinesthetic, and many use a combi- one who does not know how to do 2. Teaching Strategies nation of modalities. Movement, no that on his or her own. Other eff ective matter how limited, helps internalize • Always give a reason for repeating questioning techniques involve asking rhythm, can show phrase length or something. Saying, “Do it again,” open-ended questions that allow for direction, and serves as a visual re- does not allow singers to know what a variety of responses and are often inforcement for auditory experience. the goal is or what they are supposed helpful in developing critical-thinking to be focusing on during that repeti- skills. • Give a focus for listening. This tion. helps singers know what it is they are to concentrate on and what they are to get out of a strategy. If we ask singers to “listen” without direc- A steady tion, even though we have a specifi c stream of goal, we are asking them to read our minds. Sometimes in rehearsal, it is voices tempting to say, “Listen!” but what is supreme. it that they are listening to? Some will be startled into singing more quietly, perhaps; some may listen to someone next to them a bit more carefully; some may change nothing because they do not really understand the point. If we are asking singers to listen for bad intonation or sloppy rhythm, tell them, and that will enable them to focus their listening energy in a consistent direction.
74 CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 • When using chanting or speech Choral Workshops that took place in the way I had been taught. to reinforce rhythm, have singers the 1990s.) use a light voice, at a higher pitch • Teach for transfer. This was refer- level than their normal speech, to • Never teach anything you have to enced in the previous article under avoid fatigue. In addition, speak or unteach later. This valuable advice #5, “Effective rehearsals develop chant the text expressively. All of this came from my graduate music educa- musicianship skills.” I mention it here transfers more readily to actual sing- tion advisor, Eunice Boardman, who because it, too, came to me from Dr. ing than does the kind of monotone taught for many years at the Univer- Boardman as another powerful lesson drone that is easy to use for this activ- sity of Wisconsin-Madison and at the that has streamlined my teaching, ity, simply because we are not think- University of Illinois. She mentioned saving a lot of time and eff ort over ing about it enough. Robert Shaw, the it fi rst in relation to the fact that the years. Helping students make con- late conductor of the Atlanta Sym- children were often taught to regard nections among similar things enables phony Orchestra and Chorus, used a quarter notes as the “beat.” She them to apply skills already learned “monotone chord” for this purpose; asked, “Then what happens when in one context to another. It is a step basses sang an E below middle C; ten- they encounter compound meter and toward musical independence. ors sang a G# above that; Altos sang that isn’t true anymore? Do we tell the D above middle C; Sopranos, them that we lied beforehand?” This the F# above that. With just enough powerful lesson stuck with me. At the Hilary Apfelstadt is professor and di- dissonance to encourage alertness, time, I was working in a lab school rector of choral activities at the Uni- this chord served the purpose of with children in grades K – 5 and versity of Toronto, where she holds allowing people to phonate without learning myself, after several years of the Elmer Iseler Chair in Conducting. worrying about specifi c pitches on teaching experience, that rhythm was She is also artistic director of Exultate the page in order to focus exclusively about proportion—“longer than” or Chamber Singers in Toronto. She on the rhythm. (Examples of this can “shorter than”—rather than about taught in the United States for many be seen in any of the DVDs that are absolutes. It completely changed the years and served ACDA as national part of the Carnegie Hall produc- way I approached the teaching of president from 2007 to 2009. tions documenting the Robert Shaw rhythm, even though it challenged
Recommended Resources for Rehearsal Strategies
Bartle, Jean Ashworth. Sound Advice:Becoming a Better Children’s Choir Conductor. New York: Oxford University Press, 2003. (This has many ideas that are broadly applicable to a range of ages.)
Emmons, Shirlee and Constance Chase. Prescriptions for Choral Excellence. New York: Oxford University Press, 2005.
Gumm, Alan, ed. The Choral Director’s Cookbook: Insights and Inspired Recipes for Beginners and Experts. Galesville, MD: Meredith Music Publications, 2006.
ChorTeach archive:
CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 75
Stephen Town, Editor [email protected]
Music in 1853: The Biography of a Year reads like a travel log, documentary, the twenty-year-old genius Brahms Hugh Macdonald and novel all in one. by publishing Neue Bahnen (New Paths) Suff olk, England: Boydell Press, 2012 Berlioz is the oldest of the six at in Germany’s most widely read music 224 pp. ISBN: 978-1843837183 fi fty. Resigned to never being fully journal. (Schumann had done simi- accepted in his own country, he had larly for Berlioz twenty years earlier The six headline dramatis personae decided to limit himself to writing by reviewing Symphonie fantastic. He in this brilliant book—Franz Liszt, articles and conducting. But after used Liszt’s transcription for piano, Robert Schumann, Richard Wagner, a three-year hiatus from compos- the only score available; fortunately, Joseph Joachim, Johannes Brahms, ing, in 1853 he is writing a choral- Liszt had made careful annotations and Hector Berlioz—were the engine orchestral work that will become on orchestration.) Macdonald gives for fresh ideas and spectacular ac- his most popular during his lifetime, a vivid description of the four weeks complishments at the height of the L’enfance du Christ. Among those who Brahms and Schumann spent to- Romantic era. By casting a keenly persuaded him to compose again gether and lists the repertoire they focused lens on one year’s events, were Schumann, Joachim, Liszt, and were composing and played for one Macdonald’s eminently readable and possibly Brahms. another. Their frenzy of talks and vivid narrative brings this momen- Brahms and his lifelong friend music making was an historic event tous time to life. We gain fresh, deep and performing partner, Joachim, of mutual musical inspiration. Mean- insight into just who these composers a top-notch violinist, are in their while, Wagner was writing extensively were. early twenties and the youngest of on his philosophy of music and dra- Most music historians discuss the group. Using Brahms’s diary and ma and, following his own fi ve-year composers’ infl uences and legacies providing a detailed map of the jour- hiatus from composing, began the or focus on the evolution of musical ney, Macdonald retraces Brahms’s most massive music-drama venture styles. In Music in 1853, Macdonald ten-day hike alone down the Rhine yet, The Ring. leads us along a new path, guiding from Mainz to Bonn, all the while It is Liszt who is the pivotal star us more horizontally than vertically. sorting out what he might make of his of the group, not because of his We watch with fascination as these life. During overnight stays, Brahms pianistic wizardry or famous B minor musicians’ lives unfold during one enthralls his hosts by playing his own Piano Sonata, but rather for his acts of slice of time and in relationship to piano compositions, and he makes generosity. In Weimar where he is Ka- one another. International travel infl uential friends who become fu- pellmeister, Liszt programs a festival of was requisite for artists of that time, ture concert sponsors. Astonishingly, Berlioz’s concert music and rehabili- and Macdonald traces their journeys in 1853 Brahms had yet to hear a tates his problematic opera Benvenuto across Europe and to London in fas- Beethoven symphony. Cellini. Liszt stands out as a genuine cinating detail. Packed with materials Schumann, Wagner, and Liszt advocate for many of his friends and derived from diaries, letters, memoirs, are in their early forties. Before colleagues—this despite the evolving newspapers, journals, biographies, Schumann’s health declines, he fo- divide in philosophy beginning to and historical accounts, the book cuses the international spotlight on distinguish Schumann, Brahms, and
CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 77 Joachim from Liszt, Wagner, and One need not be particularly familiar of the première. Such a situation is Berlioz: absolute vs. programmatic with chamber, vocal solo, choral, or inconceivable today. music. instrumental repertoire to appreciate Sponsorship by royalty, aristocracy The details of concert customs how lengthy concerts must have been. and varieties of governments contin- are fascinating. While still anchored It was Wagner who discontinued ued to be crucial, and audiences grew on Haydn, Mozart, and Beethoven, the practice of vocal novelty items as concerts and operas were crafted to like today, much of the music in and placed the complete symphony appeal to the emerging, more numer- mid-nineteenth-century concerts last, as is done today. He and Berlioz ous middle class. Our six artists hold was newly composed. Concerts were were determined to raise standards positions in courts, municipalities, a mishmash of diff erent genres and of orchestral playing: we fi nd Wag- churches, and theaters on a scale un- short selections and included a partie ner fi ring a harpist for knitting in rivalled elsewhere in Europe, and fre- vocale for soloist and chorus. Instead rehearsal and Berlioz turning down quent royal and civic celebrations still of complete works, portions of a sym- a London conducting engagement require music to be written for them. phony or choral-orchestral work were because of insuffi cient rehearsal time. We see at close hand the whir and performed; a vocal soloist sang an For performance of a new work, au- buzz of these composer-performers’ opera excerpt accompanied either by diences might be notifi ed of the date working world: they travel, write copi- piano or orchestra, and an overture when preparation was nearly done, ous letters, raise money and pay bills, ended rather than began a concert. sometimes just a week in advance prepare performing materials for re-
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78 CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 hearsals, arrange for translations and seldorf, and Berlioz was crossing the piano-vocal scores to be made, proof English Channel to conduct a series scores for publication, plan concert of concerts in London. repertoire, engage halls, recruit cho- Personal vignettes include, for ruses, hire players and soloists, write example, a depiction of Liszt’s invitations to reviewers and infl uen- boundless energy and of his intrigu- tial patrons, set rehearsal schedules, ing family unit, which at the time conduct or attend rehearsals—all in included his mistress, Princess Caro- addition to composing, performing lyn, her daughter, and her mother. and, in some cases, authoring articles We learn what Wagner was reading and books. Concert announcements while he was “taking the cure” in St. and promotional articles were posted Moritz and how he found the spot, at Exxperienceperience in multiple daily newspapers, as were over 7,000 feet, where he previously the Artistry of reviews. Individual communication imagined Fricka and Wotan would was in person or by handwritten let- contemplate Valhalla for the fi rst America Cantat 8 ter. Amazingly, intercity mail delivery time. How fascinating it is to read was often within a day or two, while of Brahms’s piano playing through August 21-31, 2016 local delivery could be within hours. fi rsthand reports and of his startled Our international artists were con- discovery of Schumann’s Neue Bahnen www.america-cantat.org stant trekkers traveling via the rapidly article. We even learn of personal in- expanding network of trains and tra- timacies, such as Wagner’s romances, ditional “diligences” (stage coaches). his seemingly excessive attachment to We learn where they lodged, in some his dog, and Schumann’s coded diary cases how the hotel looked then and entries about his nights with Clara. today, its location, the route, how long And what did these compos- it took to travel there, and the stan- ers think of one another? Clara dard of accommodations. We learn Schumann distanced herself from of Robert and Clara Schumann’s Liszt and disliked Berlioz, probably exhausting Holland concert tour to because the latter had written an Utrecht, The Hague, Rotterdam, unenthusiastic review of a concert and Amsterdam, presenting thirteen she gave in Paris in 1839. As already concerts in twenty-fi ve days, with noted, Liszt enthusiastically produced Clara doing most of the performing. numerous concerts of his colleagues’ The crisscrossing of people, composi- music, particularly Berlioz’s. By Ber- tions, and performances is a ballet of lioz’s measure, however, Liszt was not incredible richness, and Macdonald a good conductor. Brahms attended portrays it splendidly. On Saturday, some of Liszt’s student sessions at the May 14, for example, Wagner was Altenburg in Weimar, but no affi nity in Zurich giving a public reading developed between them. Neither did of his Lohengrin libretto (composers Brahms make his opinion of Berlioz rarely authored their own librettos, known other than to give lukewarm and none previously had given public comments on Le Repos de la sainte readings of them), while Joachim was famille, an excerpt from L’enfance du in rehearsal with Schumann in Düs- Christ. Wagner’s comments on Ber-
CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 79 lioz’s music and personal qualities ing their librettos; Brahms, Joachim, do matter to our art. Now as musi- were circumspect at best. Schuman, and Liszt dazzled their cians we may prepare their music In terms of skill sets, all six were friends with exquisite playing. for performance with the tantalizing conductors; Berlioz was the best In Music in 1853, Macdonald’s sense that we actually know them of them. Schumann, Wagner, and “chief concern is not with musical personally. Berlioz were prolifi c authors, as was style but with the musicians who Liszt, to a lesser extent. Joachim was formed it,” and he writes with “a Melinda O’Neal the brilliant violinist and longtime delight in the details which them- Dartmouth College performing partner of Brahms. As selves may have little to do with art” for being the star of the party, Berlioz (xi). Certainly, though, the details so and Wagner could entertain by read- wonderfully chronicled in this volume
Below is a preview of the articles you will fi nd in the latest issue of ChorTeach, available to ACDA members online at
The Role Trust Plays in Music Rehearsals by Tom Wine For students to be successful in rehearsal and during performances, they need to believe in their conductor and feel empowered to fi nd solu- tions when mistakes are made. This important article offers practical exercises that you can implement in your rehearsals to inspire confi dence in your singers and build trust in the music-making process.
Software Apps for Choir Directors—Not Students by Chris Clark Software can be a useful classroom tool to enhance the education of singers. But did you know there are apps available that will save you, the teacher, time and energy? Don’t miss this helpful list of seven apps for choir directors.
Looking Back, Teaching Forward: Using Folk Songs to Teach Culture, History, and Music in the Elementary Classroom by David Row Elementary music educators can quickly become overwhelmed by the wide range of skills and knowledge that are available to teach beginning students. This article introduces the concept of using folk songs to teach diffi cult concepts and provides suggestions for activities that you can try with your own singers.
Work and Wellness for Choral Conductors: Exercise Makes a Difference by Stephen Sieck Do more hours at work really equate to better results in the classroom? If so, then why do so many music teachers burn out and leave the profession? This article examines data of a survey that answered this question in order to determine what factors contribute to higher job satisfaction in the long term.
Classical Improvisation: A Powerful and Effective Addition to Choral Warm-ups by Matthew Potterton Rehearsals are fi lled with basic theory and reading skills, vocal technique, and, of course, actually rehearsing music for the upcoming concert. Teachers who say there is not enough time for improvisation will appreciate this article, which includes fun, creative ideas for incorporating improvisation into the choral warm-up.
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America: Copland, Reich, Cage, Feldman, Kammerchor and other premier The renaissance quality of the music Bernstein, and Barber groups, draws polished, authoritative interested Shaw, who premiered and SWR Vokalensemble Stuttgart performances throughout, navigating recorded the work with the Atlanta Marcus Creed, conductor even the most diffi cult moments with Symphony Chorus. This new record- Hänssler Classic 93.306 security and apparent ease. ing affi rms the work’s worthiness for (2014; 77’33”) Samuel Barber’s plaintive lament continued programming. for men’s chorus and percussion, A The lengthiest work on the disc, Hänssler Classic’s new disc might Stopwatch and an Ordnance Map, dates Morton Feldman’s Rothko Chapel, be more aptly called “The Road Less from 1940. It is based on a poem takes its name from a place of medi- Traveled.” This is not a “go to” col- that Stephen Spender dedicated to tation located at the University of lection of Billings, Ives, Hogan, or Barber and inspired by the Spanish Saint Thomas in Houston, Texas, Whitacre. Rather, it is a compilation Civil War. Long chromatic vocal for which the Russian-born painter that leads listeners far away from lines wreathe objects Mark Rothko created a set of large familiar American landscapes and of time and imper- paintings. The installation, with into literature well outside standard manence—a watch, natural light from above illuminating concert fare. Yes, the composers here a map, the moon, dark, atmospheric panels, creates an are familiar, but the selections are not and “bones fi xed at environment that many fi nd powerful what one usually associates with an fi ve”—in a dramatic and almost hypnotic. Feldman’s fasci- American sound. musical shroud that ranks among nating musical setting for viola, per- The disc opens with Aaron Co- Barber’s most overtly emotional cussion, and chorus was completed in pland’s Four Motets, early works that works. Barber’s original manuscript 1971, just a year after Rothko’s death, earned the respect of his teacher, provides evidence that the composer and provides a fi ne aural match for Nadia Boulanger, but refl ect a style literally cut and pasted in parts for the painter’s contemplative visual the composer later rejected. The horns, trombones, and tuba after the landscape. This is the ensemble’s sec- pieces are fi nely crafted and provide work was completed, perhaps as an ond recording of the work. Every a glimpse of the young composer aid to the singers’ intonation. No such gesture, dynamic infl ection, and vocal more enthralled with Mussorgsky assistance is needed here, however, nuance is considered carefully and ex- than Americana. Each motet is as the choir articulates the powerful ecuted fl awlessly. A curiosity for some, affecting, eloquent, and certainly phrases incisively and accurately. Rothko Chapel is indispensable listening worthy of the attention of advanced Leonard Bernstein’s Missa Brevis for others, much like viewer response ensembles. One such ensemble is the for chorus, countertenor, and inciden- to Rothko’s color fi eld canvases. splendid SWR Vokalensemble Stutt- tal percussion was completed in 1989, If Copland, Barber, and Bernstein gart, whose reputation has been built more than thirty years after conduc- refl ect ties to European traditions, on masterly accounts of challenging, tor Robert Shaw suggested to the then Feldman, Reich, and Cage may often unfamiliar choral works. Mar- composer that he adapt music from be seen as pursuing newer, more cus Creed, who has led the RIAS a play, “The Lark,” as a Mass setting. experimental frontiers. Steve Reich’s
CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 83 Proverb sets a Ludwig Wittgenstein specifi cally for Opus 7. The twelve Harrison Birtwistle: The Moth Requiem text for performances by three so- composers on the disc include David BBC Singers pranos, two tenors, two vibraphones, Asplin, William Bergsma, Stephen The Nash Ensemble and two electric organs. The words Thomas Cavit, Lorri Kristin Frog- Nicholas Kok, conductor “How small a thought it takes to fi ll gét, Ron Jeff ers, Bern Herbolsheimer, Roderick Williams, baritone a whole life!” provide an apt distilla- Alan Hovhaness, John Muehleisen, Signum Classics SIGCD368 tion of minimalism generally, and to Robert Scandrett, Roupen Shakari- (2014; 73’54”) this piece in particular. John Cage’s an, and Joan Szymko. “Five” is from his late Number Series, The ensemble exhibits consider- This CD has been released to mark which includes fi fty-two works for able fl exibility and understanding the composer’s eightieth birthday various forces. Five performers work in accommodating and, in addition to his Moth Requiem, from sheets with fi ve tones, governed the diverse styles and contains a kaleidoscope of pieces by the clock but following the prin- textures encountered. from various periods of his life. While ciple of indeterminacy, which allows Opus 7 utilizes nu- titles such as “motet” and “requiem” the performers a great deal of free- anced contrast in may raise expectations of sacred cho- dom, at least until their fi ve minutes tone between genres, ral genres, and since the vocal texts— are up. from the pinpoint intonation of the for example, the lovely and intimate centerpiece work As Water Ascends to a Lullaby that captures the mood of David Castleberry Cloud to the playful, tongue-in-cheek Christmas—carry links to the Chris- Huntington, West Virginia Eat Your Vegetables! and the esoteric tian religion and symbolism, the CD sonorities of Ubi caritas. The use of aims beyond genre recognition, or the trumpet, clarinet, and organ adds to seeking after religious associations, to As Water Ascends to a Cloud: the sonic variety of the album as well. explore the philosophical elements of Music by Pacifi c Northwest Composers Opus 7 brings the highest level of life, death, and resurrection. Opus 7 Vocal Ensemble artistry to an eclectic mix of contem- The disc’s first composition is Loren W. Pontén , conductor porary compositions in this record- The Ring Dance of the Nazarene (2003), Gothic G-49285 (2013; 73’48”) ing. Chorus America and ASCAP scored for baritone, mixed choir, and have both recognized Opus 7 for its a small ensemble of fl ute, piccolo, As Water Ascends to a Cloud features a “adventurous programming” and oboe, E-fl at clarinet, plethora of compositional styles and performance excellence. Further pro- bass clarinet, and a genres by composers of the Pacifi c gram notes on the individual works of tombak, a goblet- Northwest United States and Can- this album can also be found through shaped drum from ada, masterfully recorded by Loren Gothic Recordings at http://www. ancient Iran. David Pontén and the Opus 7 Vocal En- gothic-catalog.com. Harsent’s text is based on the Gospel semble. According to the CD notes, episode of the Last Supper. The bari- “This CD is an anthology of choral Thomas Lerew tone solo represents the Nazarene, or works…that represents the diverse Tucson, Arizona Christ, but his words are occasion- cultural, social, and geographical in- ally taken over by the choir. Through fl uences of the region.” Many of the most of the work, the tombak is used texts are based on excerpted poems as a percussion continuo accompany- or traditional folk tunes. Of the sev- ing a circular ring dance, a symbol of enteen works included in this album, eternity and resurrection. eleven are world-premiere record- The Three Latin Motets (1999), for ings, and nearly half were composed six-part unaccompanied mixed choir,
84 CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 were composed for Birtwistle’s opera ters in diff erent registers and voice was written to celebrate the seventy- The Last Supper and served there as combinations, and repetitive short fi fth anniversary of the Netherlands interludes accompanying three “vi- call-motives, dominate the mood of Chamber Choir and premiered in sions.” Their familiar texts—“O the composition. Amsterdam in October 2012. The bone Jesu,” “Pange lingua,” and “In The Moth Requiem itself “explores text, “A Literalist,” is from Robin supremae nocte cenae”—are drawn the loss of childhood dreams and the Blaser’s set called The Moth Poem— from the fourteenth-century prayer evanescence of life,” according to the a mediation and refl ection on life “Anima Christi” and from a hymn by composer. Scored for twelve female and loss. From its fi rst few measures, St. Thomas Aquinas. The occasional singers, alto fl ute, and three harps, it this recording demonstrates vocally imitative treatments in the voice parts are enhanced by expressive word- painting that recalls Monteverdi’s madrigals. The voices are grouped mostly in contrasting male and fe- male choirs, with a high soprano solo fl oating above them. The virtuosic vocal writing, the freedom of vocal expression, and the treatment of the voices as soloists reminded this re- viewer of Messiaen’s Cinq Rechants, which is no surprise since Birtwistle has acknowledged that composer’s infl uence. More traditional SATB setting and formal structure can be heard in Carmen Paschale (1965), where homophonic sections alternate with calmer contrapuntal ones. The word “nightingale” introduces a solo fl ute representing the bird. Energetic “al- leluia” and “ave” sections emphasize the importance of these words of rejoicing. Wide-spaced chords convey an association with Poulenc’s musical language. The dramatic On the Sheer Thresh- old of the Night (1980) explores the Orpheus legend through the text by Boethius. The complex sound- picture here opens with the double- voiced Orpheus (sung by the fourth alto and fi rst tenor) calling Eurydice (fi rst soprano), who is represented by elaborate melismas. Sound clus-
CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 85 demanding music written for profes- the wealth of word-painting, com- New American Choral Music Series: sional singers. The extremely wide positional techniques, and detailed Stephen Caracciolo vocal ranges set a rich color palette care that gives to every single sound Cathedra from the choir and liberate the mu- regarding its register, dynamic bal- Michael McCarthy, conductor sic’s expression. The composer often ance, timbre contrast, and rhythmic Gothic G-49287 (2014; 56’07”) relies on timbre and register contrasts complexity. The performers here are between female and male voices, set- equally precise and present these In its 2014 production of the New ting them in an antiphonal fashion. demanding scores with ease and a American Choral Music Series, Ca- For those unfamiliar with Birtwis- sense of fl ow. thedra off ers a varied collection of tle’s vocal works, this CD provides an This CD is highly recommended sacred compositions by Maryland opportunity to discover his intricate to anyone who enjoys choral music composer-conductor Stephen Carac- choral writing. It is a diffi cult record- and is interested in exploring the dif- ciolo. Conductor Michael McCarthy ing to listen to, requiring concentra- ferent dimensions of contemporary and the voices of tion beyond simply the vocal sound. choral writing and sound. Cathedra use a highly Only after repeated listening can manicured attention one really grasp the multi-layered Nelly Matova to detail, intimate concepts used and truly appreciate Urbana, Illinois artistic sensitivity, and organically beautiful vocal production to create a captivat- ing performance. The Washington National Cathe- dral provides a well-suited acoustical venue for Carocciolo’s compositional language, which often suggests choral Let your music idioms of the Medieval and Renais- be heard… sance periods. The fi rst piece, Adoro te devote, sets a familiar thirteenth-centu- in Germany ry chant to shimmering harmonic so- norities and lyrical counterpoint. Two & Austria! additional unaccompanied numbers “The USD Chamber follow, including a setting of Ubi Singers had a wonderful caritas, which employs slow-moving experience. The tour was well chant melodies and polyphonic com- organized, we had wonderful positional techniques characteristic performances, and our of the High Medieval period. In a guide was fantastic.” dramatic change of mood, Christ Vic- – Dr. David Holdhusen torious, Christ, Now Reigning proclaims Director of Choral Activities University of South Dakota a jubilant anthem text accompanied Germany & Austria Tour, 2015 by Jeremy Filsell on the organ. The album concludes with the premiere Historical Salzburg, Austria recording of Songs of Innocence, a four- Witte has been arranging exceptional piece set of texts by William Blake. concert tours through Germany, Austria 800 GO WITTE wittept.com Overall, Caracciolo’s style is refresh- and the rest of the world since 1975. ingly innovative yet retains familiar
86 CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 consonance. The vocal clarity, tonal harmonic progressions. The second freedom, and impeccable intonation piece on the disc is “To the hills and of Cathedra proves a complementary the vales,” the concluding chorus of match for Caracciolo’s works. Only Act I of Dido and Aeneas. The abrupt a few minor issues bear mention, in- transition between sacred and secular cluding a brief timbre disagreement works is magnifi ed by the chorus’s in- during an admittedly diffi cult vocal troduction, played by a lone theorbo. passage in A Song of Creation and some By beauteous softness mix’d with majesty, balance issues with the more boister- an aria sung by countertenor Barnaby ous organ accompaniments. Smith, has elements typical of many Stephen Caracciolo’s compositions Baroque arias of its day: a ground theJJoin Internationaloin can be purchased through Morning bass, fl orid vocal line, and sustained, Choir Festival Star Publishers, Kjos Music, or Roger driving rhythms. O God, Thou Art My Dean Publishing, and many numbers God is a well-known anthem written August 21-31, 2016 featured in this Gothic Label record- in a more Renaissance style. Nor- ing would be valuable literature for mally sung unaccompanied, though To register or liturgical and concert venues. doubled by organ on this record- ing, its alternating homophonic and for more information Andrew Dibble imitative sections are reminiscent of visit Baltimore, Maryland anthems by Purcell’s predecessors www.america-cantat.org Thomas Tallis and William Byrd. Next are two works featuring French A Purcell Collection infl uence, both from Purcell’s opera VOCES8 King Arthur. The stately dance-like Les Inventions rhythms in the pas- Patrick Ayrton, conductor sacaglia “How happy Barnaby Smith, countertenor the lover” are charac- Dingle Yandell, bass teristic of Lully. The Signum Records SIGCD375 most striking selec- (2014; 70’18”) tion of the album is “Cold Song”; the aria’s sharp, slash- In this album, an eclectic collection ing tremolos, sung by bass Dingle of anthems, arias, and opera choruses Yandell, are wonderfully dramatic. by Henry Purcell, the UK-based octet The most signifi cant work is the VOCES8 has collaborated with Les anthem My heart is inditing, a fi fteen- Inventions, an instrumental ensemble minute piece composed for the based in France. The disc begins with coronation of James II. The eight- Praise the Lord, O Jerusalem, a sizeable voice choir is introduced with dotted anthem with a sober instrumental rhythms from the string instruments opening followed by alternating vo- and closes with a spirited “Alleluia.” cal and instrumental sections. The Listeners may particularly enjoy Thou work’s opening solemnity is replaced knowest, Lord, the secrets of our hearts, by a celebratory concluding section written for the funeral of Queen in triple meter featuring unexpected Mary in 1695 and later performed
CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 87 that year at Purcell’s own funeral anniversary of his birth, and Carus for works that deserve to be heard service. The homophonic setting is has made this wonderful composer’s and rescued from oblivion. If you expressive and sung sumptuously. engaging, yet largely unknown, works are looking for new concert or service VOCES8’s small size and voice available. Of the fi fteen motets on repertoire, do yourself a favor and makeup (two countertenors along this recording, ten are receiving their listen to Homilius’s music. with two sopranos, tenors, and world-premiere recordings. All pieces basses) is ideal for Purcell’s music. are available from the Carus catalog. Richard A. A. Larraga The ensemble’s intonation is excep- Homilius studied with J. S. Bach Holliston, Massachusetts tional with very strong phrasing and and was music director of three diction. Les Inventions is also to be churches in Dresden, including the commended for their appropriate Kreuzkirche, for the last thirty years Sergei Rachmaninov: Vespers Op. 37; Baroque phrasing, articulation, and of his life. He was a master of Emp- The Theotokos, Ever-Vigilant in Prayer ornamentation, though at times fi ndsamer style, and his compositional Netherlands Radio Choir their playing seemed subdued. The techniques reflect the changes in Kaspars Putniņš, conductor resonant space enhances the record- music between the late Baroque and BIS Records BIS-2039 (2014; ing quality, with fi tting balance in early Classicism, manifested in his 60’20”) each selection. The order of the regularly structured themes and less tracks on the album seems odd at complex counterpoint due to simpler The twenty-first century has times, especially with the fi nal two harmonies. This recording offers seen some high-quality releases of selections being quite tranquil, but Latin and German motets sung dur- Rachmaninov Vespers recordings, this is perhaps less of a concern in ing main church services and Satur- including those by the Estonian Phil- our digital playlist era. VOCES8 has day Vespers. These unaccompanied harmonic Choir conducted by Paul produced a commendable recording works off er choirs multiple challenges. Hillier (2004) and the Latvian Radio of quality, underappreciated music, While the writing is primarily homo- Choir conducted by Sigvards Klava which makes A Purcell Collection a phonic, there are also many fugues (2012). This most recent release by recommended recording for choral and short solos for individual voices. the sixty-eight-voice conductors, singers, and Baroque The range and complexity of the Netherlands Radio music lovers. works vary. Choir displays the Sirventes Berlin is an unaccompa- versatile and excel- Tobin Sparfeld nied choir of twenty-two singers led lent sound that mod- Los Angeles, California by Stefan Schuck. The choir focuses ern audiences have on early and new music for small forc- come to expect from recordings of es. The singers have a distinct warmth this monumental piece. The All-Night Habe deine Lust an dem Herrn: Motetten II to their sound and blend beautifully. Vigil (Vespers) is paired with The The- Sirventes Berlin The recording acoustic is spacious otokos, a seldom-performed work that Stefan Schuck, conductor without muddying the individual sec- remained unpublished during the Carus 83.266 (2014; 53’57”) tions. The performances are nuanced composer’s lifetime. and display a clear love of this music This recording is set apart by We owe a great debt to Carus on the performers’ part. The pres- several decisions on Latvian conduc- Verlag for publishing and recording ence of a number of world-premiere tor Putniņš’s part that highlight the the complete works of Gottfried recordings for many of these motets vulnerable, unsure, pleading aff ect Augustus Homilius (1714–1785). makes this disc not only a wonderful of the work and are emphasized by The year 2014 marked the 300th showcase of a superb choir but also the lack of cathedral-like acoustics in
88 CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 the Hilversum recording studio. The somewhat, the vitality and line of “Blazhen Muzh” [“Blessed is the choir sings with an ethereal, light, each respective voice group is em- Man”] and “Svete Tikhyi” [“O and airy tone throughout, while the phasized, resulting in a compelling, Gentle Radiance”], the calculated basses provide the unwavering strong, dynamic listening experience. crescendi in the higher voices during low tones required by this challeng- The Netherlands Radio Choir’s “Shestopsalmie” [“Hexapsalmos”] ing piece. The use of 5.0 Surround many feats on this recording include and full, balanced chordal singing in Sound technology is a unique feature; the seemingly continuous three-part the well-known “Bogoroditse Devo” and while this infl uences the blend texture in the higher voices during [“O Virgin Mother of God”], as well
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“The resonance his music makes is a new sound, stunningly beautiful and Kevin A. Memley rewarding.” Rod Eichenberger, Professor Emeritus, FSU
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CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 89 as the “Blagosloven esi, Gospodi”] focus on the constantly changing ance. Bennett’s contemplative A Col- [“Blessed art Thou, O Lord”] and seasons of life: delight is often inter- loquy with God showcases the group’s “Voskresenie Khristovo videvshe” rupted by sorrow, grief always gives fl awless technicality and expressive [“Having Beheld the Resurrection”]. way to joy, time heals all. New York breadth. Smith’s Kyrie: Cunctipotens This recording manages to bring Polyphony interprets both old and Genitor Deus is meant to fi ll the gap left something new to the existing cata- new works in the context of this ever- by Tallis’s Kyrie-less Mass, presenting logue of Vespers recordings. With its spinning hourglass. Its performance a beautiful modern trope complete combination of unequivocal artistry, is unrushed, yet nothing feels too with drone, here performed with clarity and emotional vulnerability, weighty; each turn anticipates the what sounds like a giant handbell to it may well infl uence longstanding next. The Medieval and Renaissance mysterious and stirring eff ect—an- perceptions of this iconic piece. works are executed with precision and other tolling reminder of the resolute energy. One appreciates New York passage of time. Gabriel Jackson’s Johann Jacob Van Niekerk Polyphony’s relent- lighthearted Ite missa est rounds out Seattle, Washington lessly purposeful tem- the album, a wonderfully techni- pos and sinuous yet cal piece that brings an involuntary determined phrasing smile. This is worth a look for a larger Times Go By Turns with music that is ensemble if you happen to have the New York Polyphony sometimes performed skilled performers this piece clearly BIS Records BIS-2037 by others with a bit too much pon- requires. (2013; 1’17’58”) derous reverence. The crystal-clear, With the announcement of the well-matched men’s voices carry the disbanding of the venerable Hill- Male quartet New York Polyphony listener along in an indomitable cur- iard Ensemble, we might naturally seems to be proving yet again that, de- rent of sound. Only lacking is a wider be watching for successors to their spite naysayer forecasts, the world still dynamic range; the group rarely legacy. The young members of New craves beautifully executed sacred vo- ventures beyond mezzo piano and York Polyphony unabashedly claim cal music. Formed in 2007, the group mezzo forte, and the listener sometimes much of their inspiration from the has since released seven albums, all to yearns for more drama. Hilliards, and this album draws so critical acclaim. Their newest, Times Standouts on the disc include the many convenient comparisons. With Go By Turns, features Masses by Byrd, unexpected Missa Sine Nomine by John their scholarly yet innovative take on Tallis, late Medieval English com- Plummer (1410–1483), performed early music and the addition of such poser John Plummer, and three new with a sensitivity to text rarely heard compelling new works, New York sacred works written for the group in music of this era and style. Truly Polyphony certainly owes much to the by Gabriel Jackson, Andrew Smith, a precursor to those of Byrd and trails blazed by the Hilliard Ensemble and the late Sir Richard Rodney Tallis, Plummer’s Mass still includes and others. Best of all, they continue Bennett. The album has garnered in- wonderful moments of medieval to bring early and new vocal music ternational attention, was nominated ornamentation and harmonic shifts to the mainstream, a noteworthy feat for a Grammy in the Best Chamber that surprise modern ears yet presents attained by few. This disc is surely one Music/Small Ensemble Performance a rich fullness foreshadowing his Re- of their best off erings so far, and we category, and named one of iTunes’s naissance successors. The ensemble may expect equal and greater delights 10 Best Classical Releases of 2013. manages to tease out moments of in years to come. The group seems to have, well, struck genuine anguish and ecstasy from this a chord. three-voiced mass setting. Abby Musgrove A medieval poem by the same The three modern off erings on Jacksonville, Illinois name inspires the program, with a the disc provide an intriguing bal-
90 CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1 Announcing the ACDA CAREER CENTER at careers.acda.org
YYOUROUR NNEXTEXT CCHORALHORAL CCAREERAREER OOPPORTUNITYPPORTUNITY CCOULDOULD BBEE CCLOSERLOSER TTHANHAN YYOUOU THINK.THINK.
Job Seeker Benefi ts • Access to high quality, relevant job postings. No more wading through postings that aren’t applicable to your expertise. • Personalized job alerts notify you of relevant job opportunities. • Career management – you have complete control over your passive or active job search. Upload multiple resumes and cover letters, add notes on employers and communicate anonymously with employers. http://careers.acda.orghttp://careers.acda.org • Anonymous resume bank protects your confi dential information. Your Phone: 1.405.232.8161 resume will be displayed for employers to view EXCEPT your identity and contact information which will remain confi dential until you are ready to reveal it. • Value-added benefi ts of career coaching, resume services, education/ training, articles and advice, resume critique, resume writing and career assessment test services. careers.acda.org POWERED BY Column Contact Information
ACDA members wishing to submit a review or column article should contact the following editorial board member:
Book Reviews Stephen Town [email protected] Choral Reviews Steven Grives [email protected] ChorTeach (online) Terry Barham [email protected] Hallelujah! Richard Stanislaw [email protected] On the Voice Sharon Hansen [email protected] Recorded Sound Reviews David Puderbaugh [email protected] Research Report Magen Solomon [email protected] Student Times Jason Paulk [email protected] Technology and the Choral Director Philip Copeland [email protected]
For feature article submissions, contact the Choral Journal editor, Amanda Bumgarner, at
Book and music publishers should send books, octavos, and discs for review to: Choral Journal, Attn: Amanda Bumgarner, 545 Couch Drive, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma 73102 For advertising rates and exhibit information, contact Chris Lawrence, National Advertising & Exhibits Manager, at
Advertisers’ Index
ACFEA Tour Consultants 81 Music Contact International IFC
Artist Travel conulstants 23 Naxos of America 56
America Cantat 8 61, 79, 87 North Dakota State University 68
Barbershop Harmony Society 82 Pavane Publishing 89
Classical Minnesota Public Radio 7 4 Sechrist Travel 85
Cultural Tour Consultants 5 2 Valiant Music Supply 49
Crescent City Choral Festival 60 Witte Performance Tours 86
Disting. Concerts Int'l - NY BC Worldstrides 46, 47
Int'l Federation for Choral Music 48 Yale University 37
K I c o n c e r t s I B C
92 CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 56 Number 1
American Choral Directors Association 545 Couch Drive Oklahoma City, Oklahoma 73102
“Special thanks to everyone at DCINY for making this amazing event a DON’T reality” MISS OUT - Ryan Attention Procrastinators, Call us! We can help you. Perform with us at Carnegie Hall and Lincoln Center for 2016 & Beyond.
“I can’t believe we are heading to Carnegie Hall!” - @erintancock “The cherry atop my senior year”- @_kaylatido
Don’t Miss our Mentoring Program in January 2016 with René Clausen
Orchestral Conducting for the Choral Director removes the singers from the equation so conductors are allowed to focus on the instrumentalists. This session is ideal for those wishing to gain more experience working with professional orchestral musicians. To inquire, contact James Meaders at [email protected]
Th e Art of Performance – Th e Power of Education
Iris Derke, Co-Founder and General Director | Jonathan Griffi th, Co-Founder and Artistic Director
250 West 57th St., New York, NY 10107 Tel: (212) 707-8566 Email: [email protected] www.DCINY.org