Thursday Thoughts

I went to see the King's Speech last night and if you haven't seen it yet, run to the nearest theatre before it is gone. It's based on historical fact and is brilliantly acted by Colin Firth, Geoffrey Rush and a host of others. In reflecting about the movie afterwards, I was thinking of the parallels of King George's huge effort to overcome his speech impediment  and that in our society today, sometimes we are unwilling to put in the effort it will take achieve our individual success.  People have become so ingrained with "instant this and microwaved that," that sometimes we forget the obvious - it takes time, energy and effort.  I expect that most of us realize this as we become older but by then it might be too late. I well remember when I was a young music student, someone said that in order to become a great musician that it took 20% talent and 80% hard work. I'm not sure that this statistic is truly accurate, however the lesson to take away is that you can be extraordinarily gifted but without the work ethic you will achieve little.

So whatthehell does this have to do with such a musically talented group as Camerata and what business do I have waxing poetically on this blog?  I believe that everyone needs to be reminded every now and then, that the success we have achieved is only the result of the individual effort which happens before working as a collective. I see the results of that each week: the women for instance, in the Bo Holten "First Snow." There was no way that you could have sorted out those canonic rhythms in the opening section without first working it out at home.  You sped up the learning process of the piece by weeks just by your individual work and I recognize and commend you for that.

And coming from a board meeting last Monday, it struck me how many committed individuals are working so hard preparing grants, analysing financial reports, taking care of the front of house, working on a financial campaign, preparing data bases, etc., in order to allow us to make music and not worry about the "other stuff."

And then there are you guys who, in addition to preparing these challenging scores week after week, are going the extra mile to look after CD sales, preparing concert programs, helping with languages, web site, setting up for concerts, rehearsing the rep, etc., etc. Thanks to all of you who really do uinderstand that we will only achieve collective success with individual hard work.

Speaking of hard work, I need to give you notes so you can prepare for Tuesday.  Those of you who missed Tuesday, please note that there were 3 new scores which we worked on: Psalm of Invocation (Rautavaara), First Snow (Holten), and the first of the set of Raminsh Slavic folksongs.  The rest of the choir made large leaps in these pieces and you need to prepare accordingly for Tuesday.

Christina and Sean now have the texts which we worked on up on the website. go to the choir only section and one more time: Username: Camerata; Password: HCS1986.
Everyone needs to spend time listening to the texts in order to get the accent and language in your ears.  When you can say the text out loud, then practice speaking the words in rhythm. In addition, please listen to the reference recordings I have collected. Often these are great choirs, and sometimes under the composer's direction. Please make this a goal this week.

Finally, for this Tuesday I will try to get through the following:

O Crux - Nystedt
First Snow - Holten
O Sacrum Convivium - Miskinis (basses correct the rhythm in m. 44 7 46 once and for all!)
Psalm of Invocation - Rautavaara
Evening Hymn - Rautavaara (everyone know the notes)
Three Slavic Folksongs - Raminsh (all three so please spend lots of times on these notes. Basses it wasn't great last week so please prepare accordingly.)

This will be a tough rehearsal as there are lots of new notes this week.  I have two rehearsals left before going away and would like to get through all of these scores before I go away so that Christina and Tristan know where to concentrate their rehearsal time. Lets everyone make the best use of that 80% hard work this Tuesday.

Thanks for wading through this missive. Have a great week!  Oh yeah - check out the website with the new photos Sean put up yesterday.  Impressive group!