Thursday Thoughts

Thanks you for a very good rehearsal Tuesday night. The music came a long way and is starting to settle. Now for Saturday's workshop I would ask that you refer to Joudrey's Theorm # 23 - DWWR (Do What Was Rehearsed!)

A few reminders:

- be in your places and ready for singing by 9:30 am on Saturday.
- PLEASE always be aware of Camerata's no scent policy. There are people in the choir very allergic to perfumes, colognes, scented lotions, etc. All singers - male and female - are reminded that we have a no scent policy for all rehearsals and concerts.
- please remember to wear your Camerata t shirts on Saturday
- remember to work on your program advertising as it is due in a week. Last year this was a good source of revenue for the year's programs and we should try to surpass last years' numbers.

Please check last week's blog post for the rep list for Saturday. Some people have been asking about the schedule for the day and it looks like this:

Saturday at Bethany United Church, 7171 Clinton Ave., Halifax

9:30 am      Joint Camerata and Xara Workshop (intro to vowels and resonance)

11:00 am    Camerata workshop with Elise Bradley

11:00 am    Xara in private rehearsals

12:30 pm    Lunch: both choirs + auditors

1:30 pm      Camerata  workshop with Elise Bradley (applying morning concepts to rep)

1:30 pm      Xara in private rehearsals

4:00 pm      Choir dismissed.  Joudrey/Murray/Bradley Tutorial (Q & A)

       6:00 pm      Networking Reception for choral conductors around NS (choir does not attend)
 
For next Tuesday:

Requiem (Howells) - all movements but emphasis on 5 & 6
Ubi Caritas (Gjeilo)
Antiphon (Togni)
Silencio (Togni)

Thursday Thoughts

Hello all,

Thanks to you all for a good rehearsal Tuesday night. Thanks especially to Christina to working on vowel production early on in the rehearsal. the improvement was huge when you were concentrating on single vowels and in " the moment"  As the rehearsal wore on, if was interesting to listen to the vowel colours " morphing" into your best generic guess!  Good vowel production needs to become a habit and something which I will pursue relentlessly in rehearsals,  so please pay attention to the concept from now on, especially those of you who have not already had vocal training in this area.  As we do more of this and especially in the workshops with Elise Bradley next week,  note the troublesome vowels and begin your self awareness there. You can already hear the difference when the choir sings the "before and after" vowel examples and so, this needs to be fully integrated into repertoire more and more.

Stuff to Remember:

- please bring t shirt money next week. New singers will be given the new Camerata 25th Anniversary  t shirts free of charge. Returning singers who want another t shirt  will be charged the choir's cost - not sure what that will be but Tenille will let you know.  Her plan is to have the t shirts at rehearsal next Tuesday so please remember to bring in your money.

- Elise Bradley workshop next Saturday,  October 1 at Bethany United. We are opening up the workshops to include 15 auditors so if you know of conducting colleagues or singers who might like to observe Elise in action please give them Tenille's contact info.  We have already accepted 5 auditors in the first day the info went out, so please let your students, colleagues and friends know about this.   As this is part of the Camerata outreach program, the cost is minimal, only $10 - enough to cover lunch.. 

- the link to a really fine recording of the Togni "Silentio" is here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bGtcPn-JOQo&feature=related    Please give it a listen with the score in front of you.

- people who have spoken to me about the Howell's solos please be prepared to sing them next Tuesday.

Rep for next Tuesday will include:

Howells:

Salvator mundi 

Psalm 23 ( for the EB workshop)
Requiem I (for the EB workshop) - tuning is an issue here and we need to work on making sure intrevals are secure.
Psalm 121 (for the EB workshop)
Requiem aeternam 2 (for the EB workshop) - everyone go over your parts and make sure intervals are secure.

Lord's Prayer - Enns (for the EB workshop)

Silenctio - Togni

Have fun with the music and remember - it will get better only when everyone knows the scores intimately. Have a great week!

Thursday Thoughts

Thanks again for a great rehearsal on Tuesday. Here are some reminders: 

- you all should have received the email notice from Tenille inviting auditors to of the Elise Bradley workshop on Saturday, October 1 at Bethany United. Please pass this along to your conducting colleagues, students, and singing friends. Remember we are only taking 15 auditors.

- please keep thinking of available tenors who might want to sing great repertoire with a great choir. Email me with ideas and contact info.

- Camerata T shirts will be worn by all singers for the Elise Bradley workshop. The order will go in early next week. so if you are new or if you need annother t shirt, please contact Tenille. Your first t shirt is free - any additional you will have to pay for.  There are both men's and women's sizes in S, M, L, XL, XXL, XXXL - well, you get it!  Email Tenille at: tenille.goodspeed@gmail.com

- Remember to sell advertising for this season's concert programs.  Tenille emailed you the rate sheet which you can either duplicate or email to potential advertisers. Last year this was an additional source of needed income. Let's all work on it again this year.

- many thanks to Geoff and his cohorts (you KNOW who you are) for unloading  the risers to their permanent storage space in the bowels of First Baptist. Finally those puppies have a home!

 - a reminder of Janis Cobb's Celebration of Life service at St. Luke's Anglican in Hubbards, (on Shore Club Road, just off Hwy 3 on the east side of the village) Saturday 17, 2 pm. As I previously mentioned I am away with my Girls' Choir but will be thinking of you all.

Rehearsal notes for next Tuesday:

Requiem (Howells) - mvts: I, II, III & IV
Lord's Prayer (Enns)
Lamentations Movement III- "Silentio"  (Togni)
In Paradisium (Corlis)

Thanks so much for your work. Have a great weekend.

Thursday Thoughts (just a little late!)

My apologies for this being late - yesterday was the first rehearsal for my Girls' Choir and it seemed that there were way too many details to attend to!

As I said in my email - good beginnings on Tuesday.  We have all the ingredients for a very fine choir this year. A big welcome to the new singers and I hope you find a home in Camerata.

Some housekeeping items (which for most of you are common sense):

- if you are going to be absent or late, I will expect to be notified, just as if I expect to be absent or late, I will make sure you all get a message. On Tuesdays I am in rehearsal in Truro and am unavailable from 3:15-4:30 pm. I leave for Halifax no later than 5:30 pm.  Please make note of my contact info: 902-893-4242 (o); 902-899-6299 (c), 902-893-8425 (h) and email is: jeffjoudrey@gmail.com.

- as the level of musicianship in Camerata is of a high standard, I expect everyone to arrive at rehearsal knowing the notes. No matter how good a musician you are, please don't come to rehearsal and sight read.  I mentioned on Tuesday that 2 hours /week will not be uncommon for you to spend working on scores at home and your colleagues sitting next to you, in the sections singing near you or across the choir will appreciate the time and effort we all give to the music.

- I sent you all access info for the website.  Please file it for reference. There are all kinds of documents you might want/need to read but the most important tools are found in the Choir Only section. Sean P. has downloaded reference recordings of a number of the works we are performing in concert. Use the recordings to get an idea of the shape and style of the piece - not where every breath, phrase and articulation is placed. Inevitably, our performances will be different.

Always in the Blog I will give info on my rehearsal for the following Tuesday so you can adequately prepare. For next Tuesday the rehearsal will look like the following:

Lord's Prayer (Enns)  - review work of last Tuesday. Phrasings should become an integral part of the line. Be confident with modulations, beginnings of new sections, etc.

Requiem (Howells) - be confident with movements I & II and learn notes of III & IV

In Paradisium  (Corlis)  - review

Ubi Caritas (Gjeilo) - review

Antiphon (Togni)  - listen to the recording on the website. We may note get to this but be ready in case.

I am VERY much looking forward to our working with our guest clinician, the incomparable Elise Bradley on Saturday, October 1, from 9:30-4:00 pm at Bethany United (remember: in the original schedule the workshop was also for the Friday night but Camerata Singers will be required only on the Saturday) Continuing Education for us all is how we become better musicians and the day we spend with Elise will be so invaluable to us all, whether you are a conductor, singer, auditor of the sessions, of just want to listen and watch how a international level conductor with Elise's experience works with a choir like Camerata.  Thanks to the Camerata Board and the NS Department of Culture for making this workshop possible for Camerata and Xara.

Finally a huge round of virtual applause for (soprano) Danielle Kain and her husband in celebration of the safe arrival of  Gabriel James Howard, born September 7 weighing in at a brusing 7 lbs 7 oz. Mom,  Dad and Gabriel are doing wonderfully well.  Congratulations and big hugs from us all, Danielle .
  
Again my sincere thanks for everything each one of you bring each time we work together.  I truly missed not working with you during the summer, and our rehearsal was the highlight of my week.  See you all next Tuesday.





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On Herbert Howell's Requiem

Listening in Context: Does Knowledge of a Piece’s History Affect What We Hear?

The following article puts in context far better than I could, a brief history of the Herbert Howell's Requiem. It askes some interesting questions about listening to music in context to the story behind the score and using the Howell's Requiem begs the question of whether or not the story behind the score is relevant to the understanding of the music. You decide for yourself. Thanks to Tim Parolini (February 2011) for the article.

So apparently, you can’t believe everything you read online after all.

Most performance notes found on the web of Herbert Howells’ Requiem relate the same tale of how Howells composed the eloquent and moving work in 1935 after the death of his young son, Michael. Poignant. Tragic. And yes, his son did pass away in 1935 at the too-young age of nine. Howells, though, had written Requiem three years earlier.

Herbert Howells, born in 1892, was regarded as something as a composing prodigy and upheld as one of the great hopes of English music. He had his share of troubles along the way, including his own near-death experience, the death of his son, and a sensitivity to criticism that caused him to stop writing for nearly a decade. In the end, though, he helped define and advance the voice of English classical music, particularly that of the Anglican church. He also provided us with the moving Requiem, a work full of texture, subtlety and emotional depth.

Howells shared a musical sensibility with Ralph Vaughan Williams. A September 1910 concert in Gloucester Cathedral included the premiere of a new work by the then little-known Vaughan Williams. Howells not only made the composer’s personal acquaintance that evening, but the piece, the Fantasia on a Theme of Thomas Tallis, profoundly moved him. Howells and Vaughan Williams met again, and after the First World War, their acquaintance deepened into a lasting friendship. Howells studied at the Royal College of Music under C.V. Stanford, Hubert Parry and Charles Wood. (Works by both Vaughan Williams and Wood are also featured in the Oratorio Singers program, as is a piece by the decidedly-non-British Johannes Brahms.)

In 1915, Howells was diagnosed with Graves’ disease and given six months to live. He became the first person in the country to receive radium treatment. His doctors had no idea how much to inject into Howell’s thyroid. They stopped treatments when his neck showed signs of radioactive burns. Howells lived for another 70 years.

Despite his prodigious compositional abilities, Howells was plagued by a disabling sensitivity to criticism. After a hostile reception to a performance of his second piano concerto in 1925, Howells simply stopped composing. By 1932, though, he had written Requiem, which was commissioned by King’s College, Cambridge. Howells never sent the completed work and Requiem remained unknown for nearly five decades. In the months after his son’s death three years later, Howells was unable to write. The following year, though, he used material from the previously unaccompanied Requiem to compose another work,  Hymnus Paradisi for soloists, chorus and orchestra.

So, how did the misconception about the Requiem develop? In 1980, an unreleased, undated Requiem for unaccompanied chorus was discovered. According to Dr. Robert Michael Istad, Associate Professor of Music at Cal-State Fullerton, who studied Howells for his doctoral dissertation, “It shared a significant musical connection with Hymnus Paradisi, which had first been performed in 1950. Howells, then elderly, indicated that this unreleased work was the inspiration for Hymnus Paradisi. The work immediately became popular throughout the choral community. Unfortunately, many assumed that the delayed release of Requiem indicated personal struggle and profound grief. Printed materials began to relay a connection between Requiem and Michael’s death as fact, and Howells was too ravaged by senility to engage in fruitful discussion.”

Herbert Howells Trust acknowledges that Howells wrote Requiem in 1932 and incorporated some of its material into Hymnus Paradisi, which he did complete in memory of his son in 1938. Mystery solved. But does the fact that Howells didn’t write this Requiem while grieving over his son’s death change the way we listen to it? Does the context of a composition change how we hear it? If, for example, we learned that Beethoven had his full hearing ability when he composed his Ninth Symphony, would that change our response to it? We like context. Our understanding of art is given meaning by our understanding of the artist. Besides, we just like to know where things come from, and if there is a good story behind it, so much the better.

In music, interestingly enough, this context serves us best when contemplating or discussing a work, but not when actually listening to it. When we listen, the music stands alone. During a live performance of a musical work, the composer, the context, and the story behind it all melt away and there remain only the performers, the music, and the listener. Further, if we as a chorus do our job well, even we “disappear” and what is left to the listener is simply the music. With Howell’s Requiem, what is left is a work of sheer beauty.

While rooted in the past traditions of English music, Howells was not afraid to experiment outside of traditional tonality. He did so to great effect in  Requiem. Like Faure’s Requiem, Howells’ is restrained—but it is richer harmonically with a rapt, almost hushed intensity and a more pointed sense of grief and loss. Only two movements use the traditional words of the Requiem as Verdi or Mozart employed them. The others are in English, based around Psalm texts. Throughout the work, Howells moves us between pleas on our own behalf and those for the ones who have gone before us.

Regardless of the context of its origins, Howells’ Requiem is ineffably beautiful. Mournful, pleading, and ultimately, dare we say it, hopeful—or at least peaceful—it is a work full of rich harmonic texture and immense emotional depth.