Thursday Thoughts

We continue to make progress on this program and in that light, I have asked the basses to come a little early next Tuesday. They will do sectional work at 6:45 pm and the rest of the choir should be there at 7:15pm. We will forgo the warmup (please look after that in the car on the way!) and tackle the Howell's Requiem straight off.  The Truro crowd is sometimes pressing it to get there and get the chairs set up so if anyone can arrive a little earlier to help set up, on a perfect night we need 24 chairs from the Boardroom.

A few reminders:

- our annual AGM (necessary to fulfil our obligations with the Registry of Joint Stocks) takes place on Tuesday, October 25. Rehearsal will begin at the usual time of 7pm however we will stop at 8:45pm and turn things over to the Camerata Board led by President Marsha Curry. We will finish by the usual 9:30 pm.

- sometimes we work so hard singing in a choir like Camerata that we sometimes believe that this can be our only contribution. Please don't forget that even if the music is sublime, if there is no one there to hear it, the organization's bottom line is seriously affected - let alone our own morale. With so many arts events competing for our time and dollars, it is up to each one of us to do whatever possible to publicize our concerts. With less than three weeks to go, here are a few simple things which take little time :

• please forward Tenille's recent press release to the choral music lovers in your contact list the info re season's tickets. At $50 for all three concerts it is a steal. 
• send our concert info on to your social networking contacts (Facebook, Twitter, etc and include the thumbnail of the concert poster as your profile picture. This is the  way our younger concert audience members exchange information. They rarely use email. 
• make sure our concert announcement is in your church bulletins. Encourage your choir members to come. 
• we are trying to encourage youth choirs to come to Camerata concerts. Last season an entire youth choir from Pictou came to our May concert and went away Camerata fans.   Help us identify youth choirs who might like discounted tickets and an invitation to attend a Camerata concert. 

• talk up our concerts with everyone!  The little time you spend is well worth it. You, the singers who travel week to week to rehearsals and give so much of your time and energy to create this choral art, you are our best ambassadors. Let's all take ownership of our concerts and help sell them out! 

For this week be prepared with all works on the program, especially the entire Howell's Requiem. As part of your rehearsal prep it is time to go back and listen to a recording of this piece, if only to get it in your ears. Among others, there is a good reference recording in the Choir Only section of the Camerata website. Pay attention to the joins between the movements and write pitch cues in your score. The last two movements still are not jelling, specifically: P. 20 m. 17 - m. 33 and the entire last movement.  If you are still struggling with tuning notes and vowels, the music has no hope of coming off the page. Don't forget to review the movements we haven't rehearsed in a while.  Thank you to the soloists - great work  last Tuesday.

I love this music and am so looking forward to presenting this program with you to our audiences in Halifax and Antigonish on November 6 & 7. Have a great week!