Thursday Thoughts

There is a quote which reads:  I have my own particular sorrows, loves, delights; and you have yours.  But sorrow, gladness, yearning, hope, love, belong to all of us, in all times and in all places.  Music is the only means whereby we feel these emotions in their universality. (H. A. Overstreet)

I think the quote sums up rather well the impact you made on many of our concert patrons last Saturday in St. Patrick's. I have had so many messages, emails, conversations, etc of people who were not only there, but took the time to try to put into words what your music meant to them. Some examples:

- It is a real privilege to be part of this music-making (SNSC member)

- Saturday night’s concert was a highlight! Just spectacular! It brought me to tears when I was describing how beautiful it was to someone the next day! You and every member of the choir should be very proud!  (concert patron)

- it was the most exquisite musical event I have been to in a very long time - moved me to tears, touched the soul and was so beautifully choreographed - such a gift and commitment you have to the art - thank you. (patron who has not heart the choir in a long time)

- Yes, it does remind us why we do music, to lift people's souls (SNSC member)

I included some of the comments to remind you that we do more than just sing concerts and make pretty music. People come to our concerts for various reasons and one such reason is that our music helps them cope with whatever life is throwing at them. We must not loose sight that.
 
So on to St. Bernard's!  Another wonderful acoustic - very different but wonderful.  The program is below - I know I sent it to you at least once before but you need to have a copy of this in your folder. Go through your scores before Tuesday and make sure you have everything. Please do this now - not three weeks downthe road. Email me if there is anything missing.
 
I also want to welcome Judith Burdett (soprano) and Bill Perrot (bass) who will be singing this concert with us. Please introduce yourselves to Judith and Bill if you don't already know them.
 
This concert is a combination of the year's work and we have performed everything before in concert this season.  However there are scores which need to be reviewed, so for this Tuesday, at First Baptist I will concentrate on the following:

Many Winters - Enns
O Sacrum Convivium - Miskinis
I Am Not Yours - Stroope
Benedicto - Sisask
First Snow - Holten
Kyrie - Palestrina (I am considering doing the Christe w a solo quartet. Email me if you are interested)
Northern Lights - Gjeilo

See you Tuesday.

Musique St. Bernard Program

Sunday June 26, 2011 4pm - St. Mary’s Church, St. Bernard, NS
Call for choir: 2:30 pm

Programme order

Totus Tuus – Henryk Górecki  9’
Ave Verum – Imant Raminsh * 5:15
Benedicto – Urmas Sisask  6:30 (Tristan to conduct)
Agneau de Dieu – Rupert Lang *  (3) * (quartet: Christina, Laura, Chris, Lynn)
Nunc Dimittis – Arvo Pärt (6:40)  (solo: Danielle)
O Sacrum Convivium – Vytautas Miškinis (Lithuania) 4:45

Intermission

i thank You God for most this amazing day – Eric Whitacre (6)  (solo: Paula)
Lay A Garland – Robert Pearsall (2:45)
Many Winters – Jeff Enns * (9:30)
I Am Not Yours – Randall Stroope (4)
First Snow - Bo Holten (Denmark) (5)
Northern Lights – Ola Gjeilo (Norway) (4:45)
On suuri sun rantas’ autius – trad Finnish/arr. Juha Törmä 3
[encore: Kyrie (Missa Brevis) – Palestrina]

Thursday Thoughts

Thank you all for an exciting rehearsal on Tuesday.  You are beginning to own these scores and on Tuesday there were many magical moments. I can't wait for this concert! Tell your family and friends as it will be worth the drive to Halifax.

Nothing profound today.  Please remember times and venues:

Saturday 10 - 12:30 at Bethany (w SNSC)
Tuesday 7-10 pm at St. Patricks (w SNSC)
Friday 7-10 pm at St. Patrick's  (w SNSC - dress rehearsal)

On Tuesday please be on time as we only have an hour and a half alone before rehearsing w SNSC.

On a more somber note, I would like to express on your behalf, our sincere condolences to Christina on the passing of her grandfather. His was a life well lived.

Take care everyone. Stay healthy. See you Saturday.

Thursday Thoughts

Good morning everyone:

We have two rehearsals left until the concert and one of those is in St. Patrick's with SNSC.  The music is learned, but not polished and still performances are not consistent - it seems sort of hit and miss. So in the last two rehearsals we have together before the dress, everyone needs to get out of the scores more and we need to build in consistency of great performances.

It is my goal to get through the entire list below on Tuesday.  Pieces are listed in order of importance - again thinking of the need to practice consistency of great performances in rehearsal:

Then Shall I Leap into Love - Enman (baritones remember the 8ve doubling m. 59-69)

Rosa Mystica - Balfour (please memorize opening and be prepared to rehearse recessional and sing at the same time!)

Nunc Dimittis - Part (beautiful work on this piece Tuesday. Women please remember dynamic changes on SSAA section beginning at m. 41)

i thank YOU God - Whitacre

Lay A Garland - Pearsall (review. Pay attention to your function in the chords)

Agneau de Dieu - Lang

Gloria (from Missa Brevis) - Raminsh

Agnus Dei - Barber

Please note that the rehearsal on Tuesday, May 24th will be at St. Patricks and will go until 10 pm.  Camerata will have the first part of the rehearsal alone, from 7-8:15pm  We will use the single line formation again in St. Patrick's for Camerata. After the break, we will rehearse the second part of the concert with SNSC.  (Geoff, we will definitely need the risers for rehearsals and concert)

Thank you to our IT guru, Sean for posting the March concert on the choir website. Go to the choir only section and give a listen.

Please remember the rehearsal with SNSC on Saturday, 10 am at Bethany. If you have not attended 2 of your required 3 rehearsls, please plan on attending on Saturday and work on the second half of the concert.  In general, if you are able to come and sing, please do.

Have a great weekend and stay healthy! :)

Thursday Thoughts

Good morning everyone,

There were some lovely moments in rehearsal on Tuesday. This music is getting off the page and really taking shape. Good work!

I have been asked for the concert order so am enclosing it here. Please copy it and put it in your folders:

(First half – Halifax Camerata Singers )

i thank YOU God for most this amazing day –Whitacre  (solo - Paula)
Lay A Garland – Robert Lucas de Pearsall
Then Shall I Leap Into Love – Edward Enman
Agneau de Dieu – Lang  (solo quartet: Christina, Laura, Chris, Lynn)
Nunc Dimittis – Arvo Part  (solo - Danielle)
Totus Tuus – Peter Togni *
Rosa Mystica – Andrew Balfour *

Intermission

(Second half: HCS/SNSC)

A Mass through the Ages)

Kyrie (from Missa Papae Marcelli) – Palestrina
Gloria (from Missa Brevis) – Imant Raminsh  (solo: Ann B.)
Sanctus (from Requiem) - Gabriel Fauré
Agnus Dei - Samuel Barber  (solo: Judith Burdett)
Dona Nobis Pacem (from the Mass in b minor) – J. S. Bach

The Hour Has Come - Srul Irving Glick *

For Tuesday the rep list is as follows:

i thank YOU God for most this amazing day – Eric Whitacre
Lay A Garland – Robert Lucas de Pearsall
Then Shall I Leap Into Love – Edward Enman
Nunc Dimittis – Arvo Part
Rosa Mystica – Andrew Balfour * (please begin to memorize)
Gloria (Missa Brevis)  - Raminsh
Agnus Dei - Barber
The Hour Has Come - Glick

Some of you have attended 0-1 SNSC rehearsals. In addition to the HCS rep, please be familiar with the last three pieces on the list for Tuesday as I must get to them this week.
Note that the next SNSC rehearsal is Saturday, May 14.  

Some of you have been asking about rehearsal dates/times, days off, etc.  I am  attempting to keep the blog calendar up to date, and right now the calendar should be up to date to December 31, 2011.  If you have questions or think that there may be an error, by all means please contact me.

Thanks to all of you who have updated your Facebook pages to include the Camerata poster and info on the concert. Please continue to do that and help spread the work about the concert  - coming up in three weeks!

Finally, let's remember the Xara concert coming up on Saturday, May 14, 8pm at St. Matthew's on Barrington Street. Christina and the Xara young women have been working hard on this very interesting program called "Played" and will be taking it to Festival 500 in the summer. Let's all get out there and support our little sister choir. 

Have a great weekend everyone. I will be on PEI on Friday helping our daughter celebrate her graduation from UPEI with her DVM degree. Her lifelong dream is finally realized - it doesn't get better than that!

Next Season - our 25th Anniversary!

Some of you have been asking about next season so I am posting it here (click on each page to see a large version of the image). The concert dates have been chosen after a lengthy process and sometimes going through various combinations of possibilities.  With the exception of the possible run out of Psalmo on March 25, 2011 (unlikely but still possible) and the working through the concept of the fundraising concert for late May 2012, the rest of the season is complete. (Barring you finding a mistake I have made with a date which doesn't exist! ) However although I am publishing it here, this is for your eyes only and is not for public release. In addition, along the way there may have to be a change for some unforseen reason. If that happens I will send you an updated season outline with a new revision date at the top.  I hope you are as excited about the programs as I have been in putting them together. I believe that this is a 25th Anniversary season of which we all be proud.

Thursday Thoughts

I once had an organ teacher who I greatly respected ask me what I was doing during my daily sessions at the instrument. I looked at him as if he had two heads and replied, "practicing!"  He looked at me shaking his head, and offered these words of wisdom "no you're learning, you can't practice anything until you learn it."

Interesting philisophy and likely applies to most things. Right now we're at that tough (but exciting) stage of preparing for a concert. The time between learning the score and now practicing performances - albiet of various levels of success. With four rehearsals left we should be ok, but I would like to take some in each rehearsal and work the SNSC repertoire of the second half of the program. My rehearsal plaaning reflects this but on Tuesday the plan went out the window with the extra work we had to do on the Whitacre.

So for next Tuesday the list is as follows:

i thank You God - Whitacre (everyone needs to review carefully)

Lay A Garden - Pearsall (if you have not sung this please learn it throughly as most of the choir have recorded the piece.)

Then Shall I Leap Into Love - Enman

Totus Tuus - Togni (performance run through only - the piece is learned)

Nunc Dimittis - Part (the notes are learned.  However I want to "practice" balancing the chord functions in the divisi sections - m. 43-105; shape the opening up to m. 39; and see if we can be a little more consistent in that exquisite SA blend at the end.

Rosa Mystica - Balfour (the style needs a vibrato-less sound reminicent of the Middle Ages, even in the forte sections. Be certain of the rhythm - the combinations of the quarter/eighth note are always changing in the individual parts. I would like this to be as close to memorized as possible as you will be recessing and singing as you go down the asile to close the first half. Let's begin next week)

Agneau de Dieu - Lang (I may not get to this as the piece is nearly complete, however there are some issues re text. Hopefully we will get a mp3 of the text up on the website. The quartet will be: Christina, Laura, Chris and Lynn)

Agnus Dei - Barber (depending on what happens on Saturday, I may spend time on this)

Stuff to remember:
Due to the AGM next Tuesday from 9-9:30 pm at FBC, we will begin the rehearsal at 6:45pm. Please arrive on time. (Tristan - please limit the warm up to 5 minutes)

SNSC rehearsal for all HCS this Saturday from 10 am-12:30 pm  at Bethany United.  

Finally, no excuses but apologies for not doing my best work the last two rehearsals. I think it has to do with my health. My concentration, energy level and hearning have all been affected as up to last night, I was sleeping for a maximum of 4 hours. Re the hearning, my left ear has been buzzing in the forte sections - much like a speaker with a tear in it, or an ear full of water after a shower. It comes and goes but is improving. I had a minor set back all day yesterday with a nasty stomach flu, but am feeling much better now. For those of you who are struggling with this cold/flu you have my sympathies and thank you for contributing what you can.

Easter is over! Spring is here! On to a better week! See you Saturday.

Thursday Thoughts

Thanks for a good rehearsal on Tuesday.  We are still working out the listening issues at First Baptist and I will continue to experiment with seating arrangements until we can finalize an arrangement whereby you are comfortable and can hear the other sections in the choir.

For those who missed rehearsal take note that the choir has finished learning a number of pieces on the program, so make sure you are up to speed by next Tuesday. 

Next Tuesday the rep list will be as follows:

i thank You God - Whitacre (performance ready - basses/baritones, this needs a little more work - baritones your part is integral in the 4 part men's texture and it begins with really secure pitches. Begin at m. 8)

Kyrie -  Palestrina (learn the final Kyrie - remember it is in 2; I will rehearse from the Christe on)

Then Shall I Leap Into Love - Enman (we have finished learning this and we'll stitch it together)

Nunc Dimittis - Part (the only part left to teach is m. 1-40 so I'll begin there, also review m. 107-end)

Agneau de Dieu - Lang (mark in your scores where it goes from 2 to 3 as this is not clearly already marked in the score. don't underestimate this relatively easy piece - the changes in tempi - both marked and inferred, dynamics and integration with the quartet need careful attention in order to get it off the page.

Rosa Mystica - Balfour (work on dynamics, perform through)

Totus Tuus - Togni (Tristan will perform through)

Agnus Dei - Barber (I need to work this so please know the score, Note the following divisi changes: P. 8 m. 2 - S2 the phrase and sing top part of the alto stave until P. 9 m. 2 where you join the top stave singing your regular S2 part.  Tutti Camerata altos sing up to P. 8, m. 2 beat 2, then tacit until m. 3,  beat 3 where you sing the A2 line until P. 9 m2. 2 where you sing the unision alto line. Please S2s and Altos mark your scores accordingly. )

Please note the following announcements:

- watch your email for an announcement from Marsha Curry re a special AGM on Tuesday, May 3 from 9-9:30 pm. Rehearsal on Tuesday May 3 begins at 6:45pm.

- final auditions for solos next Tuesday or at a time you have confirmed with me.

- SNSC rehearsals: I would like you to come on Saturdays April 30 and May 21. The understanding was that HCS would attend at least 3 SNSC rehearsals to prepare for the second half of the concert. Some of you have not attended any.  As I mentioned on Tuesday, do not arrive at the rehearsal the Saturday before the concert (May 21) and sight read your way through this rep.

Finally, thank you all for some really lovely moments last Tuesday.  Women, the blend of both sopranos and altos in the Palestrina and the duet in the Part was gorgeous. The sound in the mixed formation of the Palestrina was also exciting - this is what I'm trying to achieve. I also want to welcome new S2, Claire Legere,  and hope you feel welcome in this wonderful collection of musicians.   For those of you who don't know Claire, she is also on the Camerata board, is an artistic partner with Xara and is finishing her Masters thesis (UBC) here in NS.

Have a wonderful Easter holiday with your family and friends.  Stay healthy!