Wow! What a big, wonderful sound we had! Some moments took my breath away.
6:30: the Small Group was Mele Kalikimaka, and they got through the whole thing, except the special little introduction part. Amazing. It sounds great.
Our warm-up included movement, clapping, and harmonizing with the Beach Boys' Help Me, Rhonda. The sports teams disappointed us, but we still did some Wow! and What? rollercoasters.
1. 12 Songs of Christmas. It's officially Christmas music season (mine, anyway. Mid-October) and we sang this medley of 12 Christmas songs to see how fun and easy it is. Sopranos especially have an easy and fun time with this medley. The harmonies are not difficult and the transitions are pretty easy too. We sang the whole way through and spent time on the intro and first two songs. Watch out! The intro is tricky: after "the twelve", "days of Christmas are" is unexpected and all equal quarter notes. Circle that, or make a note to yourself not to be tricked into singing the twelve days of Christ--mas.
2. O Holy Night: Wow, wow, wow. I love this! We learned the chorus, and learned that we've been doing one part wrong for many years. The second ending of the chorus "e-ver mo-ore pro-claim" We've been singing e-ver-mor pro-claim. We have recordings if you want to go over your part. The oohs are not too difficult and the soloists are doing a great job. I would like someone to try singing those solos as a back-up. Let me know if you're interested. For now, we have Amy, Linda, and Sharon.
3. Angels Among Us: We tried it with soloists, and discovered that what I expected would be a challenge is a challenge, and that is getting us all in for the chorus. It's not too hard, but it's different after each verse, so watch me (and Donna will fix it if we/I mess up. Sharon and Robyn were the soloists today. I've got Ellie and Cathy interested too. We'll need back-ups so this is good news.
4. Song for a Winter's Night: It's so pretty! I love this one so much. I love that it's Canadian, and I love that it's wintery but doesn't mention Christmas. We reviewed page 9 to the ending. The part that was the most powerful was in the middle of page 11, where it's only 2 parts, but so beautiful "on this winter's night with you". The tenors and basses nailed their part and the sopranos and altos remembered not to go down too low, and it was perfection.
5. In the Bleak Midwinter: Impressive. I love the way this song moves in the 4 parts. Very choral. It's quite difficult but you got it! We've now reviewed the two 4-part verses, and the other two verses will be solos. I've got a couple people interested in those solos. Let me know if you'd like to try one. We have recordings of this. Note that the solos are both in the Tenor recording, not in the Soprano recording.
6. Do you hear what I hear? we ran out of time so I just let you know that it's big, it's going to be our finale, and you should watch the YouTube video of the choir singing it in 2012. We have recordings. There's lots of melody for the Tenors and Basses, which means there's stuff that the sopranos are going to need to pay attention to.
We talked about:
The website: make sure you can log in. Carol will have sent an email from the website for you to get in. Let her know if it didn't work. You can send me an email too, for help. There's so much there. Look around and make use of it. Check it every week to see if there's anything new in the announcements section on the home page. There are links to the YRCC Calendar, this blog, and my YouTube channel too. Sign up for events on the website. Small groups are set up as events.
Recordings and music are in folders. You'll mostly find something like this first one, where there's a recording of the accompaniment without parts, and then one for each part, played over the accompaniment, and then there's a pdf. You can print one as a "working copy" for you to mark up with more than pencil if you like. Never use anything but pencil on the one that we give you in your binder. Sometimes, there are good YouTube videos for the parts, so we have links in a word document in the Music Library folder, as you can see in the second one below.
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| Music Library Folder for Bleak Midwinter |
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| Music Library Folder for Song for Winter's Night |
November 11th rehearsal: We're singing, and we are going to be out. Our room isn't available, but we've been asked to sing for a women's group at St. Elizabeth Seton Church in Newmarket, so that's perfect. We'll have excellent rehearsal singing in front of an audience of kind women. Details will be added to the Calendar as they are determined. Our theme of peace is perfect for a gathering on Remembrance Day.
Next Week, Tuesday, October 21st
6:30 Mele Kalikimaka
- Angels Among Us
- Do You Hear What I Hear
- For Unto Us a Child is Born
- Let There Be Peace on Earth
- Peace on This Silent Night
- Why We Sing
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