Welcome back everyone! It was lovely to hear some of you again on Zoom after such a long break. Also, thank you for the constructive feedback, which hopefully we can use to improve things. It will be a learning curve for all of us at the start, but I think John did extremely well and I totally agree with Traudi and Brian that when John spoke on the videos I felt he was speaking directly to me and nobody but me – his face and eyes are so expressive! I think in summery we were delighted to be back singing even if it is in this new format. I think, as John already knew of course, that we all struggled with the Bach but found the Byrd very manageable. Also, we will be giving more warning on what homework to expect as requested. It is true that with this type of rehearsal we will need to supplement our learning of notes at home. So extra and early homework for all, see below 🙂
* Homework for 15th September:
John intends to rehearse Bach no 4 bars 1-9 and Byrd bars 23-47.
* Homework for 22nd September:
John intends to rehearse Bach no 4 bars 10-20 and Byrd bars 1-22.
* Rehearsal tracks:
I have sung the Magnificat three times before and still didn’t get all my entries with just the limited accompaniment and without the other sections to give me some of my cues. I suspect most of us will need all the help we can get therefore. As you know, we have rehearsal tracks on our website already, which are good as you can slow the speed down. However, I did come across some sung youtube tracks which emphasize the different sections, which are a little more pleasing to the ear and also are little better at providing context to your line. They also have a rolling score which I find really helpful. The drawback is that we can’t slow these ones down. Anyway in case it helps I attach a document with the links. A warning though with these tracks – they do not Italianate the words (e.g. Magnificat is pronounced almost phonetically, which is not at all what John wants from us!), so please do keep that in mind and use the pronunciation that John wants from us.
Several members have highlighted that the RTÉ Philharmonic choir is also singing the Magnificat and that they are using a rehearsal track app called Carus, which is I hear quite good and the speed can be slowed down. However singers need to by scores (€7.99/score). So I guess that will be up to each member to decide on for themselves.
* New changes to the website – message from Geraint:
In order to try to improve communication from the committee and between choir members, we’ve made some changes to the website. The main one is that there is now a ‘Members news’ page in the members’ area of the website, which will be used to post news and information intended for choir members only. This is in addition to the existing ‘News’ page, which is used to post news items for the general public and which generates the choir newsletter emails. This will continue to be used as currently. The members’ news page will be used to hold internal communications to members, including copies of Sophia’s weekly emails, and is also available for choir members to add items which would be of interest or relevance to other members. If you’d like to add a new entry, please send it via email to myself (admin@goethechoir.ie) or Sophia (info@goethechoir.ie). Members will have the opportunity to comment or respond to posted news items, so we’d like to encourage you to visit this page regularly and let us know your thoughts on posted items or any other aspect of choir life. Go to http://goethechoir.ie/