Keep it Choral

We started the evening with great news that our Treasured Treasurer has been given the all clear after 18 months of uncertainty and dangled the carrot of a free drink in the break! 

As we are approaching the darker evenings, we have our first challenge next week with our rehearsal being in the downstairs bar, which as most of us know, can be a little gloomy, so please remember to bring any torches, headlamps etc if you need more illumination.

This week we started a new song, Harbour by Anna Tabbush who is a composer/arranger, choir conductor, singer and multi-instrumentalist based in West Sussex

She wrote Harbour two years ago in response to the Syrian refugee crisis. With the appalling response by the British press and government to the tragedies that were happening at sea, she felt hers was a lonely voice in wanting a more welcoming and compassionate country to live in.

It consists of three simple verses with the first three bars with everyone singing in unison before splitting into harmonies. 

With the speaking voice, the vowels are at the back of the throat, so when singing think of bringing them forward in your mouth to give them a more elongated sound.

Altos, you know your notes, there are lots of you, so be brave and make yourselves heard.

Generally, everyone sing out and don’t be afraid of making a mistake.  If you do it will be clearly heard (no one will shame you) and then it can be corrected.

We have covered all the notes in this song, although we have not sung it all from start to finish.  Keep it fresh in your mind and check the vocal tracks, so you will be  ready for next time.

Gabriel’s Message as sung by Sting. We performed thus at our last Winter Concert, so this should be fresh in most minds. Only those of you who joined from the beginning of the year have an excuse not to know it!

It is a Basque Christmas folk carol about the Annunciation to the Virgin Mary by the archangel Gabriel that she would become the mother of Jesus Christ the Son of God.

It was originally based on Angelus ad virginem, a 13th or 14th Century Latin carol and was collected by Charles Bordes (pub. Paris 1897) and then paraphrased into English by Sabine Baring-Gould (pub. 1922), who had spent a winter as a boy in the Basque country. The tune is called Gabriel's Message. It is commonly performed in an arrangement by Edgar Pettman published in 1922.

The Altos start us off with the first verse with us all joining in harmony with ‘All hail said he …..’

‘Gloria’ is different for each voice part.

Each voice part has a verse to sing with the Sops being very quiet and gentle on their verse.

We all sing together boldly, ‘Of her Emmanuel the Christ was born….’  and when it comes to  ‘And Christian folk throughout….’ the Sop 1s have the harmony while the Sop 2s have the tune.

The Glorias at the end are different for the Sops with the first one sung as previously, but the last two are shortened.

‘Gloria’ should sound like, ‘Glor-ray-ar’ with elongated vowels and a serious face and not, ‘Glor -ee-ah’ with a smiley face.

Not quite choral, Walking in the Air was revisited from a couple of weeks ago, and like Harbour and Gabriel’s Message, it should have the elongated vowel sounds giving a choral effect.

Starting on page 3 with the ‘Aaahs’, keep them light and going to the end of the phrase without pushing it.

When singing the ‘oo’ sound in ‘you’ and ‘blue’ make it a surprised pigeon ‘oo’ sound.

Ed Sheeran and Anne Marie covering the

Fairytale of New York.

From page 7 of our score there are a lot of Scotch snaps (A scotch snap is a short, accented note followed immediately by a longer note, creating a distinctive rhythmic "snapping" effect.) so watch out for them and get the rhythm right.

This song has such a variety of rhythms and tempos, it is worth familiarising yourself with them from the very slow start to the lively jig section.

See you next week, in the downstairs bar!