Well, today is May 24 so that means that exactly one month from now we will be ironing blouses and polishing shoes ready for the big night. Three more rehearsals to go.
The good news is that things are coming together. Last night we sang through everything in the program apart from Zorongo. The recordings are at the bottom of the post. Recognise that the piano is rather loud and recording on a phone is very unforgiving, and makes us sound weedier than we are in real life, so don’t be too critical. But by all means listen closely and pick up things you can improve on! Sops, what do you notice in the first movement? Basses, happy with the entry at the start of 2? Everyone, how are the Ts of ‘eine neue Welt’ in that movement? Sops and Altos – do you see what I was saying about trying to be perfectly together in Habanera so you sound like one harmonised voice? Everyone, are the dynamic contrasts in Laudate Dominum up to your expectations or can we make the louds louder and the softs softer? Lots of things we can improve on, but also make sure you hearing all the nice things you are doing.
Remaining rehearsals – I said this wrong last night. The last three Tuesdays run like this –
Tues Jun 6 – Bernadette Lord will be joining us to put the soprano solos in and help us acclimatise to the distraction of a solo part.
Tues Jun 13 – Our one Tuesday evening with Stephen Hall.
Tues Jun 20 – Our final brush up to achieve perfection.
I hope it goes without saying that these are all vitally important and we want everybody at every one of these three if possible, please.
Seating plan: after considerable thought and experimentation, I think that the best plan for us is to revert to our old formation. The benefit of having the tenors up front was outweighed by the detriment of having the sopranos uncomfortable and less powerful. The basses don’t care where they stand, but others prefer them behind and tenors want them close. So the best available compromise is our old line up, laid out in three clean rows.
And I am hoping that we will be able to use the stage for the remaining three rehearsals, which means that we need bodies at CC at 7.30 to get us set up and ready to start at 7.45. If you can be one of the early birds, please liaise with Siobhan.
Keep going, it is going to be a great concert.
Chris
Practice – Entries and Endings
Word endings were markedly better last night, but still need to be improved to be at concert standard. A pencil is your best friend here. If you haven’t marked ‘Und eine neue Welt’ with vertical lines to denote “stop here” or horizontal arrows to show “sing through, no breath” you are making it hard on yourself. Remembering what you are supposed to do in the heat of the concert without visual prompts will inevitably mean you are the one person who holds the note too long or plops a big consonant down too early. Cue crimson blushing. And obviously it is not just that one movement, but everything. Given we have no rehearsal next week, it is an ideal chance to use the spare time to get that marking up done.
And every single entry needs to be 50% more assured. You cannot be thinking ‘hmmm, not sure if this is right so I’ll leave this one to someone else.’ We need everyone coming in together and proud on every entry, whether it’s a big noisy one or a soft, Brahmsy one. So again, mark your score to give you a bar or two of forewarning, and sing along to your favourite recording.
Last night’s recordings:
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