Mulling things over

Well nothing new has happened as far as the group is concerned but I have continued to prepare our next meeting, at least mentally.

I was really pleased with how the first part of "Jesus On The Mainline" sounded and have been trying to memorise the different harmonies of the rest of it. The main difficulty is that there is a major part for a soloist. I was hoping to have the sopranos sing that but the way it is written includes lots of accidentals which I'm not sure they will find easy to learn. The sound is more for someone with jazz/blues experience; I wonder if a dozen voices can get the same twiddly effect? It seems quite natural to me as that's the kind of music I grew up hearing my mum sing but I know people with a more 'classical' musical background have trouble imagining the harmony.

What makes this song quite difficult to memorise are the different response-style entry points for the different voices as I've never heard the song actually sung before, except in my head! It's like having a whole pile of lego and knowing it's going to make a great helicopter but you have to put all the pieces in the correct order! I guess if we all plod forwards together we'll make it eventually.

Another question I haven't answered yet is whether we should sing a cappella or accompanied. I would prefer to do without instruments and highlight voices but there are some songs which would be better with at least a piano accompaniment. It's a very practical question as we need our prospective pianist to sing and I'm not sure he could do both efficiently. I know a backing track exists to accompany the songbook but I don't know what it sounds like. The choir members have always criticised the over-important role of the band in gospel concerts they have attended so I'm not sure they'd like the idea. Technically speaking, wherever we sing it would be difficult to have playback. No-one is a sound engineer and levels would be hard to achieve, if possible at all as we'd need to provide our own amps in some venues (assuming we ever sing anywhere other than someone's basement!).
But a full band does energise the singing.I suppose I could fall back on the synth?

I need to discuss this further, obviously. Keep you posted>
Gospella

From the basement!

"Phew!" (or "Ouf" - pronounced 'ooff' - as they say in French!). Our first gospel meeting has been and gone. I woke up this morning with slightly stiff shoulders so I must have been jumping about all over the place as I directed. I kind of feel as if by sheer physical will I can get the note/sound I want out of the singers!! Great sport!

So, last night at 8.30 I set off to join the others at the house of one of our singers. Cars were parked both sides of the street and people headed into the dark recesses of the basement. I joined them as they huddled in a circle giggling that it was like some clandestine sect meeting! Actually the basement was very well lit, heated and spacious - which was just as well as there were over twenty of us. Our friend's husband scoured the house for as many chairs as he could find but I reminded them that gospel music is best sang standing anyway!

There were a couple of unfamilar faces - two teenage girls who wanted to join us and a couple of other new recruits, but mainly people who are already used to singing together. We only mustered four men - who did a good job but who could do with reinforcements.
I was pleased to see my fellow gospel 'students' who proved to be invaluable with the harmonisations they remembered from the summer course. Also our regular choir director who was sitting discreetly with the altos. Haha : a chance for revenge for all the jibes she sends our way on Tuesday evenings (all in good humour, of course). :-)

I decided to start by a short speech outlining the origin of the idea for the group and the short-term objective of basically being a musical experiment. Then I gave a quick introduction to the sense of gospel. I said this was religious music and that no-one should feel uncomfortable at that idea if they were going to sing it convincingly. I explained that I was a Christian and that just as Christians try to show their faith by the way they are, gospel music must inhabit you if you are going to get the impact of its message across. I wonder what anyone thought of that little comment? It was hardly a moving testimony but I didn't want to preach a sermon. Perhaps they just ignored it? Anyway, I then said a bit about the sort of music it was (i.e. modern rather than negro spirituals) and we started warming up.

The warming up is, I think, essential before a good sing and recently I have been delegated this job at our Tuesday choir practice. I don't know why me but everyone seems to enjoy it. They're particularly fond of the facial massage I ask them to do and yesterday I only had to say "Let's warm up," and some of them were already rubbing their cheeks!
I got them to stretch their arms and concentrate on their breathing, pointing out the muscles that should be working so they could later feel where to squeeze! Then we started a chromatic ascent singing "Wonderful, Marvellous, Fabulous" in a neutral, dreamy voice at first building up to a joyful volume by the end. Then it was time for some work!

We started off with "Lord Have Mercy (Come Here Jesus)" which is quite gentle. A lot of it is in unison so it gave us a chance to hear what our voices were like together and then to experiment with a simple harmony. Of our four men, two sing bass so they were an octave below the tenors and the danger was of having a sound more like a Gregorian chant than joyful bells at the end. Even with such simple words everyone was stressed by their wordsheets. This got worse as we moved on to more complex texts such as Kurt Carr's "God Great God".

I had intended to have them just learn the beginning of this song but things went well and everyone wanted to finish learning it so we spent a good hour on it. The greatest difficulty (apart from the words) was for the three voices to find their notes as we were singing unaccompanied. By the end of the session, though, we had managed to memorise it pretty well. The bass singers pulled a face when they heard some of their high notes but they compromised with the octave again which actually gave quite a rich harmony in places. We managed to sing the whole song through by the end without too many problems apart from one or two ropey moments for the altos.

I could see people were getting pretty tired (it was around 10.15 by now). They'd been concentrating quite hard both on the foreign words (complete with pronunciation input from me) and music. But mercilessly I wanted to get them started on a third song : "Jesus On The Mainline". Just the first verse, go on...
It took a while for the altos and tenors' voices to get in place as firstly I missed the starting note (whoops) which took us on the wrong path, and secondly there are a lot of accidentals which they felt odd about singing. But the result was great! By the end I had them on their feet stepping and clapping and singing the three-part harmony. I can't wait to teach them the rest of it. With the help of Ben (pianist and 'gospeller') and Mary (musician and choir director) I hope, who will shove me back on key when I miss!! (Names have been changed to protect the innocent!!)

Then we were all fed cake by our hosts and given a glass of wine to recover from our exertions (this is France, remember!).
I tried to get a bit of feedback from the singers to see if they'd enjoyed themselves but they just returned the question and asked how they'd done!!

Very well, I must say. From a dots-and-staves point of view. There still has to be a lot of work on vocal technique though as there is little if no nuance. But that will come. My unfathomable problem at the moment is how to get them to lose the wordsheets. They all sit/stand with their noses in the words even though I'm singing them all and articulating like some crazy cartoon character, so they don't look at me and miss entrances etc. I'll have to think about that one.

One disappointment was that the cassette of the rehearsal I had recorded for revision purposes was completely blank as the 'tape' function on my stereo wasn't on!! Now we'll all be counting on memory next time.

Then in the pitch dark (streetlights are off at eleven sharp in our village to save money and there was no moon!) I tried to find my car and came home. After seven straight hours of back-to-back teaching (I'm a secondary school teacher by the way), two-hours' driving, family obligations and two hours of gospel I slept like a log!
Gospella

Reaching out

I want to tell you about Frances (not her real name, but then you don't think I'm really called Gospella do you???)
Frances is a lady of about 60 who sings with our village choir. She's very quiet and reserved, she doesn't have a powerful voice and isn't always sure she's on key, but she likes music and enjoys singing. In 2005 I managed to persuade her to come along to the gospel course. She was really nervous and worried she'd somehow 'fail' and didn't relish the thought of singing in public (which is odd as she takes part in all the village choir's concerts).
Well I can honestly say that she has been transformed by the experience.

After that first course I directed a gospel number with our whole choir and as I conducted I saw her come alive. She had become enthusiastic, joyful to watch and opened her mouth so wide, letting out such a strong sound - she was hardly the same person.
Needless to say, she came along to the summer course again this year and has signed up to join us with our new group.
Frances doesn't speak English and always asks me the meaning of the texts we have to sing and she writes a little translation at the top of her wordsheets. She says it really helps her. I don't think she means just musically as I know she is a practising catholic.

For those not familiar with the French 'id', they are very reluctant to speak of faith, almost as if religion were a dirty word. Prayer is most definitely confined to mass and loud gospel music is not something that enters into worship. (I realise I am doing many faithful in France a disservice by writing this but I do like to challenge people's status quo! Please take no offence.)
I was, therefore, overjoyed when Frances explained to me that she was very excited at having found a new way to pray through gospel music. It took her a lot of courage to say it and she told me she hadn't dared say anything in front of the other choir members.

Her reaction has really encouraged me to agree to this gospel experiment. Someone wise once said it wasn't just a coincidence if gospel music moved people; it was the holy spirit working. I think Frances is a case in point and I hope she's not going to be the only one.

Gospella

Sheet music

I love it when you open the mailbox and inside you find a parcel you've been expecting for a while. Today the two books of Gospel music I had ordered from the UK arrived and I have spent the afternoon seeing if any would be suitable for the choir on Thursday.

One book is arranged for a-cappella choirs and the songs are pretty standard. The other is a bit more exciting and modern but requires accompaniement and soloists. I am generally the soloist when I sing with the people involved in this group but I can't lead and sing solo at the same time so I'll have to either re-arrange the pieces or hope someone else steps up! (Unfortunately, the ones with great voices don't want to be centre stage - never my problem ;-D)

Out of the new books I think we'll try "Were you there?" for a soft number and I'd like to try and put together "Jesus On The Mainline". It's really snappy and I can hear it in my head already. I reckon it will take us a good few tries to learn it but it would be worth it in the long run. I have also decided to start with a couple of songs we learned on the gospel course : "Come Here Jesus" which is fairly simple and should encourage the group to get started; and "God Great God" - but I only have my memory to go on. Actually, I don't play the piano so that's pretty much all I have to go on most of the time anyway! It's rather an ambitious piece but I think you've got to keep people motivated and it's a high energy number. Also, there will be at least one person from each voice (soprano, alto, tenor) present who already know the song which should help to move things along.

Still no change on the venue so I hope our friend lights a stove in her basement! It's been pouring with rain for two days and is cold - we're going to have to do a lot of warming up exercises if this weather continues. We are hoping the municipality will find us a place to rehearse. There is a great new theatre rehearsal room with good acoustics but I suspect other associations have set their sights on it already. Maybe just once a month? Pretty please? I'll have to butter up the mayor : he has a weakspot for my carrot cake. Maybe that'll do the trick...

In the beginning

So, this is the story of a few amateur singers who wanted to put together a gospel choir.


I sing in a village choir of about 40 singers in France (although I'm English). I'm a soprano and sing solo. The choir sings a very eclectic mix of World music, renaissance drinking songs, humorous songs in French, Russian orthodox music, Eastern European folk songs, traditional Mexican songs, and lots of African songs. Occasionally we sing a gospel song or two.

In 2005 I signed up for a gospel singing weekend in Tours which involved several voice workshops, rythm, and preparing for a mass choir concert on the last evening. I dragged along a couple of members of our choir and it was fantastic. Not least because of the superb group leaders : Erwan Jan, Taïa Kronberg, Wayne Ellington (GB) and Karen Gibson (Kingdom Choir, London UK).

We were all really energised by this weekend and I had no problem persuading the same people, along with a few more, to join me again in 2006 for a similar course. Once again it was a fantastic weekend which we enjoyed immensely. (Check out the CD of the concert coming out in October 2006 - details will follow!!)

Several participants were so excited about this gospel music that they asked me to start up a gospel choir. I must say that apart from having taught them a couple of gospel songs in the regular choir I am not a choir director normally. But no-one seems to mind that so we've decided to go for it.

I wasn't sure if anyone would be really interested in singing exclusively gospel music : a lot of our singers are non-believers. But we have a list of over twenty people who want to come along.

As we are all rather over-committed with work/family/associations we decided to meet only once a month. So the first challenge will be to see if that suffices to learn the songs. The language is another potential difficulty for all the chorists as some of them don't even speak English. For me the biggest challenge will be musical : kind of an upward learning curve as my years of formal music learning are rather a long way behind me. I'm relying on my ear!

We haven't managed to find a venue for our first meeting (set for next Thursday 12th October) so we're meeting in a friend's basement if nothing else turns up!

This blog, then, is to chart our progress (or lack of it) and will be a place for my thoughts on the project. Your comments and tips will be welcome for us to improve.
Catch you later.
Gospella

Under construction

Soon to come : news and views on starting up a gospel choir from scratch. Wish us luck.
Gospella