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Tomorrow will be our big outing! I had recounted the build-up in my previously lost post and don't know if I have the energy to say it all again but maybe I can summarise some of it...
We managed to squeeze in an extra rehearsal in preparation of tomorrow's concert but I see our initial numbers dwindling. I guess that is part of the course with any new enterprise but it leaves us with only about 15 singers. Most of us sing together on a regular basis and so that simplifies certain things, but when the strong voices are absent, singers develop a suddent shyness although they more or less know their part. Partly it is to do with singing in English. I know that they are all worried they'll forget their words (and I have banned wordsheets on stage). Last evening I met up with one of the singers who said she's been rehearsing like mad at home every day! To allay their fears, I had e-mailed the different vocal parts as an MP3 file which I recorded myself one by one so they could sing along to it at home.
The stage set up is as follows :
The main village choir (who have invited us to sing) will begin its programme with three African songs (their speciality) providing us with a spurious link to gospel music (it was that or a Breton folk song!). Then we shall step forward having shed our African print waistcoats (stage costumes!) wearing black and white. We'll begin with "Were You There?" for its beautiful harmony and feeling. I sing the first verse as a solo and then the choir joins in for the rest. It's crying out for a bass line and Ben has volunteered but I'm afraid if he abandons our two tenors they'll get lost...
Then we get up tempo with "God Great God" (which is making everyone particularly nervous). As a finale we'll join with the main choir for "Bless the Lord". So we'll be about fifty singers for that. We've ironed out our problems with "Bless The Lord" (which were mostly about being an assertive leader!) and have stepping and clapping pretty much under wraps. I just hope that the main choir keeps quiet while we sing as they will still be on stage and are prone to fidgeting and chatting. The French (and this is a purely objective observation) see nothing wrong with chatting while someone else is talking but hopefully they'll make an exception for us!
We've been working quite hard on nuances and feeling, and I've done some voice projection work with the singers which I learned from years of doing theatre workshops. This has been quite funny : trying to articulate tongue twisters and try to make it understood by the neighbour in the next building! I've tried to include a few tips from the CompleteVocal Technique to help them improve voice production. Maureen, who has never sung formally before, nor learned music, but who has an amazing voice (soprano), told me yesterday that she feels like she's made a lot of progress even though we've only met such a few times. That's encouraging.
A couple of us went to see a gospel concert in town last evening : Gospel Aujourd'hui (our unwitting mentors) were celebrating their fifth year. It was a fantastic night and I was quite moved by the spirit. One of our singers had said they weren't sure about the religious element (?!) which I thought was odd coming from someone who had chosen to sing gospel with us. I guess it is something she is working through. My friend told me then that she had appreciated what I had said at our initial rehearsal about my singing gospel with conviction. Another said that without that faith he couldn't ever hope to sing with the conviction required. It seems that quietly people are doing a lot of thinking about the subject - at least we'll have achieved that if nothing else!
Well, the next post will be to report on happenings tomorrow. God bless all.
Gospella.
Tomorrow will be our big outing! I had recounted the build-up in my previously lost post and don't know if I have the energy to say it all again but maybe I can summarise some of it...
We managed to squeeze in an extra rehearsal in preparation of tomorrow's concert but I see our initial numbers dwindling. I guess that is part of the course with any new enterprise but it leaves us with only about 15 singers. Most of us sing together on a regular basis and so that simplifies certain things, but when the strong voices are absent, singers develop a suddent shyness although they more or less know their part. Partly it is to do with singing in English. I know that they are all worried they'll forget their words (and I have banned wordsheets on stage). Last evening I met up with one of the singers who said she's been rehearsing like mad at home every day! To allay their fears, I had e-mailed the different vocal parts as an MP3 file which I recorded myself one by one so they could sing along to it at home.
The stage set up is as follows :
The main village choir (who have invited us to sing) will begin its programme with three African songs (their speciality) providing us with a spurious link to gospel music (it was that or a Breton folk song!). Then we shall step forward having shed our African print waistcoats (stage costumes!) wearing black and white. We'll begin with "Were You There?" for its beautiful harmony and feeling. I sing the first verse as a solo and then the choir joins in for the rest. It's crying out for a bass line and Ben has volunteered but I'm afraid if he abandons our two tenors they'll get lost...
Then we get up tempo with "God Great God" (which is making everyone particularly nervous). As a finale we'll join with the main choir for "Bless the Lord". So we'll be about fifty singers for that. We've ironed out our problems with "Bless The Lord" (which were mostly about being an assertive leader!) and have stepping and clapping pretty much under wraps. I just hope that the main choir keeps quiet while we sing as they will still be on stage and are prone to fidgeting and chatting. The French (and this is a purely objective observation) see nothing wrong with chatting while someone else is talking but hopefully they'll make an exception for us!
We've been working quite hard on nuances and feeling, and I've done some voice projection work with the singers which I learned from years of doing theatre workshops. This has been quite funny : trying to articulate tongue twisters and try to make it understood by the neighbour in the next building! I've tried to include a few tips from the CompleteVocal Technique to help them improve voice production. Maureen, who has never sung formally before, nor learned music, but who has an amazing voice (soprano), told me yesterday that she feels like she's made a lot of progress even though we've only met such a few times. That's encouraging.
A couple of us went to see a gospel concert in town last evening : Gospel Aujourd'hui (our unwitting mentors) were celebrating their fifth year. It was a fantastic night and I was quite moved by the spirit. One of our singers had said they weren't sure about the religious element (?!) which I thought was odd coming from someone who had chosen to sing gospel with us. I guess it is something she is working through. My friend told me then that she had appreciated what I had said at our initial rehearsal about my singing gospel with conviction. Another said that without that faith he couldn't ever hope to sing with the conviction required. It seems that quietly people are doing a lot of thinking about the subject - at least we'll have achieved that if nothing else!
Well, the next post will be to report on happenings tomorrow. God bless all.
Gospella.
posted by Gospella @ 10:50 pm
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