Okay, so I never came back and told you about last Tuesday’s full rehearsal.
Here are some small tidbits. The conductor does an incredible job of creating pictures for us to sing from. She’ll describe something, have us think about that and then sing from that place, or to that place, depending on the “picture.”
We were working on a beautiful baritone solo (that everyone eventually gets to sing) in the Faure Requiem. Faure wrote a stunningly beautiful line. The lyrics start out “Libera Me, Domine.” It’s about being freed from life. With the hopes that you’re heading to heaven. Well, this line is heaven. Anyway, we had sung it once, she told us a story about what to picture (and here’s where it gets fuzzy for me because I was busy trying to get a hold of a copy of the music, so I don’t know what she said). I found my spot in the music just as we were singing again. The difference between the first and second rendition was incredible. I wish I knew what thing she told people to picture in their minds. Whatever it was; it worked. All of a sudden the line, which had been sufficiently beautiful the first time through, was now stunningly gorgeous. There was a longing in the line that wasn’t there before.
Then we moved on to some carribean christmas songs we’re going to sing. Very simple, but FUN! I was moving and bopping to the music by the time rehearsal was over. I didn’t want it to be over, even though I’d been there since 6:00. Four hours of singing and I still wanted more.
However, once I got in the car and headed home in the dark I realized just how tired I was.
Auditions are nerve-wracking. Especially when you’re not prepared. Although, I suppose then you don’t have to deal with the dreading beforehand.
But I had such fun.
That was a week and a half ago. Now for the call back auditions.
She had said that she was going to be calling back more people than she wanted, so that she could see about blend.
The list comes out and there are 25 names on it. Mine’s the only one that has a first and last name. I’m assuming that’s because everyone knows everyone else.
Anyway, I’m rushing because the woman I carpool with was running a tiny bit late. I’m one of those goofy “if you can’t be on time, be early” kinds of people. The carpooling will be fine. She was only a few minutes late, but I was nervous about the call backs.
So, we’re in and singing through the piece one time. This time she’s calling 8 people up at a time. Two on a part. Two on a part is tough. It’s the hardest thing to blend. Two on a part. Ack! One is easy, three is easy. Two is TOUGH! Oh, sorry.
Well, if she’s looking to see what people can do with blend, that’s certainly the way to do it. So she has one set of 8 up. She takes out all but two and adds six more. Then another set of 8. I’m still sitting and I’m sweating. My breath is shallow. I can feel my entire body tensing. I don’t like waiting. I prefer to just sing and get it out of the way.
Finally, she calls me up. I’m up with nobody I know. Of course, that’s not hard to do, since I know all of three people auditioning at this point.
We sing. We hit the tough spot at the top of page two and she stops us. She spends sometime talking about how the alto’s pitch goes sharp in this one spot, see, here it’s the tonic, but then the chord changes and it’s the fifth. I’m listening intently. It sounds like she’s asking me to keep the pitch low. Hmmm, that’s odd, because the dynamic tune would have it go sharper, but she’s the conductor so okay.
We sing again, the other alto and I both hold that pitch low and the conductor stops us again. “You went FLAT!” Uh, that’s what we thought you wanted us to do.
NO! She heads over to the piano to explain again. It’s at that point that the other alto and I look at each other and say “didn’t she want us to stay low?” I realize what she’s trying to tell us and apologize for misunderstanding.
The next time through we sing it perfectly.
She sends everyone back except me. I’m standing up there. She calls up a tenor and a bass and then finally another soprano. Then she starts us up at that tricky spot again. The tenor bombs. He can’t find the tonality to save his life, poor dear. He’s pulling out his pitch pipe, trying to play his note, but we’re in dynamic tuning now, not tempered so he’s toast.
Okay, let me back up a little bit. I’m not sure what the real term for my dynamic tuning is. I know what tempered is. Tempered tuning is what the piano is tuned to. That way you can play in any key you want and the tuning isn’t all funny. But if you’re playing a stringed instrument, notes are tuned higher or lower depending on the key you’re in, the place in the chord that the note is in, etc. Anyway, most singers don’t often sing a ccapella. They sing with a piano, they learn music from a piano, they’re not familiar with this thing that I call dynamic tuning. (I really wish I knew the proper phrase for that.) Anyway, tuning is tricky.
So, we’re back to the tenor. She has him sing the line by himself. She sings with him. He matches her pitches fairly closely, but he’s still sticking closer to tempered tuning. She adds a bass. The tenor completely loses his tonality. It’s tight harmony, this Ave Verum Corpus that Mozart wrote. Beautiful. But tight harmonies, and clearly not what he’s familiar with. She says “how about if we add Nancy to that, so you can see where you fit.” I sing. The bass and I nail our pitches. The tenor is still struggling. We spent almost 20 minutes on this. I’m completely relaxed by now, because it’s clear that I’m blending well, I’m singing the pitches the way she wants them sung. I’m truly excited that she wants dynamic tuning (or whatever the hell it’s called, please if you know, you HAVE to put me out of my miser). I struggle with tuning when everyone else is singing tempered tuning. It just doesn’t ring. You won’t get overtones with tempered tuning. I get pissy when people holler at me if they’re singing tempered and I’m singing dynamic tuning.
So, Panda is waiting impatiently for me to finish this post. She just logged on and read the back posts to get caught up and then wailed “I’m Done! Finish that post, Mom!” And then proceeded to ask me question after question til I finally hollered “Stop that!” Stop asking me questions, evil child. I’ll never finish if you don’t stop asking me questions.” “oh” says she, sheepishly, “okay.”
Not 15 seconds later: “So Mom, there’s this pair of white skinny jeans . . .”
ARGH!
Now we’re laughing uproariously, but I’m still not finished with the darn post.
Oh, now it’s quiet. I’ve asked Keno to turn off the sound of the game he’s playing and Panda to turn off the music she’s playing and the STOP the questions!
And it’s quiet. Except for the crickets. They’re getting noisy.
All’s quiet on the woodland front.
Nighty night.
SongMom
YAY YOU!
Jen
Would your dynamic tuning also be known as Pythagorean tuning?
Carolyn/Bird ‘Pie