Week 1: choir warmups & preparing a piece of music for conducting
This blog series is part of a course I’ve built to learn more about choir conducting (“Directed Study in Music”, under the supervision of Mark Vuorinen at the University of Waterloo). I am learning and thinking about many cool things and want to share some of them with you!
Conducting is exciting for me because it combines some of my favourite things: music, pedagogy, and leadership.
Jackie Hawley, conductor of my childhood choirs, taught a lot about vocal technique and the subtleties of conducting. She inspired me years ago to want to be a conductor. In 2014–15 I took Waterloo’s two conducting courses with Mark Vuorinen. In summer 2016 I co-conducted a chamber choir with a friend. In fall 2016, I was a student conductor with the Waterloo University Choir and conducted in concert. In Winter 2017 I participated in the masterclass and workshop Sharing the Podium during which I conducted the University of Guelph Chamber Singers in concert. This is the next chapter of my studies: from January-April 2018, I will be working on several projects to develop my skills in choir conducting.
What I did this week
- Built and deployed a website where I’ll be collecting my favourite choir warmups and teaching tools (and added several warmups to start it off)
- Researched, analyzed, and wrote all over a piece of music I will learn to conduct: I Thank You God, composed by Gwyneth Walker (one of my favourite pieces I’ve ever sung, from my Cantiamo days)
- Started reading Vocal Technique: A Guide for Conductors, Teachers, and Singers (introduction, chapter 1: posture, chapter 2: breath control)
Choir Warm-ups
Warm-ups are short exercises done at the beginning of rehearsal that get the choir ready for rehearsal. The book I started reading this week said that “for many amateur singers in choirs, conductors may be the only source of information about vocal technique [and] thus [have] a valuable opportunity […] to encourage great vocal technique and vocal health.” And how can this be done? One way is warm-ups, which “are critical for teaching, practicing, and improving vocal technique.”
This is why one of the biggest projects I’m working on this term will be reading several sources of vocal warm-ups and exercises, collecting my favourites, and putting them on the internet. I have a simple version of this website up, but also have many plans for more features. This is an exciting opportunity for me to combine my software engineering and musician skills.
Researching + finding meaning in a piece of music
Every little thing I learn about a piece I’m singing (why it was written, what it’s about, some cool musical technique used) makes the piece more fun for me to sing and helps me perform it better. As a conductor, these cool tidbits about a piece of music give me insight into how to communicate the piece to the choir — how to move my hands to convey what’s important, what to talk about in rehearsal, what to listen for when helping the choir sound better, and so on. And, in a ripple effect, when the singers learn these things they are also more excited about the piece. So, here are some things I learned about Gwyneth Walker’s I Thank You God!
(You can listen to it here)
Background
Walker wrote this piece while she was living back home caring for her mother in the last years of her life. This is extra personal to me because I experienced this myself just under two years ago — it was difficult and lonely. This piece reminds her of how music gives strength to overcome obstacles, and inspires me to convey the strength and calming power of this intense and beautiful piece.
A reminder of mindfulness
The lyrics are a poem (by e e cummings) which describes an amazing day he is grateful for. I love how the day is amazing not because of the things he has done — accomplishments or social interactions (things that often turn a day “good” for me) — but just the pure beauty of the world around him (the trees, the sky, the limitless earth). I have been thinking a lot about mindfulness lately and appreciating the world immediately around me, and this is a reminder of that. I love how, musically, there are both playful flowy parts that seem like dancing through the trees and hearing birds chirp, and also grand moments of awe similar to looking at the beautiful expansive sky. These are different feelings of happiness and appreciation, and both are special.
Marking the score
One thing many conductors do it draw all over their score with lots of colours and notes. One benefit to this having what’s going on very clearly laid out in front of you while conducting. Another benefit, that I experienced this week, is getting to really think about the piece and what you want to bring attention to or write down to remind yourself.
The things I generally mark in a score
- dynamics (where it’s quiet, loud, and in between)
- where big breaks are between sections (e.g. if a verse just started, put a big line in front of it to divide it from the previous section)
- where the choir will take breaths, and where I will take breaths to remind them they’re about to sing (yup, that’s a thing conductors do!)
- what pattern I move my hands in weird bars (especially in this piece since some bars have 3 beats, some have 4 or 5 or even 6, and there are also lots of places that pause)
- stuff around the text: consonants and vowels I especially want the choir to enunciate, words that should be emphasized more than other words
- the mood! I like to add little notes like “playfully” and “as if exclaiming from the rooftops!” to make sure I’m reflecting that in my body language as I conduct that part of the piece
I find it interesting that I tend to mark dynamics first. One reason I think I do this is because they’re very objective, so they’re easy to mark (if it says p, colour it blue, if it says ff, colour it bright red). I also really like how dynamics contribute to the intensity and contrast within a piece, and it’s fun to see it all coloured out in front of me.
Harmonic analysis
One thing I noticed was that I am much more eager to analyze and mark out things that my own conductors have talked about in rehearsal — things I’m more familiar with. One common method for score marking that I often avoid is harmonic analysis, which is writing down chord progressions and comments about the harmonies in the structure of a piece. I mentioned this to Mark and so he challenged me to do a harmonic analysis of I Thank You God.
I’ve done things like this in music theory classes, but have limited theory background and so it took me a while. This piece is also quite modern and has more unusual chord progressions, as well as areas where I can’t even tell what the chords are. I asked my friend Bailey Gu (who has more theory background than me) to help and though he helped me understand some things I wouldn’t have thought of, he was also confused by a lot of what was going on in the piece.
I’d like to learn more about how to approach this process to be more efficient and to focus more on the important parts. I’m also interested in learning how to use this information more in how I conduct a piece. Pretty much, I did what Mark challenged me to do but am not convinced yet that harmonic analysis is something I always want to do when preparing a score.
Questions for Mark
Q: How can I mark scores more effectively? What markings that I chose are more useful, what might be better left out, and what sorts of things could I add?
Q: What can I use harmonic analysis for when I conduct, and when I think about a piece?
A: He said that it might not make sense to make chord by chord analysis for pieces like this. He meant more to do barline analysis, or structural analysis. I will prepare this for next week. He said to think about:
- How does the song reflect the poem?
- How are choruses or verses related to each other? how are they different?
- What musical ideas are repeated?
- What key changes are there? When are they? How are the keys related?
- Harmonic rhythm — how often do chords change?
Highlights from reading Vocal Technique: A Guide for Conductors, Teachers, and Singers
I started reading a really cool book this week! I’m a huge vocal technique nerd (when you sing you’re the instrument and changing your body changes how you sound and that’s so cool!! here’s a video of me talking about this) and it’s awesome that I now have an excuse to spend time learning more about it. Here’s a few bits I liked in the the chapters I read this week:
Introduction: Our Philosophy of Vocal Technique
- “all too often singers are expected to accept a technique or related exercise based on faith. Yet, if conductors and teaches communicate the reason, singers would implement it more effectively and enthusiastically” — YES! The “why” is so important ! It helps the singers appreciate what you’re teaching, but builds critical thinking and musicianship skills 🎉 🎵
Chapter 1: Posture
Posture is important because all sound is produced by the body, and if the body isn’t positioned optimally for singing, the sound produced will be… well, not optimal. This chapter talked about technique for standing and sitting well, and ways to reduce tension across all parts of the body.
- “Ask singers to switch occasionally from sitting to standing positions during rehearsal. This reduces the tension that accumulates from being in one position for too long.” — just like a sit/stand desk this is something I know is a great idea but always forget about!
- on page 17 they talk about avoiding excessive body movement (e.g. swaying body, using more extreme facial expression). Question for Mark: Sometimes I do this as a way to “feel” the music more fully through my body, but does it bring unnecessary tension to my body? If I do this as a conductor am I causing harmful tension in the singers’ bodies?
Chapter 2: Breath Control
The breath is the generator of the energy that produces and supports the sound. It’s so important. Breathing technique helps you sing higher, lower, louder, softer, more consistently, more comfortably, … (this list could continue for a while)
- Upper chest breathing (which is improper technique compared to expanding the abdomen) can be caused by “singers holding in the abdomen to keep the stomach flat for the sake of appearances”
- I learned about suspension! Which is holding the breath without closing vocal folds. I remember Jackie talking about pretending you’re in a forest holding your breath to listen for the quietest sounds, and noticing how the throat doesn’t close. I thought it was cool that there was a difference between closed and not closed. What I only just learned is that to keep the lungs fairly full without closing the throat, you need to use all the muscles involved in breathing to keep the air in (the “easy” way is to just block the air from coming out with the throat). Exercises in holding the breath with the vocal folds left open are super great for developing those muscles.
- Also, since abdominal muscles are so important, yoga and pilates therefore help with singing!
That’s all for this week! I’ll be posting these weekly, so keep an eye out for the next one.
If you have questions about anything I talked about or want to chat with me about conducting stuffs, I love to talk about it so feel free to reach out!
