The Choir
I hope you’ve been watching ‘The Choir’ on BBC each week when a young highly-enthusiastic musician has bullied and cajoled various groups from around the country to improve their singing skills and join in a public performance of (sometimes) a relatively-difficult piece.
Although the timescale is greatly contracted and the whole thing is intended to make good television, it is still very-interesting to watch what can be done. If you haven’t seen it before, give it a try!
May I Precent?
Recently I visited again, a lovely little Church of Scotland in an idyllic part of Argyll, which has all the hallmarks of a conventional Highland Presbyterian Church.
It had a pefectly-preserved Precentor’s chair, just below the pulpit. The one shown above is from the Glasite Church in Dundee in use in the 1700’s.
The name Precentor goes back as far as the 4th Century and means literally ‘First Singer’. He, for it was always ‘he’, was an important official in a church, monastic community, or Cathedral where he sat opposite the Dean. Hence we have the two sides of the Choir, Decani (of the Dean) and Cantoria (of the Precentor).
In the days and places such as the Scottish Presbyterian Churches, where there was no choir or organ, (at least before the end of the 1800s) there was still a wish to sing. The metrical psalms were highly-regarded and so were very important in the worship of the day. Paraphrases and hymns were just starting to be used (not without some local objections!) .
So someone who had an ear for a tune could be useful and might be appointed to start and lead the singing. It was at this time he might have been allowed a pitch-pipe, especially if his inherent pitch were not perfect.
So whilst we sometimes see and hear a Precenter in Songs of Praise from one of the islands, the Precenter’s chair is now a seat rarely occupied.
However…..I saw recently at a Roman Catholic funeral service, this very office being fulfilled by a very-competent singer, who was able to lead a rather-recalcitrant congregation along……..so maybe the hands of the clock have been turned back!
FAURE REQUIEM
The RSNO organised a Workshop on the above, in Sherbrook-St Gilbert’s Church in Glasgow on Sunday. It was intended to encourage more people to join the Chorus, as, like many institutions, they can always take on more members.
This was the first time I had taken part as a singer, as previouslyI had conducted it! I would reckon that there were over 100 ladies, with about 30 men….so we were well out-numbered!
We practised from 2pm to 5pm, during which we had periods of vocal training which I found very useful. It was during this time I found out the nitty-gritty problems of trying to pitch some of the notes. It is a complex piece as far as a singer is concerned. I would actually say that there was an element of in-built orchestral writing and harmony. This may have been influenced by the fact that both his parents died about the time of writing, and his mind was in a turmoil.
The performance at 6pm had an audience of about 30 brave souls. There were moments when I felt I had lost it, but just kept an ear open for clues. So whatever the difficulty it still has a certain solemnity/reverence/tunefulness which no doubt accounts for the popularity of this wonderful piece.
Royal School of Church Music
In these days when educational establishments want to be called universtities, colleges, academies, institutions, etc, there is still one modestly called a ’school’. …..RSCM
The moving figure was Sir Sidney Nicholson. He was born in 1875, studied at Oxford, the Royal College of Music, and then Frankfurt-in-Main. By his late 20s he was holding positions at Carlisle Cathedral, and Manchester. He was then at Westminster Abbey from1918-1928.
By then he had decided to establish St. Nicholas College, and an associated School of English Church Music, to improve the quality of music in Churches. (Makes me wonder what was happening around the rest of the UK!) The SECM, was formed by Sir Sidney, on 6th December 1927 (the feast of St Nicolas, Patron of Choirboys and children) at a meeting in the Abbey. It had a number of associated choirs and churches all committed to high standards.
From 1929 to the outbreak of war it operated from Bullers Wood in Chislehurst, Kent, and organised major choral festivals in the London area. By this time there were some 1300 affiliated churches home and abroad. Many students were called-up in 1945 but Sir Sydney continued travelling round teaching to Parish Churches and Dioceses, from Tenbury and Leamington Spa.
At the end of the war, it became the RSCM operating from the precincts of Canterbury Cathedral with the College of St Nicholas being re-established there. By 1952, there were over 3000 affiliated churches.
Most of us who have any connection with the RSCM, will know the picture of Addington Palace, Croydon where they moved to in 1954. It had been the home of the Archbishops of Canterbury, and was a wonderful setting.
From 1996 to 2006 the headquarters were at Cleveden Lodge near Dorking, and is now established at Sarum College, in Salisbury.
It is and has been, arguably the most decisive influence on the quality of our religious praise over the last 80 years, and no doubt will continue to be so, and all because of Sir Sydney Nicholson.
The perfect choir?
Click on the link below to see one of my most favourite-ever cartoons…..
Tenor or bass?
From my early choral youth, I sang tenor after my voice broke. Maybe this was because father, cousins and uncles all sang tenor, and there was an immense amount of pride in who could sing highest.
However as musical education and experience continued and increased, I was informed sagely by one of my uncles (who still sings in his 90’s!) that if I ever wanted to conduct or write music, then I had to be able to read and, if possible, sing, all the parts.
This did prove useful to me in my early composing days, in that I gained an appreciation about what is ’singable’, and how boring it is to sing a part which is difficult or un-interesting.
When writing, I usually compose soprano and bass parts together, then fit in tenor notes, and finish with the poor old altos. Of course it’s not always like that, but there are always notes , or ‘jumps’ which you would prefer not to have to use but are needed for completeness.
But now that my voice is dropping into baritone and bass levels, I revel in the simplicity of finding (hopefully) the bass notes at any time. Anyone with an awareness of chordal structures can generally fall into this line very quickly, whereas the poor old tenors and altos have the constant struggle of keeping in touch with their notes.
So one great advantage of aging, for me, is that I can really enjoy my singing and still make it difficult for the inner lines in my compositions….sorry folks!
A big sing!
In the middle of last year, we drove north, with some good friends, to join the Churches in the Pitlochry area, to meet at the Festival Theatre Garden, and sing some well-kent melodies and harmonies with other members of local churches.
For those of us who love to exercise our lungs in public, what is it that makes joining in a large choir so wonderful? Is it the comradeship, the mutual mistakes, the thrill of well-sung harmony, or some strange primitive sensation bringing us together in a common purpose, where no-one is more important than others, and equality is all? Or is it the anonimity which assures us that a mistake made by us is not going to destry the overall effect?
About the same time, I joined over 500 other choristers in the Glasgow City Hall to practise and then perform the Brahms German Requiem, all on one day! Some feat…..and (besides several Austrian holidays) one of the few occasions when I was able to justify the time spent as a youth learning the gutteral formation of awkward long words!
However it was a wonderful event and the sheer numbers of those singing the same part as I was, carried me forward to the right notes (well, at least, mostly!).
But the answer still eludes me….why do we like to sing in large numbers?
Some positive quotes about singers and singing
The previous post would not encourage anyone to take up singing!….but there are some positive attitudes expressed by some great people…
St Augustine….. ‘Sing with your voices and with your hearts, and with all your moral convictions, sing the new songs, not only with your tongue but with your life’
Berlioz……’A singer able to sing so much as sixteen bars of good music, in a natural, well-poised, and sympathetic voice, without effort, without affectation, without tricks, without exaggeration, without hiatuses, without hiccupping, without barking, without baa-ing —such a singer is a rare, a very rare, an exceedingly rare bird.’
William Byrd….’The exercise of singing is delightful to nature and good to preserve the health of Man’
Tyrone Guthrie….’God in his Almighty Wisdom and Fairness has not always given the greatest voices to the persons with the greatest intellect, or the best education, or to the most beautiful of his creatures’
James Joyce….‘Tenors get women by the score’
Mozart….I like an aria to fit a singer as perfectlyas a well-tailored suit of clothes’
SO I THINK THERE IS A BALANCE !
Negative quotes on singers and singing
Maybe they should take a 'paws' for breath!
Many worthies have made comments on the bad singer and singing, but I’m not sure what made some of them so vitriolic. However,let’s have a look at the ones I found, and with any luck, I will find an equal number on the other side!
SAMUEL COLERIDGE…..Swans sing before they die -’twere no bad thing should certain persons die before they sing!
FREDERICK the GREAT….. A German singer! I should as soon expect to get pleasure from the neighing of my horse!
GEORGE GERSHWIN…..My voice is small but disagreeable
HANS von BULOW…..A tenor is not a man but a disease
THOMAS CARLYLE….Let a man try the very uttermost to speak what he means before singing he has recourse to.
CHARLES LAMB….. I even think that I am organically disposed to harmony. But organically I am incapable of a tune. I have been practising ‘God Save the King’ all my life; whistling and humming it over to myself in solitary corners; and am not yet arrived, they tell me, within many quavers of it.
FALSTAFF (Shakespeare) ……For my voice, I have lost it with hallowing and singing of anthems.
OLIVER HEREFORD…..Definition of Song: the licensed medium for bawling in public, things too silly or sacred to be uttered in ordinary speech.
HORACE…..The fault, common to all singers, is that when their friends ask them to sing, they’re never willing, but when they’re NOT asked, , they will never leave off!
Can you add any more?….put them into the Comments section
The Bells, the bells !
One of our members (Gill, the artistic one) has provided us with this lovely little drawing, as a sort of logo for the Angelus Singers. I especially like the bell, and, of course, the flared trousers! It has a wonderfully-peaceful and, dare I say it, angelic, feel about it.
I suppose that’s why a lot of us sing….it gives us a bit of inner peace, even if we are struggling putting the words and notes together!
If you like church bells, click on some of the links below
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wvn3ftWVAb4
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5RtN3urZiDk
http://video.google.co.uk/videoplay?docid=7372425122532402557&ei=st34SJmjIJOwiALisYXsDg&hl=en
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ogQrUvJrWy0
