Music Notes – November 19 and 20

General Notes

1. VOWELS – Please focus on singing with tall, open vowel sounds. This has been improving but there are still times, particularly when voices are in their higher range, when the sound is spreading, which results in poor blend and intonation problems. This is hard to remedy with masks on.  Practice at home without your mask while looking in a mirror to make sure you are keeping your jaw relaxed, mouth open and elongated in front of a mirror.  If you are not sure your mouth is opening up enough try putting two fingers, placed vertical to your teeth, in your mouth.
2. CUTOFFS – Please make sure that know where final consonants go (on what beat of the measure). Also, make sure that we can hear those consonants–sometimes, it seems like terminal consonants are missing, or just not strong enough.  Make sure to check music notes on the production website for where the cutoff should be, and make sure you are placing the final consonant cleanly.

Specific Notes

Wexford Carol

• All:  Be ready for full chorus entrance on the “and” of beat 4
• Altos:  Make sure you are carrying over in ALL the places where we have the dotted eighth rhythm:
  — mm 20 into 21; 24 into 25; 32 into 33; 52 into 53; 56 into 57
• Soprano/Alto: On the SSA section in verse 3, be sure you are right in tempo when you enter after the children.

Deck the Hall

• Altos:  No passing note on the second word of the first measure of lines 1, 2 and 3 of the music.  The sopranos have a passing note –  altos have an interval.

Kentucky Wassail

• All:  Our cup is white;……..The cup is made

Didn’t Leave Nobody But the Baby

• Opening solos:  Jan sings first measure, Jennifer Green joins on second measure with middle part, Jane joins on third measure with low part. All others should join on the 2nd time through (a few folks near Jan, Jane and Jen can join earlier)
• Correction from music notes from earlier week were: “We added a dotted quarter note at the end, to make a full measure.”  This is incorrect.  We need to add a dotted half to the “by” of “ba-by” in the second to last measure.   Basically you will count this out as “Ba-2-3-4, by-2-3-4.”   Then take the first beat of the next measure to breathe before starting the next repeat of “Go to sleepy…..)
  Corrected score is available online

New Britain (Amazing Grace)

• Important Note for ALL: We are taking out the repeat in the B section.
  Corrected score is available online
• Verse 1:  Greg M. (Sung freely, improvisational)
• Verse 2:  Trebles/Sopranos and Tenors (we will hold at the end; then start v. 3)
• Verse 3:  SATB
• All:  Measure 12:  Add a lift in all verses after the first note ie. “found”, “–pear”, and “far”.

Promised Land

• All: Please remember to crescendo on the long notes (like the opening whole note)
• All: Verse 2 should be “lighter” (followed by a lighter refrain; Verse 3 should have more heaviness; Also, save something for the final refrain!
• Altos:  Refrain: Measures 15 and 24:  The second beat quarter notes on “will” do not descend stepwise, it is an interval.
• Altos: make sure you are singing A flat to F on the second beat of measure 15.
• Altos: mm 16 and 25: “I am” is stepwise, not an interval.

Amazing Grace (Audience Sing)

• All: The melody is a bit different than what you might be used to, especially measures 6 and 7.  There is a recording on the website that was made for the Children’s Chorus if you need a listening resource.
• Listen to recording

Come Thou Fount

• All:  The word is “Fount” pronounced with the “u”, not “font”.
• All:  There should be a lift after every comma except for after the first note of the piece.  One of the earlier music notes was as follows: For text make a lift….. in the fourth line after both  “mount.”s  That is incorrect.  The lifts in the fourth line come after the first “mount”, and “it”, not after the second “mount”
• Altos:  The 1st, 2nd and 4th lines of music are the same.  In the 3rd line, make sure you are getting all the way up to the Ab on the words “me” and “by”.  Remember that the last notes of “sonnet” and “above” are different – for “sonnet” you come down to Eb, for “above” you stay on the G.

Lord of the Dance

• All: Start the descant only after the last verse

Wayfaring Stranger

• All: Listen to Matt and other parts in order to line up the ensemble.
• All: Make sure you move to the “mm’s” on the proper beat.  For example:  Measure 35 and 36 – some folks were moving to the “mm” on the second note in measure 35.  The “mm” should not happen until measure 36.
• Sopranos: Please, no scooping on the E to B interval in m. 37 and similar places.
• All: Chorus should enter strongly on the verse starting in m. 40 – the feeling is joyful.
• All: Emphasize “crown of glory” in mm. 45-46 – this is the peak of the verse
• All: No scooping.  Come in on your pitches cleanly.
• Altos:  m. 51:  The word “me” should be placed on the third beat lining up with the tenors and basses.
• All: m. 52– close smoothly to the “m” right on the third beat.
• Soprano/Alto: In m. 56, put the “m” of the word home on the 3rd beat, and then continue on a hum to the end of the piece
• Bass: Low basses can drop to the lower octave on the word “home” in m. 56
• All: Fade out as you are leaving the stage

Star In the East (This was really lovely Sunday!)

• All: Text change: “Brightest and best OF the sons of the morning”  Not ARE the sons in measures 9, 25 and 41.
• All:  Cutoffs at the end of the first line of each verse are on the fourth beat.  Make sure you are sounding the “d”.   At the end of each verse hold the last note out for the full measure (2 beats) with cutoff at the end of the last measure.
• All:   “au-wer” not “ar”
• All: We will not be taking any ritards
• All: At the end of the final chorus, sing two full beats before the cutoff

Alleluia

• Altos:  The final note on the 3rd “alleluia” in each sequence is not always the same (for example, in m. 14 we go down to a low A, in mm. 22 and 30 we go down to a D).  The 4th “alleluia” (mm. 15 and 23) are the same, m. 31 is the higher version.  Also, make sure you come down to the D on the final note of the piece, not back up to the F the final “alleluia” started on.

Rorate

• Altos:  In each verse make sure there is no breath from the second full measure through the first beat of the following measure ie. V2 “in the air sing with”; and “fair be mirthful now”:  V3″most of height regions of” and “of flight be mirthful and”
• All:  Measure 43 – lift after “-ven”, carry over through “earth, sea, man, bird”; lift after ‘bird”.  Cutoff for “beast” on beat 4, breath and back in on “He” on second half of beat 4.
• Sopranos: make sure the dotted rhythms are clear and there is voicing on the 16th note
• All: The brass interlude after verse 2 is two measures- we enter on the 4th beat of the second measure.

Auld Lang Syne

• All: The melody is a bit different than what you might be used to, especially measures 7 and 15.  There is a recording on the website that was made for the Children’s Chorus if you need a listening resource.
• Listen to recording