Haslett Internship - Visit 7

Today at Haslett, I lead another bass sectional with the young men of the Varsity Choir. This time, we worked on their part in Old Irish Blessing, an SATB piece that has become a tradition to sing at the last concert with the alumni. This is one of the first times that I have become aware of the difference between parts in an SATB texture and a TTBB texture. The bass section spans a much wider range in this SATB piece than I have seen in any of the TTBB music that they have. This made me realize how beneficial it is to have young singers in either a TB or SA choir, since only a few of the men could produce sound all the way through the over-an-octave bass line that sat really low for a while and then really high. These men will have support for the concert from the older basses to be sure, but it was an eye-opening observation.

The sectional itself went really well - I can already tell how much better the young men have begun to read from the beginning of the semester to now. One of the goals that Mr. Boyce had was to teach them where were were adding breaths and where we were carrying through. Because of this, I found myself adjusting my conducting to be more technically clear and sacrifice a bit of musicality to exaggerate where the breaths and no-breaths were until the men had them in their voice. I vocally modeled these places well, but I think I could have modeled crisper diction, as I kept having to get after them to produce more energized voiced consonants. In addition to the music making, I was happy with the way that I addressed them, calling them "gentlemen" instead of my usual bad-habit-go-to, "guys", and was surprised at how much of a difference it made in the tone of the rehearsal. There was much more focus, all of the men were engaged in making good music, asking questions, and very respectful, which was a really nice way to start my day.

Repertoire Project Piece 2: She Sings

This piece is great for an middle school SSA choir. The ranges of the upper two parts span an octave, only dipping below an octave briefly. The soprano 1 part often functions as a descant and the soprano 2 part as a melody, though the parts are equally interesting. The alto part is also interesting, but has a low enough tessitura that it would be best sung by singers who know how to navigate the low part of their range without pushing at the sound with unhealthy vocal production. Students would not be met with too much difficulty, since the parts are all doing their own thing for most of the song until the last verse. The text is about singing, followed by imagery of a beautiful day, and then almost a sad prayer, which brings a surprising end to the piece which started in a very happy place but ends on a dreary note. This would be a great song to work on singing in unison with beautiful english vowels.

Repertoire Project Piece 1: Rainbow 'Round My Shoulder

I think that a group of young men would love this piece because it brings up an important part of American history, includes vivid imagery, and it calls for unique percussion and nontraditional choral sound. This piece would be appropriate for a big TTBB high school choir, or maybe even all of the tenors and basses in a middle school and high school program with the middle school choirs taking their own lines. The range is a bit low for the tenors at the beginning of the piece, but the melody could be turned into a bass section feature or even a solo. The low basses have a very low part, but it could be taken up the octave. The texture gets thicker as the piece goes on, offering more specific ranges that could be suited better for singers. Many musical ideas can be taught, such as tuning open chords, finding an appropriate vocal tone for this style of music as well as stylistic nuances, singing a unison line, working toward an overall crescendo-shape to the piece, and function of each part in the thicker textures. The text is filled with imagery as aforementioned, and also can start a discussion about the chain gang spirituals.

Hayes Middle School Class Visit

Mr. Armstead is clearly a master at keeping his class moving, in more ways than one. I admire how seamlessly he used chanting between activities and vocalizing to not only keep the attention of the choir, but also to keep them listening and thinking in a musical way. He kept them moving physically as well, such as when he had them moving their arms when they were singing, which helped with the choir's phrasing and vocal production. Also, when he asked the girls to sing with bent knees, I thought it was really cool that he also conducted with bent knees. I feel like that must give the girls permission to move without feeling self-conscious, and to establish more of a problem-posing model of education rather than a banking model, with an emphasis on learning together. By exaggerating his own movement, he makes it okay for them to move.

I also liked the way he integrated a school requirement that might at first seem like a burden. The daily reading is not only a great way to integrate a skill not always found in a music class, but also a great way to address important topics in life and talk about them in a meaningful, safe way.

CMS Young Men's Chorus - Visit 2

Today I focused on Kyle's musicianship. There was never a single moment in the rehearsal where I wasn't absolutely confident that Kyle not only knew everything on every page of every piece of music, but he also knew exactly how he wanted every note, phrase, and whole piece shape to sound. He has many, many strategies for each teaching move. In the piece, "Praise his holy name," Kyle was working on getting the men to sing with more accent. In a span of about a minute, he modeled what he was looking for, explained that an accent had a loud attack and then decayed quickly, and then had the men try that section while "karate chopping" their hands. After that, Kyle didn't stop listening for the accents, and would stop the choir when they didn't perform the accents as well has they had previously. After he worked on the accents with the men, the rest of the piece felt more rhythmic in general. 

Every time he modeled, while he might have had a more singular goal, he was able to communicate so many musical ideas that were also picked up by his singers, and that were also then present in his gesture. I feel like he was audiating his ideal sound while still being able to listen to exactly what he was getting, and added helpful teaching tools into his gesture, like pulling a string vertically for taller "ah vowels", to get the sound he was hearing closer to what he was audiating. And, of course, the whole time he seemed to be having fun which was infectious to his singers.

Haslett Internship - Visit 6

On April 2, I led another sectional with the basses on the piece "Rainbow 'Round My Shoulder." I was so excited, since I heard the piece for the first time earlier this semester when Dr. Mitchell directed the TTBB State Honors Choir at MMC. The sectional basically consisted of us running the whole piece. I discovered that the piece didn't really offer much variety to their part. Since all of the men in the choir program were singing on the piece, these basses had a line all to themselves, but it was very repetative. We ran out of time to work on much else than just some seemingly random differences that came up in their part, but it occured to me that maybe more could have gotten done with the piece if we hadn't split into sections. Knowing the tenors, they probably knew their part at least as well as the basses did, so maybe the very few note things could have been addressed later and they could have worked on things across the whole ensemble, like vowel shape and stylistic nuances. 

Mr. Boyce was also able to answer some questions that I had about his operational procedures for me that day. 

The choirs at the middle school and high school are: 

6th Grade Choir Rotation (6 Week Exploratory for EVERY 6th Grade student)

7th Grade Choir- 2 mixed groups of approx. 50 students

8th Grade Choir- 2 mixed groups of approx. 50 students

Varsity Choir- Beginning HS Men's Choir (40ish primarily 9th grade and newer singers)

Treble Choir- Beginning HS Women's Choir (75ish Primarily 9th/10th grade, and newer)

Concert Choir- Intermediate HS Mixed Choir (70ish)

Chorale- Advanced HS Mixed Choir (40ish)

Select Women's Ensemble- Advanced after-school group

Select Men's Chorale- Advanced after-school group

As far as relationships with students, teachers, and other faculty at the school go, communication is the most important part of maintaining the positive relationship he has with those he comes in contact with. After reviewing the handbooks that he sent me for the middle and high school choirs, I think one of the most unique and important things that stuck out to me was how Mr. Boyce and Mrs. Valla are such a united front when it comes to their expectations with the programs at each school. It must help with recruitment as middle schoolers graduate to high school, and more than just recruitment it must help with keeping the majority of the students who did choir in middle school in choir as they go to high school. I remember being surprised at how many middle school choir friends of mine did not continue to do choir in highschool for various reasons, and I wonder if there was more of an overlap of the programs from school to school if we would have seen less people drop the program.

CMS Young Men's Chorus - Visit 1

Last week, I was able to visit the Young Men's Chorus at CMS for the first time. I love how Kyle connects with each of his choirs while still establishing himself as a leader. He has a great sense of when it is appropriate for him to "follow down" an opportunity to connect more, and when to stick to rehearsal. For instance, he used the metaphor of a unicorn as he asked for more resonance from the tenors in their head voice. One baritone shouted out, "Or be a narwhal!" Kyle asked what that was, and then the men erupted in explaining the whale with a unicorn-like horn and he had someone look up a picture of it. It was simple, didn't take a lot of time, and was a fun way to incorporate their ideas into his teaching of a concept.

Kyle's also not afraid to set expectations and follow through with them. This day was picture day, and since one of the kids didn't have his performance shirt, he wasn't able to be in the picture. Those are the things that I feel like I'm going to have trouble following through with, but I think that because he follows through, he gains the respect of the parents and the kids. Even if the student is disappointed that he's not in the picture, he understands that it was his responsibility, and I don't think he was actually all that mad at Kyle for enforcing the rule of which the whole group was fully aware. It's evident that Kyle respects the students, and that they respect him.

Haslett Internship - Visit 5

The next day, Mr. Boyce had me warm up the choir. Usually, Mr. Boyce and Abbie follow a similar process that we discussed in class, so I modeled my plan after the warm up sequences we have discussed in class, using some exercises of my own and some that I have observed in the classroom. Even though I had my plan, I got more nervous the closer it got to warm up time. This affected by piano playing. While I was able to keep the class going, I found myself focused much more on my own playing than on what sound the men were achieving. Also, I was so flustered at one point that I added a random warm-up that I wasn't even planning on doing, and that threw me way off.

All in all, I stuck to my plan and effectively prepared the men for class, but I did not feel good about it afterwards. Through this experience, I realized that being in front of a group that you work with all the time is very different than being in front of a group for which you are stepping in. Being in front of a real group of young men, not just hypothetical ones, was a challenge too. I found myself wondering just how low to warm them down and where to start certain warm ups, even though these are things that we've talked about in class.

I'm excited to try and navigate this again!

Arrangement Project: Shady Grove

Haslett Internship - Vist 4

On March 19th, I noticed a few changes in the classroom since MSVMA Festival was getting closer. Particularly, Mr. Boyce's behavioral expectations seemed to have been pushed up a notch. Some things that Mr. Boyce would have probably let slide in the past were addressed more quickly, such as students having phones out when he wasn't working with them. He was very respectful whenever he asked for attention, he just did it more often than before. Sometimes he would walk by a student with their phone out and quietly but authoritatively say, "John, put it away." If there was excess talking, he was much quicker to use "sh" rhythm patterns to focus them back on task, be it warming up or sightreading. When they started rehearsing their festival pieces, if not everyone was singing, he wouldn't hesitate to stop and say something like, "Basses, I need all of you," or "Guys, everyone." The tenors, who tend to be the most attentive and the most extroverted about being excited about singing, were clearly getting annoyed with the young men who were being less than respectful.  After a few stop and starts from Mr. Boyce, though, most of the students began to really engage in the task at hand and Mr. Boyce had to use less and less time managing the class.

One of the tenors who was clearly upset at the students who were disrupting the class was the same young man who asked super musical questions on my first visit, and who I've began to be able to pick out in the tenor's sound as a leader in that section. Once Mr. Boyce was walking back to the podium while the introduction to a piece as playing, and this student stood right up, ready to sing, and then sort of looked around sheepishly when no one else stood up.  As he sat back down I realized that it had been a while this class period since the boys were asked to stand. I think it might have helped them all focus on really performing the piece if they had been standing, not only to refocus the group, but also because almost all of the students, even the engaged ones, don't sit with very good singing posture.

Another thing I noticed is how effective Mr. Boyce's modeling is. There is so much information in his singing, like phrasing, crisp consonants, and vowel shape. Sometimes the students don't exactly get everything that he has done, but there is usually a noticeable change in their sound. I also noticed that when Mr. Boyce sings first and explains what he's looking for before he has them try it, he gets a bigger change in the sound than when he explains and then sings, as if they have time to forget what he was looking for between the time he explains it, through the modeling, and then to their turn to sing. Often, he will pair movement with modeling, or afterwards if the change in sound wasn't enough. He doesn't often let the students get away with singing that is not up to his expectations, and his teaching is flexible enough that he can help his students get to those expectations in many different ways.