Heavens to Betsy girlfriend, I'm exhausted just reading about all of that. Where do you find the time and energy? I will certainly understand if you get a bit behind in your blogging. Just remember to ocassionally take time to breathe. Good luck.
andante, you're (ahem) preachin' to the choir! I've never been a choir director myself, but I've seen what our now-retired director (who wore another hat as my thesis advisor) went through, and I have nothing but admiration for the service you perform... "services you perform" might describe it better! Hang in there.
I'm also the part-time secretary, and handle the accounts receivable end of the bookkeeping. Which means that after the Christmas rush, I get to prepare and mail statements for tax returns - all 500 or so of them.
It's a piece of cake after the Christmas season!
In every organization I ever belonged to those who showed a willingness were buried.
I've done some web work for the local community chorus and it's just nuts as their Christmas concert approaches. You have the concert and a children's pageant. As Echidne said in one of her recent posts: remember to breathe.
Remind me to tell you a few of my liturgist war stories when you need a lift, my dear. I've got tons.
I also remember my second college choir director (she joined the faculty in my junior year) telling us just how tremendously difficult it was to get folks south of the Mason-Dixon line to do Latin right (it's no picnic north of the line, either, let me assure you!). To this day, at least among my college choir friends, if I want to get a laugh all I have to do is say "Kah-roo-chay-feex-oos"--her approximation of how one of her lead singers used to pronounce "crucifixus" in the Credo.
In the meantime, you should dig out Robert Fulghum's Christmas pageant story (I think it's in It Was on Fire When I Lay Down on It). It will help. Trust me.
It's been a long time, but I do recall reading that - thanks for reminding me; I need to look it up again!
I don't understand what's so hard about pure vowel sounds, but apparently the concept is alien to most humans. This particular tenor has a glorious voice, but benedicta tu in mulieribus gives him the hives. I don't think they make phonetic symbols that could give you a sense of how it comes out of his mouth.
Another blessing of living in a rural area is that I'm the only one, generally, that knows the difference.
Yeah, but you do. And if you're at all like me, hearing somebody mangle the text just makes your guts knot up.
It was the Gregorian chant and not the Schubert version, but I have gotten to sing the Ave, Maria in the Basilica of the Annunciation in Nazareth and in Dormition Abbey in Jerusalem. Those were both goose-bump experiences!
Ooooo...I get goosebumps just from reading about the experience! Wow.
I get strange looks every time I mention we could improve our sound and acoustics by ripping up the carpet and pew-padding, substituting hard surfaces.
One of my dream trips is to observe - just observing would be enough - a rehearsal at Westminster Abbey and also the Cambridge Singers at Kings College. I'm sure I would dissolve into a pitiful puddle.
Stone and glass are where it's at! I remember very fondly such a chapel at a little choir college in Nashville where we stopped on our way to South Carolina on choir tour my junior year. The acoustics, naturally, were wonderful--and the director had a hell of a time reining in the soloists (we were doing CPE Bach's "Magnificat" that year) because the space did such wonderful things for the voices (and the music naturally lends itself to a little embellishment).
Upholstery is great for the backsides of people, but not so good for singers. 
I am in awe of you, gal! Wow you are one busy Belle! (and I can't stop giggling hearing "Ave Maria" in a deep Southern accent in my head!!)
See latest post. It's no giggling matter!
Hopefully, I'll regain some semblance of sanity in time for our date in January, assuming we're still on.
As far as I know, we're still on for January...gotta get our cold weather fix (along with seeing all the new fabrics that come out)!
Andante, you need to email me. I had no idea you were a musician, too....lol.... you are in NC, right? I have friends in Raleigh....one plays in the symphony, one is a singer, their kids are musicians, yadda yadda...lol
You don't want all hard surfaces, there definitely is a limit. I used to teach at Girard College in Philly. If you want to hear "chapel acoustics", that's the place...all marble and serpentine and pews. No carpet. None. Tons O' Echo. Imagine a jazz band (with sound system)....the drum set sounds like machine guns...lol....and of course, it all comes back at ya from 5 different ways!!!
Commenting by HaloScan
