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Choral Evensong


Guest Roffensis

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My personal preference for teaching choirs diction is to let them sing what comes naturally, then correct the unnatural or ugly sounds that arise from time to time, rather than be totally prescriptive about it.

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I deplore the present trend for 'professional' singers and the 'professionally-trained' group to sing the letter i as an e - him becomes heem, sisters becomes 'seesters' - which only makes me think of street traders in Tunisia trying to peddle naughty postcards.

Sidney Campbell was very particular about stamping out any hint of this tendency. He was forever insisting on a very full "ih" sound with the lips pushed well forward (which I daresay is anathema to any trained singer) - to the point of it sounding rather contrived. It was a very important constituent of what was perceived at the time to be the "Campbell" sound.

 

The problem with a word like "Jesus" is the rather indistinct nature of the second syllable in normal speech. If the choir's diction is not to sound contrived it needs to be kept indistinct when sung, but at the same time given enough body to be musical.

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If I might add my two pennies worth, as a "young choirmaster". Feel free to shout me down anyone, but I am not sure how helpful it is to brand tone into chest and head tone as so many do. Ok we know what is meant by these terms, but many people seem to have a slightly different interpretation of these terms.

 

I believe that the key to good singing (and good tone), is clear diction, singing through the long notes. getting phrases louder as they ascend. Personally I find that if these simple suggestions are followed the resulting tone is not only musical but as a by-product almost what most would classify as head tone. Soft vowels, together the sound right foward in mouth. I make my choir sing "Cheese-arse" rather than "Jesus" to the amusement of some!

 

We are all going to have our personal preferences about what sound is ideal in our head. My personally thinking is that Kings under Ord and Willcccks is a musical sound, and that's they way I like things to be done. There are also other things to be considered in setting the correct tempi, if things are too fast then a head tone does not have a proper chance to develop and it all starts to become a bit "songs of praise" for my liking, without any cadences and "songs of praise" is generally what I consider to be chest tone. (no disrepect to the excellent television programme intended). The other crucial thing in my book is a legato line (if it's in style). Again, "choppy hymns" to me encourage a tone I don't like, but perhaps more importantly, a musicality I don't like  :lol: I cannot abide the comment about head voice being almost damaging I'm afraid. I think that's b******s.

I believe this is some of the best, most clear headed advice I've heard in a very, very long time.
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Guest Roffensis
I know I'm no expert, but comments like that get my back up a bit - probably contributes to my slightly aggresive attitude in other postings on this thread - why do you think young choirmasters should be any more or less ignorant than the older generation? I would suggest that "young" choirmasters probably know an awful lot more about the physiology of singing and boys' voices than any previous generation.

 

I cannot agree, there was a whole standard that has been almost lost, that was based on solid and standard techniques. A deliberate move in the 50s to rid singing of that technique has allowed a new generation of choirmasters to emerge that simply do not have a clue how to produce the traditional tone. Scales down at first, getting boys to hum a note first, using mirrors so they can see mouth shape, jaws relaxing, placing the tongue low, diction, phrasing, subtle vibrato, and a whole host of other basics, are not evidently taught today. Even worse, old styles are frowned on as old hat, despite the obvious beauty of a boys voice trained in such a way. Young choirmasters have been, in my opinion, cheated by their elders, who became entranced a new gimmicky way of doing things. At least two spring to mind to caused the rot to set in, one quouted as "spending his life trying to get rid of that" and crying over people wanting it back. The success of St Johns is partly that they can do both, Continental but also traditional Anglican. The sound on their English discs is typical old Anglican, so it is still done sometimes, but of course Robinson knows his stuff. Younger masters really have to learn the title. I am sorry to say I find that few do. It is a technique, and a natural technique that has very much to commend it, as well as being English, and ours. I would hate to cause offence to anyone by such comments, and mean no disrespect to anyone, but really we all have to listen to our choristers, and set "new" standards of excellence. The whole point of the RSCM and Sidney Nicholson's input into choral singing was surely to halt the damage to standards that had been accepted as excellent for such for a long time, and gave us singing that was world famous, and envied. I am still only in my 40s, but in my years have seen such decline that I find it very sad.

R

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Guest Roffensis
Exactly - there is no good reason for bizarre consonants (or vowels).

 

A colleague who deputised for me some years ago, used to get the boys to sing 'Gott', until I asked him not to - I pointed out that they all sounded as if they had joined Hitler Youth....

 

 

Totally ridiculous, GoD, definite "D" at the end. I would never tolerate a Gott, it's plain butchery. One visiting "choirmaster" tried to start my boys off on scales....up I might add..... doing Leeee, Leeee, Leeee. I had always taught them to sing the E vowel up in the head and I thought I was back in Nursery school. I had to stop him, and got him to play organ instead!!

 

R

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Guest Roffensis

I deplore the present trend for 'professional' singers and the 'professionally-trained' group to sing the letter i as an e - him becomes heem, sisters becomes 'seesters' - which only makes me think of street traders in Tunisia trying to peddle naughty postcards.

 

Too true. Just watch their mouth shapes as well, let alone the sound. Still, the E is tricky to get right, but once it sinks in it's there and boys will do it naturally. To me the "heem" and other offenders sound distinctly childish. You would hear little difference in Year 1 kids!!

 

R

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Quite. But.... "Jesus" should be sung Geee-serss with much emphasis on the E vowel, the mouth has to be wide and hardly open, with lips tensed for best diction. I suggest choristers insert a wedge  sideways to keep the jaw from relaxing and  from falling naturally. We don't want want any of this correct English diction/tone talked about on here. Anyway, schools are far too busy teaching other languages to bother with correct English grammar and singing.  Why should choirmasters bother to set a standard of excellence? The singing on SOP has much tro commend it. :blink:  :lol:

 

R

Richard - here you want the boys' jaws tense - a few postings later you want them relaxed. Make your mind up.

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Guest Roffensis
Richard - here you want the boys' jaws tense - a few postings later you want them relaxed. Make your mind up.

 

 

The first post about tensed jaws was pure jest, based on what I have seen. The whole post was tongue in cheek. Of course jaws should be relaxed.

 

Best wishes,

R

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LOL, yes it's pretty bad isn't it.

 

R

 

====================

 

I think we are in danger of assuming that there is but one way, and that it was somehow better in times gone by.

 

I can still recall the identical controversies surrounding the different styles of King's, Westminster Cathedral and St.John's Cambridge.

 

Meanwhile, at Peterborough, they had Dr Stanley Vann!!

 

When it comes to diction, nothing could have been as bad as one clergyman for whom I worked, who had such perfectly Anglican diction, that when he read a particular lesson, it sounded like, "He that hath years to year let him year."

 

Sadly, for the most part, Anglican music has collapsed.

 

MM

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Even worse, old styles are frowned on as old hat, despite the obvious beauty of a boys voice trained in such a way. Young choirmasters have been, in my opinion, cheated by their elders, who became entranced a new gimmicky way of doing things. At least two spring to mind to caused the rot to set in...

Richard, you are shouting into the wind.

 

In my opinion, Willcock's choir at King's was, when on form, as near perfection as you can get. I once heard them in the very dry acoustic of the royal apartments in Windsor castle when they gave a carol concert for the Queen and they were as immaculate as ever. The Argo LP of Howells is still the best recording devoted to Howells's choral music that I have heard - and I think I have heard them all (why, oh why has this never been reissued on CD?) The climax at the end of the St Paul's service contains real passion and excitement that thrills me in a way that, surprisingly, many choirs with a more extrovert tone fail to achieve. There are many other recordings of theirs which are of a similar standard.

 

Yet I also have recordings of Winchester under David Hill and Christ Church, Oxford, under Stephen Darlington (to single out just two) where the singing is just as immaculate and glorious. Darlington's CDs of Taverner beats Willcocks's hands down. To criticise as gimmicky the practice of teaching of boys to sing in the same way that adults are taught to sing is pure wrongheadedness in my view.

 

The truth is that both styles of singing are valid and can produce very rewarding and moving results. I would suggest that allowing one's prejudices to blind one to the virtues of either style reveals more about one's own musical shortcomings than anything else. Surely we all have such shortcomings to a greater or lesser extent, but it is in our musical interests to try to minimise them.

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Jjust for the record - how many people here have actually had singing lessons?

I've had some, but anyone who hears me would agree I need some more! I was formerly married to a singing teacher, who did for a time give individual singing lessons to the boys of a cathedral choir close to where I live.

 

Paul

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Guest Roffensis
I've had some, but anyone who hears me would agree I need some more!  I was formerly married to a singing teacher, who did for a time give individual singing lessons to the boys of a cathedral choir close to where I live.

 

Paul

 

 

I also had proper singing lessons. On a slightly different note, at primary/junior school we were taught correct grammar. All has stayed with me, throughout growing up in the south east, and then moving north. Back to the topic we are discussing, I have never, ever felt that other choirs have nothing to offer who avoid? traditional tone. The world is big and variety is refreshing. It is the wholesale abandonment of one style that I feel ought to be avoided. I am fully aware I am talking (not shouting, I don't shout, ever) into the wind. I couldn't agree more.

 

Best regards,

Richard

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Guest delvin146
Totally ridiculous, GoD, definite "D" at the end. I would never tolerate a Gott, it's plain butchery. One visiting "choirmaster" tried to start my boys off on scales....up I might add..... doing Leeee, Leeee, Leeee. I had always taught them to sing the E vowel up in the head and I thought I was back in Nursery school. I had to stop him, and got him to play organ instead!!

 

R

 

"Gord" :blink:

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Guest Barry Williams
Totally agree. Sort the vowels out, the rest, largely, looks after itself.

 

 

Incorrect singing technique has also given us the dreadful 'Klyst' for 'Christ' and many other similar infelicities. Regrettably, few modern choirmaters have had singing lessons. Until the late 1950s most choirmasters knew exactly how to sing and thus trained the boys correctly.

 

Barry Williams

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Guest Roffensis
Incorrect singing technique has also given us the dreadful 'Klyst' for 'Christ' and many other similar infelicities.  Regrettably, few modern choirmaters have had singing lessons.  Until the late 1950s most choirmasters knew exactly how to sing and thus trained the boys correctly.

 

Barry Williams

 

 

Yes, and some of us were at least around in the late 60s and 70s and witnessed it being done properly even then, let alone the golden earlier decades! Personally I value witnessing such experts beyond measure. I only wish I had been about in the earlier 50s and further back. To me, current training is often nothing more than an apology.

 

R

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Incorrect singing technique has also given us the dreadful 'Klyst' for 'Christ' and many other similar infelicities.  Regrettably, few modern choirmaters have had singing lessons.  Until the late 1950s most choirmasters knew exactly how to sing and thus trained the boys correctly.

 

Barry Williams

I've forgotten the name of the Northern choirmaster at Magdalen College, Oxford in the Golden Age who, when questioned as to how he trained his boys to produce such beautifully modulated diphthongs and trypthongs replied "There's nowt to singing; just open bloddy mouth and sing!".

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Yes, and some of us were at least around  in the late 60s and 70s and witnessed it being done properly even then, let alone the golden earlier decades! Personally I value witnessing such experts beyond measure. I only wish I had been about in the earlier 50s and further back. To me, current training is often nothing more than an apology.

 

Are you talking Cathedral, Parish church or what here?

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Guest Andrew Butler
I've forgotten the name of the Northern choirmaster at Magdalen College, Oxford in the Golden Age who, when questioned as to how he trained his boys to produce such beautifully modulated diphthongs and trypthongs replied "There's nowt to singing; just open bloddy mouth and sing!".

 

Varley Roberts, I think

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