Reach for the stars!

It has been over a month since my last post – tut tut! – time just seems to fly by. Apologies for my tardiness but life just seems to get busier every month.

I have been thinking about breathing and support this month. One of the difficulties one has as a singing teacher or choirmaster is giving advice on what is fundamentally a physical process – singing!

You hear grumpy old choir masters using phrases like “sing with head voice” or “lift your soft palate” but what does that really mean? The problem with putting it into words is that the physical sensations are hard to describe – so I prefer giving you a few practical demonstrations that hopefully will help you.

So I’ll give you a quick three point guide in how to stand (or sit) well for good singing!!

1. When standing place your feet about as far apart as your shoulders. You should be physically well balanced (and mentally for that matter but I’m not sure I can help with that). rock from side to side until you feel “well planted”. If you are sitting don’t slouch in the chair, sit up with your weight supported by your legs; in practice this means that you should sit so that you could stand straight up without moving your feet

2. Stretch your hands way up above your head and then lower your hands to your sides without moving any other part of your body. this will put all your apparatus in the right place!

3. When you breathe in, imagine you whole body filling with air, right down as far as you pelvis. The air pours in very much like water filling a glass – it comes in from the bottom up!

That’s you ready to go. We can’t stretch before each song, phrase or set at a gig but if we learn how these correct positions feel, we can replicate them in the concert environment.

Beati Mortui

A quick post today - this is a recording of Beati Mortui by the men of the Choir of Trinity College Cambridge, directed by Richard Marlow.

Dr Marlow uses slightly different pronounciations in a couple of words but as the National Lutheran Choir uses the same as we do I am content!

Interestingly if you listen very carefully you will hear that the choir have redistributed the voice parts near the end in exactly the same way as we have.

Hope this is enjoyable and useful.

Beati mortui
Beh-ah-tee mor-too-ee
Blessed are the dead

In Domino morientes deinceps
Een Do-mee-no mor-ee-ehn-tehs de-een-chehps
Who henceforth die in the Lord

Dicit enim spiritus,
Dee-cheet eh-neem spee-ree-tus
Thus says the spirit

Ut requiescant a laboribus suis
Oot- reh-kwee-ehs-cahnt ah lah-bor-ee-us su-ees
That they may rest from their labors

Et opera illorum sequuntur ipsos.
Eht oh-peh-rah ee-lor-oom seh-koont-oor eep-sos
And their works follow them

Share my longing

One of the stated aims of Bournemouth Male Voice Choir (in it's constitution) is "education" - an unusual aim for an amateur choir perhaps but one which we take seriously nonetheless. We tend to eschew the "I know what I like and I like what I know" philosophy in favour of introducing all kinds of music in our programmes.

So, for choir members, let me introduce you to one of the pinnacles of the choral genre - J S Bach's St Matthew Passion. Being the Easter weekend, this is timely - but I also know some of you have an antipathy to sacred music - around 75% of our choral output in BMVC is secular but please don't close your mind to the beauty of this sacred item. As I have said before, you don't need to believe to sing music convincingly. I imagine most of you don't have a "Five, foot two eyes of blue" girl at home but that doesn't prevent you from convincingly performing it.


Sometime in the Middle Ages, Christian churches began observing Holy Week by retelling the story of Christ's crucifixion in music. Those beginnings were simple—Bible verses set to simple chant melodies—but eventually they would culminate in one of the most ambitious musical compositions of all time.

When J. S. Bach came to write his St. Matthew Passion in the 1720s, the passion, as a musical form, had grown to allow orchestra, choirs, and non-scriptural choruses and arias. But even by the standard of the Baroque passion, the Passion According to St. Matthew is exceptional for its musical richness and its grand scope.

Musically, the score is of imposing length, and calls for double orchestra and double choir—three choirs, at one point. The musical textures range from complex counterpoint to simple hymns. Dramatically, the point of view shifts regularly, from the narrative of the Evangelist, to the actual words of Jesus and his disciples, to reflections that speak for the individual believer. But in Bach's hands, the effect that the Passion gives is not one of a brilliant collage, but a single, sustained, sombre meditation—appropriate for a work that was first performed as part of a church service.

Scholars believe the first performance of the St. Matthew Passion may have been in 1727. It was certainly performed on Good Friday of 1729, and perhaps at several other Good Friday services during Bach's life. It then dropped from public view until 1829, when it was triumphantly revived by Felix Mendelssohn, crystallizing a revival of interest in Bach that grew throughout the 19th century and still continues.

The text of the passion was created by the German writer Christian Henrici, who wrote under the pen name of Picander. Like Bach, he lived in Leipzig, and it is believed that he and Bach worked closely together on the text.

There are three strands in the text: the actual text from the book of Matthew; Picander's own poetry; and the pre-existing hymns, or chorales, which Bach incorporates into the score, which would have been immediately recognizable by his first hearers.

I attach the opening chorus in the hope that you might like to dip into "The Matthew" - the best recording (in my humble opinion) can be bought on Amazon by clicking here. http://www.amazon.co.uk/Bach-J-S-St-Matthew-Passion/dp/B000J233L2


This fabulous chorus was described by Leonard Bernstein thus...

"Suddenly the chorus breaks into two antiphonal choruses. 'See him!' cries the first one. 'Whom?' asks the second. And the first answers: 'The Bridegroom see. See Him!' 'How?' 'So like a Lamb.' And then over and against all this questioning and answering and throbbing, the voices of a boy's choir sing out the chorale tune, 'O Lamb of God Most Holy,' piercing through the worldly pain with the icy-clear truth of redemption. The contrapuntal combination of the three different choruses is thrilling. There is nothing like it in all music."


the text is

Chorus I
Come, ye daughters, share my longing,
See ye, whom?— the bridegroom Christ,
See him, what?— a spotless lamb!

Chorale
O Lamb of God, unspotted
Upon the cross's branch slaughtered,
See ye,—what?—see him forbear,
Always displayed in thy patience,
How greatly wast thou despisèd.
Look—where, then?—upon our guilt;
All sin hast thou born for us,
Else we had lost all courage.
See how he with love and grace
Wood as cross himself now beareth! Have mercy on us, O Jesus!

Enjoy

England's Song forever

As you may realise our first own choice item at Llangollen is also one of our most ambitious choices of repertoire thus far. Granville Bantock’s Fighting Temeraire sets Henry Newbolt’s poem to music and draws its inspiration from Turner’s Masterful Paining above.

In this painting, “The Fighting Temeraire, tugged to her Last Berth to be broken up” Turner touched, as he rarely did, the common heart of mankind. Apart from particular associations, there is an eternal pathos in an old ship being tugged to its last berth in calm water at sunset. It is not necessary to tell the story of how the good ship was captured from the French at the battle of the Nile, and broke the line of the combined fleets at that of Trafalgar; nor is it necessary to think of her battered hulk as a type of the old sailing “wooden walls,” so soon to be replaced by ironclads and steam propellers—of the “old order” which “changeth, giving place to new.”

It is a poem without all this, though all this gives additional interest and pathos to it in our eyes. Considered even in relation to the artist, this picture has a peculiar solemnity: he, as well as the Téméraire, was being “tugged to his last berth ;“ he had still many years of life, but his decline as an artist had commenced, and was painfully perceptible in most of his pictures; occasionally his genius rallied, and this was one of its expiring efforts, the last picture which, “he painted with his perfect power”

Turner referred to this painting as "My Darling", and refused to sell it. When this painting was exhibited at the Royal Academy in I839 its title was accompanied in the catalogue by these lines from Thomas Campbell's `Ye Mariners of England'

The flag which braved the battle and the breeze,
No longer owns her.

The passing of the age of sail into steam-ships, iron vessels, indeed the industrial revolution, coincided with great artist like Turner and John Constable painting both the old idyllic landscape with castles, abbeys and scenes of the past age alongside steam trains, boats and industrial changes as exciting them days as computer in our time.

The pinnacle of Constables paintings 'The Haywain' is set undeniably in the past. Turner's 'The Fighting Temeraire' shows us the passing away of that time. A grand forty-year-old champion of the Battle of Trafalgar, being towed away to its last berth by a modern steam tug bellowing smoke.

Turner was seen on board a Margate steamer sketching the passage of the Temeraire upriver to Beatson's ship breaking yard at Rotherhithe on 6 September 1838, although what he saw and what he painted are two different things. Thus we know from contemporary newspaper reports that the Temeraire was towed by two tugs, and another observer of the towing later testified that the painter invented the spectacular sunset. The Temeraire glorified for the last time by Turner's brushes, for in reality she is stripped of her masts, the Admiralty removes sail and rigging, all guns and useful parts as spares. The ship is to be stripped of its oak wood at the breaker's yard, the copper sold back to the Admiralty for £3000, the breaker having paid around £5500 for the hull.

The Temeraire that would have made a marvellous museum piece in itself, is now left to the nation in the National Gallery as a painting. Thanks to Turner the ship that saved the 'Victory' at the Battle of Trafalgar is still remembered.

Smooooth!

We have been working this week on the legato line, so in today's post I'll look at the fundamentals and the building blocks of technique; in subsequent posts we'll look more closely at practical manifestation of that theory.

Breath support/breath and breath management.

This is crucial for real legato singing. In singing a legato line, the singer must learn how to make a low breath into the lower back, not too much breath, however it is always a low breath". Over-breathing will encourage you to"blow out the vocal cords " with too much breath pressure. This manifests itself as "pushing" the voice or too much "pushing of air pressure" through the cords. Over-breathing will certainly distort any legato line. A slow and gradual release of breath is crucial for the basis of a legato line.

The Jaw.

The proper position of your jaw is"hanging slightly down and back" (a sort of gormless look) much as the jaw would hang down and back if one went to sleep with the head back. The jaw NEVER goes forward. Too many singers open their mouths too much until the jaw "pops forward" out of its socket or joint. This is completely incorrect for healthy singing. It also makes a legato line impossible because the jaw cannot manage the relationship between vowel and consonant function. If the jaw is "slightly down and back", the relationship between vowel and consonant is smooth. This creates a longer vibrational time between vowel and consonant function: a pure legato line.

Try a "gentle chewing motion" of the jaw.

• chew several times before singing.


• Then sing "ee,oh,ee,oh,ee,oh". When a "gentle chew" is achieved, as in eating food, the pressure in the jaw muscles is released. This exercise creates a smooth, gentle, and elastic motion of the jaw muscles.

The Tongue

Think about the "ng" position of the tongue as in the word "singing" or "hanging". This "ng" position of the tongue is the basis for resonance to be present in singing a legato line; without this technique there is a "muted" or "darkened" sound in the voice. True resonance is lost.

Some simple exercises:

1. Try leaning slightly forward from the waist" then sound a "hiss" creating a lot of resistance at the tongue/teeth area. This will give the you the feel of "holding back the breath pressure" with the body and allowing a "small controlled breath stream" to be used. Then (when there is no-one around) do the same thing but create a small moaning sound, this will give you the proper feel of breath support.


2. The "hanging" relaxed jaw. Use chewing exercises and imitate the jaw function of chewing food. Sing from a closed vowel to an open vowel . This could be "ee, oh, ee, oh, ee, oh," etc. or "eh, ah, eh, ah, eh, ah," etc.


3. Try it again but use Italian syllables such as: da, me, ni, po, to, la, be, da. Use the "hanging jaw" as proper position to pronounce these sounds. This can be properly found by using the position of "drinking out of a large glass". Allow the tongue to do all of the pronouncing. This will keep the jaw from closing and the result will be a more "open ". Note: (if you raise your eyebrows, the "relaxed hanging jaw" will be much easier.)


4. Use a "ng" sound and gradually open to an open vowel such as "oh" or "ah". The result will be a vowel that has resonance and this resonance can maximise the length of the vowels and minimise the time spent on consonants.

It is important to remember that the core of good musicianship in singing is a good legato line, when the legato line is present in your performances, the audience is moved and touched emotionally.