h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Some weeks ago, the conductor of our little church choir announced that she had been diagnosed with gallstones and could be operated on at any time.

The time turned out to be last week. Just before Palm Sunday.

I was asked if I would take over the choir for a couple of weeks, as I am the only one qualified to do so.

Just to do the Palm Sunday, Maundy Thursday and Easter day services. The biggest stint of the whole year.

Palm Sunday went well enough, considering that the organist was pretty new to the whole thing (I know him from music school; he's only 16. His mother is a colleague of my husband's. Small town )

However, no way were we going to get through the whole programme for Thursday AND Easter in one choir practice, with two different organists dropping in to practise their bits, and all the to-ing and fro-ing that that entailed. I've just returned from that last rehearsal before the Thursday service. I'm utterly drained.

To go into any more detail would bore everyone, but suffice it to say that I'll be glad when it's Easter Monday!

TC, I, for one, have faith in you.

Strange posting that, as an agnostic, but unsure how else to post it.

Chin up, chest out, and go for it.

All be over in seven days and who knows, you may find a new vocation!



MMF

I remember singing many such services when I was much younger. For that matter, I remember an organist/choir director who was deaf . Whenever he criticized the choir's singing, I wondered what to make of his correction.

Are you getting paid for directing the choir? If so, I hope you will treat yourself to something nice with the money after it's all over.

Brilliant, TC! Nothing like real life experience to pare away all non-essentials! And the fact that it's the high point of the church year will mean your choir will be on their toes, almost the most important asset you can have.

Don't forget to take it all in. We can go through performances in such a busy state of mind that we come out not knowing how it went at all at all. And if people give you compliments, don't hesitate to believe them.

By rights, I should get a small fee, but I'm not too bothered about that (that way there's no pressure to do a perfect job). I would have been there to do the singing anyway, so the commitment was already there.

There's a helluva lot of administrative work to do as well, though: clear all the songs with all the clergy involved, keep the choir informed by e-mail of what we're singing and any changes we have agreed, keeping in touch with the organists and making sure everyone is in the right place at the right time. Fortunately I don't have to bother with opening up places (church, practice rooms), and the members of the choir always do a lot of the other things.

For example, we sing the service on the Thursday (gaaaah - that's in two days' time!). This is a very important service as it celebrates the Last Supper. Then we retire to the church hall and have a simple meal of hard-boiled eggs and dry rolls. Traditionally, there are huge baskets of these rolls (which have been blessed during the service) at the doors of the church for the congregation to take one each, and one for any sick or old family members. A few extra rolls are ordered for our little get-together.

Hard boiled eggs are available in gaudy colours at all bakers and supermarkets all through Lent. We just have to make sure we have fresh ones.

But then you have to organise salt, something to drink, plates, washing up afterwards, etc etc. I have to check it's in hand, but I don't have to do anything, thank goodness.

Then at 10 pm we do a 45 minute Vigil, which consists of Taizé songs and meditative texts. I shall have to accompany the songs, or at least conduct them and make sure they start on the right notes. As a "foreigner" I somehow don't get asked to read the texts, and I shan't have anything to do with that. The girl who's putting them together is a single mum and runs the local kindergarten - she's far busier than me!

Thanks for the uplifting comments, MMF - with the conjoined efforts of the choir, organists and myself, and the lubrication of decades of doing the same thing every year, it'll work out somehow.

Choral directors should have no duties relating to hardboiled eggs. They wanted Bach to teach Latin in the Thomasschule, but this is ridiculous.

And thanks, Recumbentman for the encouragement. I am trying to concentrate on listening, as I've noticed that that's where beginners fall down.

It helps having 50 years of sitting in the choir and wincing at what the others are doing, and then wondering why the conductor hasn't reprimanded the tenors for taking a semitone too flat, or the sopranos for pushing down so hard from the top that the altos and basses are singing at the bottom limit of their range.

But it all looks so different from the front.

Very important too, is praise. But if it's earned, it comes spontaneously, anyway. It's learning to phrase a criticism so that the choir isn't offended.

And Rule No 1 is - don't talk - do! Singing it the way you want them to sing it, for them to copy is a hundred times better than just describing it.

And never sing it the wrong way to show them how they were doing it wrong - they'll remember the wrong way.

That's the worst: the conductor who mimics you with a 'nyah nyah de nyah' voice. Time for a walk-out.

"wondering why the conductor hasn't reprimanded the tenors for taking a semitone too flat" [TC]

I've known conductors who would be delighted if the tenors were *only* a semitone flat . As an almost lifelong tenor, I know whereof I speak, so I can offer this advice: if you keep pointing out pitch problems to tenors, you can annoy them enough to improve. The catch is that it might take so long that they haven't improved *enough* by the time of the performance.

Certainly. Zero tolerance is the only way. Stop the whole proceedings on first appearance of flatness. Sympathy (genuine, 'I know it's hard and you're very tired') helps rub salt in the wounds.

In my experience flatness is most common in sopranos. People who find it hard to maintain an inner part tend to volunteer for sopranoism regardless of the voice they have been born with.

Tenors on the other hand are generally more energetic; the lazy option for the male is to sing bass.

I think I've posted this before, but here goes...

When a singer's not engaged in ululation
Or contributing his vocals to a chord
He indulges in delightful conversation
Just to save his friends from ever getting bored
When a tenor's tenor register's not ringing
He cracks a smile and perpetrates a pun
Ah, when singers are not actually singing
A conductor's lot is not a happy one

When disciplinary duty's to be done, to be done
A conductor's lot is not a happy one, happy one

When disconsolate sopranos have been waiting
For an alto cue that's not entirely there
And sectarian division's escalating
It can drive the mildest maestro to despair
When the basses exercise their baser morals
When the orchestra packs up before you're done
When the soloists start resting on their laurels
A conductor's lot is not a happy one

When disciplinary duty's to be done, to be done
A conductor's lot is not a happy one, happy one

Bravo!

The few. The loud. The tenors.

I copied an older version than I meant to. I've since revised the second verse to begin

When exasperated altos are awaiting
A soprano cue that's not entirely there

(Declaration of interest: I have been for many years an emergency tenor. Like most men I am more or less a baritone, but I describe myself as BWTSTP -- baritone willing to sing tenor parts.)

Shame I can't show that to them. They can't read music, let alone English, and they have no concept of Gilbert and Sullivan.

I shall definitely call for more ululation, though!

We have three tenors, which is not bad for the size of choir. One has been singing for ages and knows all the songs really well, but has a very grating voice and sounds out of tune even when he isn't. He's invaluable in other ways, because he puts all his energy into enunciation and has enough oomph in his "S"s and "T"s, "P"s and "B"s for the whole choir.

The second is an experienced singer and performer, but can't read music and needs a lead. The third hasn't been with us long and doesn't dare sing very loud, although I'm sure he could if he tried. He takes longer to get the notes right, but he bolsters up the middle parts well enough.

What's missing is my middle son, who used to sing with the choir till his voice broke. If he ever joined in later, when he'd left home, he provided the exact sound that was missing between the harsh and soft voices of our regular tenors.

I'm sitting here after hours at work, waiting for the IT department to call me back because our system has conked out. Had hoped to get some work done because of tomorrow being such a short day....

This is interesting: 'has a very grating voice and sounds out of tune even when he isn't'

A lot of intonation issues are improved by getting people to match each other's vowel sounds. Champion barbershop quartets and choruses spend a huge amount of time at this.

Time may be the crucial element. People can make amazing improvements if they rehearse a piece often enough under a capable director's guidance. When I was in college, I sang in a choral group that rehearsed more than six hours a week. Voices were thoroughly warmed up, and all pieces were memorized so that all singers would watch the director in concerts.

Oh, we rehearsed enough. Even without me having the time to prepare or rehearse much with the choir this year as such, it's stuff we've been singing every Easter for the last 35 years (I've been in the choir for 20 of those years)

Anyway, it's all over now. The tradition is that the organ and the bells leave at the Gloria on Maundy Thursday and don't come back till the Gloria in the Easter service. Which means that the latter half of the Thursday service and the first few songs of the Easter service are without accompaniment, and I had to start them up with the tuning fork. That worked out OK, mainly thanks to the inherent musicality of the some of the singers, who just knew what the first note should be, and, of course, to the fact that they had sung most of the songs since they were knee high to a grasshopper.

Once it was all over, everyone was really nice to me, as no one would have liked to take on the job, and they were basically grateful that I'd stood up front and done it.

However, I think I'd rather herd cats than go through that again.

I read between the lines of "everyone was really nice to me" and deduce that you were triumphantly successful!

I know someone who has a dozen cats, and I wonder if you realize how hard it is to herd them

But congratulations!