Today was the last day in which individual ensembles worked with Werner, John or me. This gave me, at least, a chance to go through a number of things I wanted to do, such as parts of the Rollright piece with the Trio and Quartet, as well as looking again at my "extras".
The Trio and I finally managed to get some time to learn the "Kyrie" I wrote for them and they mastered all the notes pretty well, but I think they will need some more time on their own or with Werner after the masterclass is over in order for them to feel secure with it. The Quartet can now perform their "Agnus Dei" without me (which is tricky for the opening because of the off-beat rhythm following a quaver rest at the start of bar 1) and I have to say they are singing it really well.
Nobiles rehearsed their "Sanctus" on their own and, towards the end of the morning, asked me if I would like to hear it. This, of course, I did, and I was really pleased how well it sounded - and I think they were too.
We've now, this afternoon, run through all the joins between sections, where the tempo and/or the key changes, and I am happy that these now run through smoothly. One of the ladies in the quartet said to me this afternoon, that the section where the music describes the sun rising through the mist and the witch appears gave her goosebumps (though she needed to gesticulate as that particular word was a bit beyond her excellent English vocabulary). Anyway, that sounds like it works!
Tomorrow, we have one last rehearsal of the Rollright Stones together and then each ensemble sings their other pieces for the concert to each other.
This evening we have had the Sangerhalle 110th Anniversary Celebration and Concert, with guests in the audience who are the descendants of Friedrich Weyerhauser who, having been born in Saulheim, emigrated to the USA in 1834 and making a lot of money from timber, paid for the building and establishment of the Sangerhalle in his home town. So the concert had speeches (in two languages) and performances from all the groups based at the hall, from a young children's choir to adult choirs (one female, one male). Other performers were the Trio Avijo and Quartet "Jubiladies" both of whom are involved in this week's masterclass, Werner's "The Four Reasons" (two of whom are part of the quartet too) who sang and then played a lively Irish jig. Finally, Nobiles performed half a dozen songs ranging from Tallis to a fun arrangement of "It's a Wonderful World". All very enjoyable.
No comments:
Post a Comment