Monday, February 29, 2016

How to be a bad choir director (it’s easier than you think)

Ann read my post The six qualities need to be a good choral director and it sparked off a quite a rant.

Whiplash
photo by bagogames

She has obviously had a bad experience. I thought I would share it with you.

Monday, February 22, 2016

How to decide whether to cancel a concert or singing workshop

It’s your worst fear: despite all your hard work publicising the event, only a handful of people turn up. Or the musical director is taken ill. Or perhaps the venue burns down.

empty seats
photo by B Rosen

The difficult question is: can you continue or should you cancel? And if you do decide to cancel what’s the best way to do it, and what are the implications? There are no easy answers, but here are some things to consider.

Monday, February 15, 2016

Your job as a singer is to get out of your own way and be in the moment

I’ve just run a workshop for members of my choir to help improve their singing technique.

in the moment

I realised whilst teaching that all the singers had the necessary knowledge already, it was simply a matter of reminding them to put it into practice. I’ll explain what I mean.

Monday, February 08, 2016

Money matters 2 – online payments and ticketing systems

The other week I wrote about practical solutions for dealing with choir finances.

ticket

This week I want to look at the many options for using online services to collect payments and set up box office systems for concerts.

Monday, February 01, 2016

Sing the intention, not the meaning

We’re always told to focus on the meaning of the lyrics when singing a song in order to communicate it properly and to give some emotion to our delivery.

crying

But what if the lyrics are “lully lullay” or “fa la la” or what if the context seems to contradict the meaning or what if any ‘meaning’ is ambiguous? Then you need to sing your intention. I’ll explain more below.