First of all, if you’re reading this post on Christmas Day: shame on you! Can’t you leave the computer alone for just one day in the year??!!
But since you’re here, I thought I’d highlight the most popular posts of 2011 in case you missed any of them . . .
Everything in the concert is going brilliantly. The choir is firing on all cylinders. The audience are lapping it up, even your lame banter between songs.
Then you spot the one person frowning in amongst a thousand smiling faces and the doubts set in.
There have been grumblings in my choir of late. Some people are not happy.
But is it possible to keep everyone in a choir happy?
“In our choir we’re not allowed to use words in concerts.”
Great idea. In principle. But how do you achieve it?
This weekend I’m running a ‘voice clinic’ for members of my choir. I’ll be spending time working on basic vocal technique and confidence building.
When I asked people what they want to work on almost everyone said they lack confidence in their singing voice.
Sometimes old choir repertoire becomes stale.
Well-loved songs start to wear out and lose their sparkle. What can you do to overcome this?
Put me in front of a huge crowd of strangers and I’ll perform loud and proud.
But in a room full of friends and family I get embarrassed and stumble. Why is this?
A while back I taught a song wrongly. Not for the first time!
Even though I corrected myself quickly, the original version stuck in people’s minds and now they can’t shift it.
My main skill is as a teacher of songs to those who don’t read music.
Other choir leaders have different skills – like polishing songs for performance.
People come to my singing workshops because they love to sing.
But first they have to spend time learning songs.
As they say: size doesn’t matter, it’s what you do with it that counts.
The size of your lungs isn’t important in singing, it’s how you use the breath in them.
I’ve always known that I’m more interested in traditional songs, but I’ve only just realised that it’s the vocal quality that I’m most drawn to.
There’s something thrilling and primal about the sound of traditional singers’ voices. How do they achieve that and how does it differ from, say, ‘classical’ singing?
This post is part of a series of occasional Questions and Answers. Just use the contact form if you want to submit a question. A budding choir director writes:
“I had prepared and arranged four songs, but the other person who leads the choir kept on asking the choir what they would like to do and of course they come up with ‘pop songs’.
“Would you ask a choir what they would like to do? The work I do with the choir is voluntary so I don’t really want to spend hours of time arranging if then we are only going to do pop songs - although I’m happy to do the odd one.”
After the long summer break, I used to arrive really early at the first choir session, sit by the door, and worry that nobody would come back.
I worry less now, but there are still many things to consider after your choir has had a long break.
I’ve been asked to create a choir specially for an inter-faith event.
There will be contributors from Islam, Christianity, Judaism, Hinduism, Buddhism and more. Plenty of songs to choose from. But what about atheists? Will they be represented, and what songs do they sing?
Sometimes I only have to hear two notes of a song and I know what it is.
Often I join in with someone singing a song only to realise that I’m singing a completely different one. What’s going on here?
I had a girlfriend who believed that we are all capable of anything if we just put enough effort in.
She believed that if you fail at something or are not very good at it, then you just don’t want it that much.
Apparently it’s the summer break. The weather is sunny, choir doesn’t start back until September, kids are off school and ice cream vans are cruising the streets.
So how come I’m stuck in the office and seem to be working as hard as usual?
You know those people who sing all the time — when they’re cooking, hoovering, gardening, whatever? Well, I’m not one of them.
I love singing. I earn my living by teaching songs, I enjoy singing with others, I adore listening to singing on CDs and the radio, but I don’t sing around the house.
The other weekend 50 singers performed in public to a large, appreciative audience. We performed eight songs in four part harmony, most in foreign languages and some with dance moves.
The standard was high, the performance was tight and the singers clearly had fun. But this group of singers did not use sheet music, had rehearsed for just six two-hour sessions and welcomed all-comers regardless of singing experience.
Last week I looked at the pros and cons of traditional choir formation vs. mixing parts up (Flying in choir formation – placing singers effectively).
Whichever approach you choose, there are still several choices to be made.
Last week I looked at how singers choose where to stand in their section (Don’t stand too close to me! – finding the right place to stand in your choir). But that assumes that your choir is divided up with all singers in any given part standing together.
But it is also possible to have a mixed formation with individual singers from different parts standing next to each other. What are the advantages and disadvantages of these two alternatives?
In some formal choirs you’re told exactly where to stand when performing. There is often a fixed set-up which varies little from concert to concert.
However, in most community choirs, even though the separate parts might have fixed positions, where you stand within your part is up to you. How do you choose the right place to be?
The OK Chorale are not a performing choir (yet!), but after two terms of hard (but fun!) work, we’ve invited some friends and family along next week to hear some of the songs we’ve learnt.
I’m trying to keep it very low key as it’s the first time many people will have performed so there will be a lot of nerves about. How can we deal with these anxieties?
Singing together creates a real sense of community. Sometimes a choir arises from an existing community, but other times the creation of a choir builds a brand new one.
In most cases people come together simply because they love to sing, but in others there is a real need to join a community of like-minded souls.
I’m beginning to worry that zombies are taking over my choir! Have you noticed how the living dead always have husky breathing?
Well, the singers I come across seem to be doing the same thing. What’s that all about?
Places strictly limited. Book now to avoid disappointment. To be sure of a place, please send a cheque. Last year we sold out, so reserve a place early!
How many times have you heard these kind of pleas for a concert or singing workshop? But the tactic can seriously back-fire.
I’ve been under the weather lately with no energy at all. But last night was choir night so I had to pull something out of the bag.
I decided to use the fact that I had no energy to structure the rehearsal and we ended up doing some really good work!
There is a proverb from Zimbabwe (apparently) that says: “If you can walk, then you can dance. If you can talk, then you can sing.”
Exactly! The whole of my work is based on my belief that everyone can sing. But what does that mean in practice?
When I was much younger I used to think that once you knew everything and were vastly experienced, only then would you become confident.
But one day I was in a singing workshop when I realised that this is not true. You just have to decide to be confident! Behave as if you are and the rest will take care of itself.
I’ve been creating some new singing workshops for next year.
Last week I wrote about how to create snappy, attractive titles. But what about the content – does the theme of the workshop actually make much difference?
I’ve come to believe that it’s irrelevant what songs you teach in a workshop.
Like a newspaper headline, or title for a blog post, a good name for a singing workshop can make all the difference.
I’m constantly wrestling with titles for new workshops. I’m always on the lookout for that killer title that will get the punters flocking in. In the process I’ve discovered a few guidelines that I’d like to share with you.
I’m having a tough time writing this blog post.
I didn’t sleep well last night, I’ve been over-doing it, I have too much on my plate, and I have no idea what to write about.
Actually, I have plenty of ideas what to write about. I have a file with hundreds of ideas for blog posts, but none of them appeal to me today, and the ones that do will take a long time to write and I want to do them justice.
But I have to write a blog post because I’ve promised you – my readers – that I will publish one post every Sunday.
Or it could be a song I promised to arrange, or a choir rehearsal that I have to run, or a workshop that needs planning, or a song that I agreed to write. It’s no use waiting for the muse to appear or to be in a better mood, it needs to be done now, today, this minute.
The answer is simple: JUST DO IT.
You don’t need to feel inspired to begin the job at hand. Just get started. No matter how tired you are or how rubbish you think the result will be, by just getting on with it some weird alchemy happens: you will begin to feel inspired.
Desire follows action, not always the other way round. Start to go through the motions then you will begin to feel like doing what you’re doing. No need to wait to feel motivated or inspired.
We often read about professional song-writers or authors or painters who tell us that they just work every single day, no matter how they are feeling. As professionals they can’t afford to sit around and wait for the muse to appear.
The results may not be the best (or they may be), but that’s not important. Just get on with it regardless.
So next time you don’t feel like going to choir or planning that workshop or doing your vocal warm up (or writing that blog post!), ignore that feeling and just do it. The creative juices will soon start flowing and you will end up with good results and feel better.
What are you waiting for??!!
This post is part of a series of occasional Questions and Answers. Just use the contact form if you want to submit a question. A budding choir director writes:
“Last year I got involved with helping to lead a community choir. I have a musical background in that part of my degree was in music and I play the piano and cello. However, I have never had any singing lessons or led a choir before or even been in a choir — except a school choir — so when I was asked to help I was quite nervous!
“I found that I really enjoyed conducting and teaching new songs. However, I’ve been getting a little stressed recently because when I come to teach parts, I can’t always think what the note is that I need to give the section of the choir when we’re rehearsing. Or when I need to help out a part by singing along with them, I can’t always come in with the correct note.
“Does this suggest that I haven’t got a good enough ear to lead a choir? I’m beginning to fear this is the case. I can usually pitch A and get a note from that, but I certainly haven’t got perfect pitch.”
My first response is “Gosh, you’re more musically trained than I am!”
Just like you, when I first started leading choirs I had never had singing lessons and hadn’t been in a choir since school (and even then we didn’t sing in parts)
I too was very nervous when I first started out, but it does get easier. Even so, I still get nervous before a new season or a one-day workshop. I think that’s healthy as it means I never get complacent and keep doing the same old stuff.
I’m not exactly sure what you mean by “I can’t always think what the note is”. I always, always write down the start notes of each part of the song I’m teaching. I have a chromatic pitch pipe that has all the notes in the scale and I just dial up the appropriate note and blow into it.
I don't have perfect pitch by any means and, given an ‘A’ for example, I’m rubbish at finding, say, an ‘F’. In which case you are far more accomplished than I am!
Use an instrument to get the start notes and write down what they are. Even the best professional conductors do it!
Even though I teach by ear and don’t hand out sheet music, I always have a copy of the score myself when I’m teaching. I often don’t have to refer to it, but it’s good to have it in reserve if I get confused or make a mistake. I’ve taught over 600 songs in the last ten years so it’s very hard to keep every part of every song in my head. The score is useful if you need to find the right note to come in with a part half way through a song, say.
If you need to, just stop, check the note on an instrument or pitch pipe, and then carry on. It will get easier as you (and the choir) become more familiar with a song.
I think you’re being far too hard on yourself. You don’t need perfect pitch to lead a choir.
You might like to check out an earlier post: Start as you mean to carry on (about giving out starting notes — read the comments!)
Some people just love anything that’s finely honed, all shined up, squeaky clean, highly skilled and perfectly rendered. Not me.
Give me imperfection and humanity any time!
I like my art to be dirty and messy. I’m not a fan of art that just copies real life – illustrative or representative art. We have the real thing to look at after all. Or art that airbrushes out all the little blemishes and mistakes of nature.
I’m not keen on skills-based art, the kind of thing where people go “Oh, how clever! I could never do that.” Then you’re not looking at any kind of creativity or humanity, but the skills and techniques behind it.
I don’t like dancers who have perfected their technique, but have nothing to say with it. You know the ones where you can tell exactly who they’ve studied with. Or people who study Alexander technique and walk down the street like they’re balancing a book on their head.
And I really don’t like jugglers. At least those who only juggle. We can all learn to juggle if we want, it’s not that hard. I have more time for the bad juggler who keeps dropping things.
The best juggler I ever saw was in Covent Garden. He had this amazing act whereby he juggled a range of differently sized things at the same time, but it was only at the end that I realised he had been juggling at all! The skills and technique were very much secondary to his act.
Give me an artist whose technique and skills are invisible and who has something to say about the world. Or even a creative person who is not perfect where we can see the imperfections and humanity behind the finished product.
Which is why I don’t like singers or choirs or music which is just so, so perfect. The blend is perfect, the rendition is perfect, the enunciation is perfect, the costumes are perfect. I may as well stay at home and read the score and imagine the music in my head.
If you ever go to one of those kinds of concerts you will tend to find the audiences on tenterhooks, unable to relax. As soon as the singers walk on stage you know what you’re in for and you start to worry for them. Perfection is impossible, of course, but you will them to succeed. You’re on the edge of your seat hoping against hope that there won’t be a bum note or a missed cue. Then you applaud wildly (and over-enthusiastically) at the end, because it’s all over and you can relax.
Then there are those concerts where the musical director puts you at ease with a bit of light-hearted chit chat, where the singers are obviously relaxed and enjoying themselves, when a wrong starting note is given and the world doesn’t end. At the first laugh or mistake you can feel the audience relax and sigh and settle in for an evening of entertainment without having to worry. We’re all human, and we’re all in this together. They’re on our side!
Sure technique and skill and practice are important, but don’t let it dictate. If you have nothing to say with the skills you have acquired, then better just keep them to yourself.
At least that’s my two ha’p’orth. What do you think?
At the end of each of my one-day workshops I’ve recently started to record all the songs I’ve taught during the day. It’s nice for people to be able to take something away to remind them of the songs.
But one comment recently gave me pause for thought: “In all the years I have been attending singing workshops I have never heard how we sound. I think we should be proud of what we have achieved.”
No matter how singers are positioned, and even if one half of the choir sing to the other half, it’s hard to get a real sense of how the group sounds as a whole.
Sometimes singers in a choir can’t do a performance for one reason or another and they come as an audience member. Every time this has happened in one of my choirs, they’ve come up to me afterwards to tell me how wonderful the overall sound is and that they had no idea how good we sounded!
So no matter how many times your musical director says how fantastic you sound; no matter how many times you position yourself in order to hear the other harmonies; no matter how many times you hear the other half of the choir sing to you; and no matter how big your ears are – you never quite get the sense of how good your choir sounds unless you stand outside and listen.
Make sure you get a recording of your choir or workshop. Or even better, resist the temptation to sing at every concert and take time out to be an audience member for a change. You will be surprised by what you hear.
Have you had this experience? Do drop by to leave a comment and let us all know what you think of what you heard.
Size is in the eye of the beholder. How ‘big’ a choir is depends on the context of course, but working with a large group of singers in any circumstances can prove to be difficult.
I recently started a choir in my new home town of Woodbridge: the ok chorale. I was lucky enough to have over 100 people turn up to the first session. Working with such a large group from the outset has set me thinking about how one works with large choirs.
From personal experience, I find that working on my own with more than 70 singers at a time is very tiring. I don’t know why it should make a difference that there are 20 singers in each part instead of 15, but it does.
The maximum number of singers you can work with also depends on the space available and how you work. Obviously a larger room can take more singers, but even a large space might be too small if you need to do lots of moving around. If you work with the singers seated, you can squeeze more people in.
The singers also need to be able to hear you clearly, so even if you think you can work with 200 singers, there might be trouble ahead if you’re in a large hall with no amplification.
When you start out with a new choir, you may think that bigger is better, but there are definite pros and cons to having a large group.
People don’t often talk about the downsides of singing. Yes, we bang on about the health benefits, social aspects, etc. but seldom mention the bad bits.
Here are 7 terrible things that might happen to you if you start singing.
So be warned: approach singing with caution. Once you start you might not be able to stop. And it’s like a virus which you can easily pass onto someone else. Remain alert at all times in case the bug gets you!
Philippa writes:
“How do you respond when you get asked directly for sheet music? I’ve had this a few times now, usually by men interestingly! I’ve not had a woman ask me for dots yet, although when I first joined a community choir five years ago I was the person asking for music.
“I have managed to say no nicely until now, and explain my logic for not giving out music. I find it hard to refuse as I’m a people pleaser, but I totally agree that as a choir leader you can never please everyone and I’m not going to tie myself in knots trying to!”
I met a woman the other day who was interested in joining my choir, but it clashed with another choir she was in. She then said that if she had joined my choir she would have to have the music. Even if I didn't give it to her, she would write it down herself!
This woman is a control freak. She needs to be in control and hates that eggy place where you’re not quite sure what’s going on (see The importance of being confused). She has a method (sheet music) that she knows works and sticks to it. It’s her security blanket.
You need to point out to people that reading music is a learnt skill and is not necessary to be able to sing (see Music notation – do singers need it?). It’s an invention, an aide memoire originally developed to help those learning hundreds of chants (easy to get lost with them!). The vast majority of the world’s singers do not read music, neither is most of the world’s music written down.
People need to trust the learning process (it takes longer than they think) and not expect instant results. We have become a visual culture, so need to re-learn how to LISTEN. See Learning songs by ear.
So ... I don’t hand out written music to teach songs. I use it myself to remind me of parts because I have 600 songs in my repertoire and am not good at remembering all of them! Once we have learnt a song and sung it for a few months, I might hand out music if someone asks so they can play it at home on the piano or pass it onto someone else. But only if they know it perfectly by ear first.
I make it very clear that my groups do not use sheet music. There are plenty of choirs out there who do, so they can go and join one of those if they want.
Men often request sheet music because bass parts are usually very hard to remember as they often don’t have a recognisable tune. In fact, many of my basses invent their own music notation for just that purpose. But if you teach them to listen to the chord changes, then they will soon know when to go up and down.
You can’t please all the people all the time. Be assertive and clear about what you offer. There are plenty of other choirs that people can join.
Many community choir members enjoy practising at home. And so they should!
They sing out loud whilst washing up or mowing the grass, re-living last week’s choir session and hearing the full glory of all the other harmonies in their head. Trouble is, we can’t hear what they’re hearing!
It’s like when people sing along with their iPods. They can hear the guitar solo, the backing group and the other singers in the band, but we can’t. They’re lost in the midst of a glorious mix of sound which we can’t hear. We just get to hear their part on its own with a tinny “tsh tsh” backing coming from the earphones.
It’s the same when a single choir member is singing their part on their own. If we’re lucky it might be a recognisable melody which is pleasant to listen to. But there’s a 75% chance that it’s not. It will be a harmony they’re singing and we can’t hear the main tune so it doesn’t make much sense!
The worst is usually tenors and basses who often don’t have recognisable melodies. Basses at least tend to follow the chords and can have a nice bouncy fun line. But tenors very often have just one note for ages, or those strange accidentals which make for weird chords when put with the other parts. But we can’t hear the other parts so it’s often not very nice.
It’s also not that nice to sing on your own unless you can really hear the other parts simultaneously in your head. Many’s the time I’ve had a tenor complain that their part is boring or tuneless. But when they get to hear a concert (usually only when they’re ill and can’t take part) or listen to the CD they realise that they’re an important part of the mix and that their part makes so much more sense when heard with the others.
So, hats off to the tenors who have a difficult job of it most of the time. We couldn’t do it without you!
Having written about starting your own community choir, I recently put my money where my mouth is and started a brand new singing group – my first in 15 years.
I learnt a lot from this process and thought I’d share with you.
Last autumn I moved to a completely different part of the UK – Woodbridge in Suffolk. I knew that at some point I would need to start a regular weekly group as I have to earn a living! I decided to wait a while to settle into our new house and start something up in the new year.
Before I moved here I thought I would start a group in the nearest big town, Ipswich, as that had the largest population and was a central point for the surrounding area. But I also decided that I wanted to cut down on my travel.
So I decided to take a risk and set up a group in the small town that I live in (population 11 – 12,000).
In January this year I put my modest publicity machine into action, gave the group a name (The OK Chorale – I wanted to keep it light-hearted and avoid the word ‘choir’), found a venue (this was very hard as most decent spaces are already used on a regular basis), and waited.
I had modest expectations. I reckoned that if 20 people turned up, that would be OK as I could build over the coming months. If only 10 people turned up, at least I could cover my costs and it would be a start.
The start time was advertised as 7.30pm. A handful of early-birds turned up just after 7pm. By 7.10pm this had turned into a steady trickle, and by 7.15pm all the seats in the room (about 30) had been taken. By 7.30pm there were almost 100 people squeezed into the tiny room that I had booked with no room to move!
Fortunately, I was able to contact the person who books the large adjoining hall which (luckily for me!) just happened to be empty on that one night that month. We re-assembled in the big hall and only then did I realise how many people were there.
Panic over, I began the session with some trepidation as I’ve not worked with such a large group before. The acoustics were great for singing, but I had to really project my own voice to be heard above the hubbub. The evening went fast, and people seemed to enjoy themselves.
I got everyone who was interested in coming back to jot down their email address as clearly I had to find a new venue by the following week. I was amazed at how many names there were! I had thought we maybe had 60 or 70 people, but it was only when I counted them all up that I found there were over 100.
I spent the rest of the week phoning round madly to find a suitable new venue. I thought I’d exhausted all the possibilities when I booked for the first session, but finally managed to find a school hall only 5 minutes walk from my house!
The following week pretty much everyone who said they would come back did, plus a few more who had heard about the group. Now that the dust has finally settled I have 93 fully paid up member for this term (I work in blocks of 10 weeks). And I still have people contacting me to go on the waiting list!
We have just finished our sixth session and everyone seems as keen as ever. The biggest problem I now have is what to do with such a large group and how to deal with those people who still want to join. A nice problem to have!
Several of you have contacted me over the last few months to say that you’re setting up your own choir. I’d love to hear how you’re getting on and what you have learnt from the experience. Are there things you would do differently? Did you make any mistakes? What was your biggest success? Do drop by and leave a comment and share your own experience.
Very, very few people are tone deaf. Tone deafness is an abnormality of the brain which can also affect the understanding of language and certain spatial abilities. So unless you are one of those rare individuals who are born with amusia or have suffered a brain injury or have hearing problems, you aren’t tone deaf.
So now that’s out of the way, you can get on with singing!
When I tell people that my singing groups and workshops are open to anyone and that I believe that everyone can sing they often ask “But what about people who are tone deaf, people who just can’t hold a tune?” They just jump in and start being negative and putting obstacles in the way!
Now, what if I’d said I was starting an amateur soccer team or a beginner’s cookery class or a tennis academy for kids? Most people would probably say: “Well done, great idea! Can I join?”, not “But what about those people who can’t kick straight or those whose taste buds are under developed or those who have to wear glasses?”
Somehow singing is different. People who sing are expected to be perfect from the off, be able to “hold a tune” from the get go, to have a lovely voice without any practice, to never dare to “inflict” their horrible tuneless voice on others. They must be able to sound like Pavarotti or Britney Spears or Justin Bieber or Lesley Garrett as soon as they open their mouths.
But we don’t expect someone starting to learn soccer to be able to play for the premiere league next week, or someone to open a Michelin starred restaurant the week after they sign up for cookery classes, or new tennis players to play at Wimbledon next summer.
A person can kick a ball about in their back garden and nobody minds if they’re good or bad. Someone can practice their serve on their own until they get it right, even though the ball hits the net most of the time. A beginner cook can experiment at home to create new dishes which, at first, may be virtually inedible.
But when it comes to singing, somehow expectations are different.
“No, no, no,” you cry, “I don’t mind if someone sings in the bath or around the house, as long as they don’t do it in public or inflict it on others”.
So let’s take our new footballer out of her back garden and to the first practice session of the local amateur soccer team. Now it’s in public and her team mates depend on her and can also see how well or badly she can kick a ball. In the beginning her passes will be rubbish, she’ll miss easy shots at goal and she’ll run out of breath quickly.
But as the weeks go by she’ll get better and become an important part of the team. She may never get to be as good as, say, Wayne Rooney, but few do. She’ll have fun, face challenges, be better or worse than some of the other players, possibly compete with her team, get much better at soccer and become a valuable team player.
Same with singing. Ears and mouths are just like eyes and feet: it takes time to connect the two. Just as our soccer player can’t pass accurately at first and a beginner tennis player keeps serving into the net, the singer just starting out in a group might not be able to accurately reproduce with their mouths what they hear with their ears.
But be patient. Like any skill the ability to hold a tune accurately will develop in time. It’s not that you’re tone deaf, it’s just that it needs practice. And any way, most of the time in a group it’s not a big deal if you’re slightly out.
So next time someone says “I can’t sing, I’m tone deaf”, just tell them to join a choir and get practising!
Last week I looked at what music notation is for and if you need it to sing.
This week I’d like to lay out what I think are the benefits and shortfalls of using sheet music to teach and learn songs.
Is there anything I’ve left out? Do leave a comment. If you’re reading this by email or in an RSS reader, you should find a ‘comment’ link at the bottom that you can click on.
Do you have to be able to read music to sing? Lots of people believe so and are put off joining choirs as a result.
I don’t use written music when I teach, but does that mean I am limited in what I can teach? And am I making life difficult for those who can read music?
I want to make music as widely accessible as possible, so I don’t use unnecessary musical jargon or rely on sheet music. All the groups and workshops I run are open-access in the sense that everyone is welcome and no experience is necessary.
My argument is that the vast majority of the world’s folk or traditional music has never been written down and it is learnt by ear in the cultures that it originates from. And that is my repertoire.
I don’t use written music when I teach. I teach by ear, singing each part in turn and getting people to sing back until they’ve got it. This is partly due to the fact that a lot of the repertoire I teach comes from cultures where songs are passed down orally from generation to generation.
Of course, what I do is artificial. If you came from the same culture as the song you would have heard it repeatedly since you were a baby. Gradually you would have become more familiar with it until you knew it off by heart. At no point would you have seen either the music or the lyrics written down. You would have learnt everything by listening.
Trying to replicate that in a choir or singing workshop is fairly ridiculous as we’re trying to short-circuit years and years of repetition. But we try, and after a few weeks it’s surprising how much has gone in. More importantly, people retain it for a long time. All without seeing anything written down. (OK, maybe I do put the lyrics on the wall from time to time, but it’s not our native language!)
So what do we need music notation for? (Liz Garnett has also written on this subject recently: On Musical Literacy)
There are forms of music notation dating back to Ancient Greece and before. These simple ways of describing music visually consisted of symbols representing relative pitch and note duration. The original urge to notate music was probably for several reasons:
In 8th Century Europe, monks in monasteries regularly used symbols (known as neumes) to put plainchants down on paper. Because the notation couldn’t express exact timing or absolute pitch, the parchments served mainly as a reminder to those who already knew a tune. They were not that useful to people learning a new tune if they had never heard it before.
Gradually systems of music notation became more sophisticated until we arrive at the five-staff system that most people are familiar with today. This system originated in European classical music, but is not the only system around. There are other forms of notation in, for example, India, China and Indonesia, as well as alternative Western notation systems (such as Solfège) and graphic and pictorial forms invented for specific experimental compositions.
In many of the choirs that I have run, the basses often invent their own notation, a version of early neume-based notations. The length of a horizontal line reflects the length of a note, and the vertical distance between lines shows the relative pitch. Like early Western notation, this is just an aid to memory and can’t be used to learn a song from scratch. The basses tend to invent it because bass parts often don’t have a recognisable tune so they need to know where notes go up and down and how long they stay on it (rather like plainchant).
Since music notation has evolved and can now express complex rhythms, absolute pitch, and accurate note duration, it can be used as a tool for learning and not just an aid to memorising a song already learnt. It was also a useful means by which music could be disseminated over long distances before the advent of recording devices.
It is important to remember that much of the world’s music is not written down. The vast majority of music in the world is traditional or folk music which is transmitted orally. When early song-collectors (usually Westerners trained in music theory and notation) arrived they would have to notate what they heard because they had no recording devices.
However, not only is it very difficult for Western notation to cope with complex rhythms, microtones, unusual scales or modes, but the song-collectors would often ‘edit’ what they were notating to fit in with preconceived notions of ‘proper’ musical structure. Sometimes a harmony would appear ‘wrong’ or each verse might have a different rhythmic structure which would get simplified when notated, or a tricky rhythm might be mis-heard. Also, since these songs came from living traditions, the song might be entirely different depending on which day of the week it was collected or who was singing it!
The vast majority of notated music is composed by a known individual (rather than being created by ‘Anon’ and handed down over generations) and of Western origin. This gives a very distorted picture of the world’s music if we only pay attention to written scores.
Rather like when the bible was only available in Latin, the fact that you have to learn to read music means that it is easy for an elite to arise. Those who could read and write music became musical gate-keepers who decided what people could hear and what music got passed on. Inevitably it became a class issue.
The middle classes, who wanted to behave and sound different from the ‘rough’ working classes, promoted the idea that ‘proper music’ (i.e. notated) was ‘high art’ and anything folk or traditional was somehow less worthy. Because traditional music was passed on orally and not written down, it didn’t count.
Andrew Emmet has written in a comment on this blog:
“We have a lot in common, but I know one of our differences is that you choose not to have written music available. To me this is like reading a story to someone, but never teaching them to read.”
The implication in Andrew’s comment is that only music ‘literature’ counts. Only stories (or songs) written down in books are worth reading or singing. Stories and songs passed on through the oral tradition don’t count.
But the oral tradition is a living tradition. Books are fixed and set in time. Sheet music is like an insect in amber. There is no longer scope for change, embellishment, or additions.
Reading a book is one experience as is watching a movie. But seeing a live theatre production or hearing a great storyteller is something else. There is room for both, but one is not less than the other. It is, of course, possible to sing without being able to read music.
It is impossible to notate a song accurately whether it is a written version of a song heard ‘in the wild’ or the score created by a composer. If it were possible, then there would be just one, perfect, canonical performance of every song or piece of music in the world.
However, some people believe that the written score somehow represents a Platonic ideal that we strive to achieve. But we can never know exactly what the composer intended, or whether the piece of music we have in our hand is an accurate representation of the song it is notating.
Next week I’ll consider the pros and cons of using sheet music, and in a later post I’ll consider what to do in a ‘learn by ear’ choir if someone insists on having the written score.
In the meantime, do let me know what your attitude is to sheet music. Do you use it? Do you find it useful or does it have its drawbacks? What kind of repertoire do you sing? Do you use an alternative system to the popular five-staff system? Do drop by and leave a comment.
To sit or not to sit, that is the question. Whether ‘tis better to be standing whilst singing, or to rest one’s weary bottom on the nearest chair.
I’ve tried both standing and sitting, and there are pros and cons either way.
When I started my first choir, there were only 12 or so people and we used to sit in a semi-circle whilst learning songs and stand when we sang. But in my one-day workshops I often get 70 or so people and by the time we’ve got the chairs out and tried to arrange them in a sensible way, a good ten minutes or more have passed.
I always start with a physical and vocal warm up any way, so people are already standing. Then we can easily move into simple steps to help keep the tempo whilst learning a new song. I always make it clear that individuals can sit if they need to (people might have injuries or illnesses that I’m unaware of), but I stand throughout. If I sit down, my energy levels drop and I fall asleep!
When I’ve been in workshops using chairs, people become extraordinarily attached to them. I was in one workshop where people arrived and sat in identical orange plastic chairs wherever they wanted. Then the warm up started and we all moved around the room at random, ending up scattered far from where we’d started.
The workshop leader then said we should pull up a chair. I watched one woman walk right across the room to get ‘her’ chair (the one she’d sat on when she arrived), carry it right across the room and sit on it. It was an empty chair, she hadn’t put her coat or bag anywhere near it. But because it was the one she’d used when she arrived, it had become hers!
Most of the time I lead workshops and choirs with people standing. Sometimes in smaller groups, or when we are doing difficult songs (so singers end up hanging around for a long time whilst other parts are being learnt) I will use chairs in a semi-circle.
As you can see, I’m rather biased towards not being seated!
I’d love to hear about your own experience and how your choir or singing workshop works. Do you have more advantages (or disadvantages) that I haven’t thought of? Do drop by and leave a comment.
