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A new standard in choral music?Date: August 16, 2009
According to the music teacher's blog, this is the new standard for choral music.
What do you think? A new standard?
Ernest Grainger on August 16, 2009 4:02am
It might be a new standard for a particular kind of choral music, but I'd hardly say for all choral music.
on August 16, 2009 8:25am
Whoa ... I don't think I would buy the performance as a "new standard for choral music," per se, but it may very well be a new standard for Barbershop Chorus work. I can't understand how some of the effects, e.g., costume changes and prop presentation were pulled off ... just amazing. This live production rivals many of the film extravaganzas from the Thirties and Forties, Very compelling entertainment ... I'm betting this one won first place ..
Dean Estabrook
on August 16, 2009 11:25am
[True confessions time] I began my professional teaching career as a band director. I got out of it because of marching band and the lack of opportunity for real music-making. While visual stimulation is not a bad thing and great vocal groups do it, if this is evidence of the new standard, then I will have to politely join the ranks of the archaic. A better standard would be Carmina Slovenica or the like.
on August 16, 2009 3:31pm
This certainly generates enthusiasm! However the same can be done with a formal choir generating art.
Mike Shirley
North Kansas CityHS
on August 17, 2009 12:39am
Certainly very well sung and extremely competently staged, but it is just too long and too crammed full, both musically and in terms of stage business. I found myself glancing at the timer at about 1:15 and thinking "Three more minutes of this??" The wow effect of the costume change is no longer a wow effect because by that time the listener/viewer is already completely saturated.
I can happily listen to an entire concert of barbershop music, but the prospect of a concertful of this kind of thing is too terrible to contemplate.
--
Jaakko Mäntyjärvi
Helsinki, Finland
on August 17, 2009 2:37am
Makes me wonder how this kind of approach would be applied to something like Verdi's 'Dies Irae'. Call me old-fashioned, but I like my chorus to stand relatively still so that the music predominates. (There are one or two exceptioins to this, of course.) This is a production number in which the choreography shares equal place with the music. Fine for standard barbershop presentation, but distracting, expecially as there is not a uniform standard of easy movement in the lines. Hardly a new standard for choral music. To snipe a little, it's really a form of playing to the gallery.
As an afterthought, it is also an excluding thing. I have had blind and physically handicapped people in my choirs. This sort of 'standard' would definitely cut them out. Indeed, unless one were young, trim and in full health, one is automatically excluded.
on August 17, 2009 7:42pm
Different strokes for different folks - very definitely.
Speaking of strokes, the director looked pretty close to one at the end. Certainly a new standard for occupational hazards! And they say Wagner 'sweats'?
on August 18, 2009 8:58am
This is no more outrageous than a production number in a musical. It just might be the world's largest Show Choir. The vocal performance and theatrics seem excellent to me. It looks like a pretty good aerobic workout to boot.
on August 23, 2009 3:17pm
Quite right on the comment about this being no more outrageous than a musical or show choir number. If choral music was not a visual medium at all, we would eschew tuxedos, dresses, and allow choristers to sing in street clothing. We wouldn't use black folders, we'd just hold sheet music using whatever was convenient. We wouldn't worry about a concert hall having nice wood paneling or a church being nicely decorated.
Humans have five senses, and nature has made the visual and the aural ones the most valuable and important. I for one am DISTRACTED from the music when I see dead faces, or heads buried in sheet music folders. When I see singers expressing the mood the music composer intended on their faces, it enhances my understanding and enjoyment of the music.
As for David Monks's observation about having blind/differently abled choristers.......I am assistant director of a barbershop chorus that received a bronze medal in the same contest which that video came from. We have a blind member who stands on the risers and executes every single move as well as those around him. And he's one of our best bass singers.
You may want to observe that the singers in the video who are not standing on the floor (about 80% of the chorus is on risers) are NOT dancing. They are using different hand/arm moves and body postures to enhance the floor team's formations, and this allows them to sing better without running out of breath.
By the way, in case anyone is interested, this is my chorus's Marketing video:
Probably not appropriate to call any of these a "new standard" of choral music. But it's perfectly appropriate to say that the best barbershop choruses around rival any other choral ensemble on Earth. And it's perfectly appropriate to say that singing in a barbershop chorus is an excellent option for folks to try out if they want to sing as their hobby.
Matt Swann
Aurora, CO
Assistant Director
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