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WHO adjusts pitch to tune a choir?Date: May 31, 2013 by william copper  Views: 1159
I've been reading and thinking about Richard Sparks' blog posts on intonation. How often do we hear "tune yourselves", given as a blanket statement to a chorus? Or worse, "tune to the sopranos"! ...
Does anyone use some visual method of indicating which voices, which notes, and when, are to be tuned to other voices, and which are to rely on tonal memory to hold onto a tonic note or reference pitch for a piece of music?
I'm experimenting with ways to show how this should be done ... my 'pitch graphs' (tm ... one day) give a way for a conductor to say something like "if you have a fat green bar, TUNE to the other voices"; if you have a thin gray line, you are tonic and hold your pitch for others to tune to. If you have a narrow green or orange bar, your voice is in perfect relation to tonic, so also try to hold pitch by your tonal memory and let others tune to you. If you have a fat orange bar or a double-wide green bar, your pitch is exceptional and you should learn how it fits in the musical texture.
I've tried little arrows and symbols, numbers over notes; latest experiment is the colored bar approach. Comments welcome, an example pitch graph is online for my a cappella arrangement at www.hartenshield.com/dannyboy.html
This message is not a promotion of the work; it's just an arrangement of a piece easily available free from many sources ...
But it is an attempt to see if where I'm going with writing music in just intonation resonates with conductors who have to face the reality of teaching a chorus how to sing and how to make music and how to tune. It should apply, I think, to the high school chorus and the professiona singers.
Thanks!
William Copper, composer
www.hartenshield.com
Replies (8): Threaded | Chronological
Richard Sparks on May 31, 2013 4:03pm
William,
Thanks so much for your insightful comments on my intonation series of blog posts!
I guess to me, such notational systems can just as easily get in the way of the singer--I think of the Curwen solfege editions, the Vari-bar editions of renaissance music, and the Waring tone-syllables.
It's not that what is aimed for isn't absolutely correct (making solfege easier, showing metric freedom rather than anachronistic barring in renaissance music, or the actual sounds in the words that need to be pronounced in singing), but that the notation slows things down and adds a level of complexity that doesn't really help. Those that are capable of singing with just intonation will do it--those that cannot will not be helped by the notation. (that may well be too harsh)
It's certainly my job as conductor (and a teacher of conductors) to deal with these issues with the choir. I need to find ways to teach them how to tune pure thirds or when a second scale degree needs to be higher. But I want them to learn how to hear it themselves. Once they can and have accepted that, I can remind them (stop--who has the 3rd? can we sing it again with a pure third?--sing the chord) and they can do it. If they can't, I may need to do the chord without the third and sing it for them, then have them do it. In that case they haven't absorbed the skill sufficiently. If I had a choir that wasn't sophisticated enough to know who has the 3rd, I'd point out who does and ask the same thing as above.
I'll readily admit that with some choirs, the knowledge of notation isn't advanced enough to do that . . . but I'm not sure that the colored notation system would help them get it. (But I'd be willing to try! -- if I can, this fall, I'll do Danny Boy with my University Singers and see if it helps them)
In my rehearsals, if possible, I always want to teach concepts and skills--ideas and skills that can be generalized to other music and "carried away" to other situations. I want to avoid correcting an error, rhythm, tuning, vowel, etc., only in isolation. I tell my singers that I want them to walk away from my choirs able to apply what they learn (musicianship, ensemble skills, etc.) to other situations.
I'll be curious to try this in the fall, William, and will let you know how it works. I'll also be curious to know if others find this a useful way to conceptualize intonation.
Thanks!
Applauded by an audience of 1
Lucy Hudson Stembridge on June 3, 2013 8:43am
I totally affirm that we are teachers of skill, as much, or more than we are "players of the choral instrument before us."
Whether William's devices are successful remains to be seen. I wish you every success, William, and your dedication to this project is to be commended. The choir sample is certainly on pitch. (Nice arrangement! :)
My questions would be:
What happens a few months/years later, when the device is no longer used? Is the pitch better, or have they responded to/depended on the colors to tell them what, we hope, they learn to hear.
Sometimes in my voice studio, a beginning student will be off-pitch [for example a 4th too low]. I will tell them, "Higher". They will go up , say a 2nd, and look at me as if to say, "Is that right?" I guide them gradually to this skill, but I emphasize that they [eventually] need to know - to develop this ability to tell when they are accurate. It is amazing what happens when I don't tell them, requiring them to tell me. When they finally reach the pitch I'm playing/singing,[or, at the more advanced level - the pitch vibration,] their face lights up. Something in the feeling of sympathetic resonance..? Maybe...But more likely, that they allowed the stereotypes they've heard to fall away, and purely used their natural hearing and singing - adding the improved posture, open throats, relaxed-but-accurate vowels, etc. that they've been taught.
Sometimes we just need to give ourselves permission to affirm what we already know. The conductor/teacher is the necessary guide/permission-giver.
My wonderful music education teacher, Mrs. Alia Lawson, often reminded us that "education" is from "educare" - meaning to draw out [what is already within us.]
William, I don't mean to sound lofty at all, and again, I am impressed with the dedicated work you have put into this...but honestly, I will be more interested in your device when it can correctly deduce the physical issue causing the pitch problem, and say, "Sit taller/support more strongly/relax jaw tension...etc..."
Often people know when they are off-pitch. What they cannot always get to on their own is how to correct it. When we continue to advise/remind them, I think we teach good habits - and generally habits that improve the total sound/artistry of the choir.
Best Wishes, and thanks for sharing an interesing concept.
-Lucy
on June 1, 2013 7:29am
Having sung with Richard almost 40 years ago (!) I can attest to his consitent encouragement in the cause of good intonation!
William, I am fascinated with the ideas implicit in your post. Something for us all to watch for.
One suggestion:
Richard and I spent time, back in those mists of academic time, with Rod Eichenberger.
In his rehearsals and conducting classes there was discussion of how one's conducting gestures influenced intonation along with ideas, since developed more fully over the decades, as to how to how to help the singer(s) use physical internalization - on the fly, so to speak, to help individuals, as well as sections adjust intonation.
Rod got me to join ACDA back then, and I owe him and Richard thanks for the steer and the opportunity to associate with talent and insight!
Rod's videos on conducting, including What They See is What You get, could contribute at least one clue to where Richard and I got some of the ideas we still use in rehearsal, ourselves.
I'm sure colleagues from that time and since could add to this discussion - come on, folks - let's talk about what we've learned!
Cheers
on June 2, 2013 5:31am
Thanks for two very compelling responses. I'm very afraid what you say about adding clutter to the page is correct, and thus my graphs maybe not a good idea for use in performance, Richard .... you should see some of the past attempts I've made at getting the music explicit about what's going on with the harmony/intonation. Possibly it would be useful as reference material? Kind of a pre-planning aid to the music...
Gene, the very notion of conducting gestures influencing intonation is fascinating ... quite an idea. I do know (from string players) that reduced volume on the 'tunable' notes (most bacially the major thirds of major triads) is a great help to tuning, so maybe a marvelously well-balanced conductor can use some movement to help that notion.
on June 2, 2013 8:01am
I'll go further out on a limb - the tree is one Rod planted 50 years ago with growth every time I've had the privilege to work the Haystack Workshops in Oregon or just watch him conduct.
His premise, last time I observed his methods, includes the empathic response of the singer - to the gestures made by the conductor. I had things I was doing with my posture making it difficult for singers to sing in tune, and, with the process of modifying my particular poor gesture, combined with participation by the singers in internalizing physical gestures themselves, the empathic "two-way" communication helps all concerned.
Alexander Technique - addressing posture - the conductor's, as well as the singer's, has been used in the workshops I worked in the 1990's to help folks get their "body habits" out of the way of good vocal production.
Another Technique, Dalcroze Euryhtnics, addresses physical activity as an internalization tool. Various rhythmic exercises and physical activitiea can be shown to make the body "remember" various concepts affecting things like tempo, including ways to improve doing syncopated attacks in concert as ensembles.
There are hand gestures Rod has taught both conductors and singers, to help thems elves change internal habits, reactions, or mental attitudes to improve pitch.
One such gesture was used to help modify "placement' of a vowel in a sung word, and consisted of moving one's hand alonside the head in an effort to raise the soft palate.
Once, in a performance, an individual who has worked in the "teaching ensemble" that has been part of Haystack, reached their hand up aongside their head in what appeared to be the biginning of the gesture. Several other singers, who also participated in the Haystack events, were panic-stricken - thinking this singer was about to demonstrate the way it worked! At the last possible instant the singer realized what they were doing and made a somewhat elaborate gesture of adjusting their glasses...
The soapbox is getting a little shaky, here.
Rod is the originator of many of these tools. A master class with him - either on the Oregon coast or the other locations would be a much more eloquent (and less verbose!) way of observing how they work.
The original idea of my posts was to convey that there are tools using words, gestures, and other physical activity that make good intonation, pitch modification, and other "therapeutic" muaical action possible, to the good end of well-tuned performance.
The soapbox has been pushed aside...
on June 3, 2013 1:52pm
Lucy, good golly .... it is the richards, genes, and lucys of the world who must do the posture, vowel, and jaw teaching. I yam but a poor creature trying to produce scores to help them and their singers be able to successfully use all that to feel success in making music. I'm not the first composer to try it ... Mozart certainly did, and even a modern Lauridsen with his sixths and ninths writes in such a way that tuning the voice is fun. My goal is in part to make explicit what tuning is possible ..
The question about reliance on a graphic illustration leading to problems, or laziness: I don't know. I don't think so, but that's just an intuition; reliance on a conductor's gestures, and on music history courses, and on instrumental training, none of that is harmful.
on June 4, 2013 7:24am
William,
I hope my perspective did not distress you - it certainly was not meant that way. I certainly don't think your techniques would lead to laziness. I just raised the question as to how it is retained - and it very well might be! :)
When I first read your post, before I went to the site, I pictured that you had developed an electronic device, such as the ones on cell phones to tune guitars - they also use red and green bars. Maybe I should have modified my answer more after seeing your sheet music, and gaining a more accurate picture of your goals.
It is probably simply that our backgrounds lay a different emphasis.
As I said, your research, dedication, & expertise are impressive, and I can hear the consistent accuracy in the recording.
It also may be that you are working with adults, or advanced students, and I teach in low-income areas where college-attendance seems an unattainable fantasy for many. (As we sometimes say in the South, "Shoot, honey, I'm happy if I can just get 'em to open their mouths! " :)
We both have the goal of beautiful singing. I have seen, and believe, that goal is reached through a combination of listening, solid techniques for breathing, air placement/resonance, vowel and consonant production, freedom [from tension] , and artistiry such as the shape of a phrase.
Of course it is quite possible, though rare, that a singer does all this and still does not tune well. Your techniques would certainly address this.
A nearby colleague whom I greatly respect teaches the patterns of chord resolution as part of how he teaches sight-singing. ("Class, what note does 'FA' resolve to?" [CLASS:] "MI") The students are, largely, successful with this. I think your color-code idea might apply helpfully there. Have you considered writing scores for the sight-singing component of Evaluation/Festivals?
Thanks again for your dedication, and for asking this community. I apologize if my response sounded unreasonable or out-of-touch.
Best Wishes with your projects! Please keep us posted as to their effectiveness, as your time permits.
-Lucy
Applauded by an audience of 1
on June 7, 2013 10:01am
Lucy, thanks for your additional note. No, no distress, and I'm impressed by the clarity of your comment: the notion of fixing listening, breathing, vowel, freedom ... al that, and tuning will come naturally, is no doubt quite true. I'll update sometime in the future, whether this notion of giving very definite tuning indications in the score is of any value.
You noted earlier how the tuning in the recording is quite good: I laboriously tuned each and every note in the recording, then overlaid soprano and alto lines with a recording of a single singer (with a lovely voice and a nice range); she got all the intonation beautifully right, though I never mentioned anything about my 'scientific' examination of tuning issues.
William
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