Music, themes, and collaboration

141 titles.  That's what my librarian pulled a single copy of and placed in binders.  I have dedicated the first week of August to music selection.  This is what I'm most anxious about getting started.  Once music is selected, I can begin preparations.  I will sit at the piano in my office, I still sing in each part, I will play the music while singing, I will wave my arms, and then I will sit in silence and hear the music in my head.

Conductors are crazy.  We wave our arms to the voices we are imaging in our heads.  And we convince people to trust our ideas of the music.  I'm so grateful for singers.  Of course, without them I would not have a choir.  But people love to sing, and then they join choir.  And they want to sing well and want to learn.

Choir auditions are in less than a month.  It's a fairly normal audition process, with sight reading and singing a solo selection and pitch recall.  They will also each prepare a excerpt from the Gloria in Haydn's Harmoniemesse.  The collaborative artist faculty member is going to play, and she invited one of her students to play as well, which means I will get to also work with a young collaborative artist.  I enjoy that!

A few other things I know will be on the docket this fall: Stanford's "Beati Quorum Via," Haydn's "Der Greis," Elgar's "My Love Dwelt in a Northern Land," Eberlin's "Christus factus est," Senfl's "Das G'läut zu Speyer," and I'm hoping a Czech madrigal.  I'm looking at some English choral/organ stuff for my non-auditioned choir.  I have a huge list of potential pieces, but I'd like to narrow down a theme.  I am finding it difficult to pick a theme, mainly because I do not know my choirs and want to make sure the music I select is appropriate.  I think I will likely come up with two programs for the October concert: One program will be "safe" music I know that each choir should be able to do, and the other program will be what I hope the choirs will be able to do according to what I think they should be able to do.  Unfortunately, because the program needs some TLC, it might limit the first concert.

I am more and more convinced, however, that it is going to be a great year.  The students seem eager to learn.  They want to do well.  They want to have expectations placed on them.  The head of the voice department is also doing great things, so I also think that what the voice teachers are doing will work in tandem with the growing choral program.

It's a good time to be a Maverick.  (The UNO kind, not the Sarah Palin kind).