Today was a normal observation as Ms. Valla did not have any opportunity for me to lead a sectional or warm up. The group is competing in state Solo and Ensemble next week Friday as well as District Choral Festival on Thursday, so Ms. Valla is really pushing for performance readiness right now. Also, Tuesday was a short rehearsal because parent/teacher conferences started at 3pm.
Because of the shortened rehearsal, work consisted of run throughs of both pieces ("Dance on my Heart" and "Bright Morning Stars") with targeted work as it came up. The group began with "Dance" and I noticed a big improvement on facial expressions and movement from last week. Also, the group was a lot more musical and had much greater dynamic contrast than before. Ms. Valla must have really targeted these things on the Thursday rehearsal because they sounded great and everyone was very engaged in the performance.
After "Dance", the group switched to "Bright Morning Stars". The focus on this piece is maintaining an open sound, even when the notes go higher. This allows for the piece to float and not be strained at all in the voice. It also allows for the sections to blend easier, as this piece has a few staggered entrances that are supposed to sound seamless - you are not supposed to know when a new soloist or section enters. Just like last week, the three soloists at the beginning are wavering on pitch and end up going flat as new soloists enter (or the first soloist began very sharp - it's hard to tell which because the piece is a cappella). However, when the whole choir entered and the pitch settled, the blend and the tone quality was absolutely beautiful. Vowels were very tall and, again, there was a large dynamic contrast throughout the work. I got goosebumps listening to them.
Unlike "Dance", the girls were not moving very much at all on "Bright", which Ms. Valla pointed out. She said that while the piece is technically correct, there is not a lot of emotional connection yet because the singers are not as engaged facially or with their body like they are on "Dance". She also said that there is no connection with their breathe because of the lack of movement, which helps with the emotional connection. This is going to be their main focus next week on their final rehearsals.
Because this group is so close to two rated performances, Ms. Valla is not comfortable allowing me to lead part of the rehearsal. She said she is very possessive of this particular group because of how little she sees them and won't allow her student teacher to lead the group either. However, she is going to let me lead a sight reading exercise next week in preparation for State S+E, which means nothing can be sung before the whole exercise is sung, except for a scale and tonal chord patterns (Do Mi So Mi Do, La Fa Re Ti Do). Instead, potential hard intervals can be discussed, but not sung.
I have really enjoyed watching and working with this group and I'm sad that next week is my last observation with them.
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