Rebel rounds, overtone singing and calibrating my artistic compass -Leading Voices Day 2
I have another very interesting day behind me here at Leading Voices. My personal highlights today were meeting interesting people and the concerts. So, I am giving you just a few takeaways from each workshop that I went to during the day.
Singing with Community Choirs by David Lawrence – I took away that you can sing rounds not only in the prescribed phases, but you could actually start them at any time. This is not only huge fun (and messes with your brain) but also creates beautiful new patterns and dissonances. If this is done with a familiar round, this will help choir singers to feel safe with the musical material and allow them at the same time to discover new harmonic spaces. Apart from that, David is a great person to meet and we had some fantastic conversations throughout the day.
Overtone Singing with Choirs with Anna-Maria Hefele – I only joined half-way through the workshop due to so many things happening in parallel. I watched Anna-Maria work with each individual singer on getting them (and me!) to produce overtones. This was fascinating. If you’re interested in this, watch this video and explore her website in more detail.
Turn your success into significance with Merlijn Twaalhoven – this was a whole afternoon of taking space and thinking about your artistic mindset. We thought about the artist’s mindset through our senses, the beauty of imperfection, feelings and emotions, creating/having the safety to play (and fail), imagination (breaking patterns) and abundance (of opportunities). There were a few things that resonated strongly with me, for example:
“As artists we can create spaces of imperfection”.
I really liked this because our focus naturally lies in perfect performances. However, the performances I enjoyed most were the unpolished, the slightly raw performances where you really see the artist. One word that kept coming back to my mind here was Authenticity. Another thought that resonated was to engage in long-term thinking. What does your artistic activity change long-term? For me, this is creating opportunities for children and adults to sing.
But now, the concerts!
The first concert was by Mikrokosmos, a young choir from France who presented an amazing concert of contemporary choir music incorporating sounds of the saxophone, bells, bowed cymbals, balloons, foil and kazoos. If you know me, you’ll know that I have a strong interest in contemporary music having studied composition at Leipzig University and also completed a PhD in Music Education related to sounds. The harmonies, the dissonances, the energy and the great textures produced by this choir were stunning. If you have a chance to see them, go!
The second concert was by Cuncordu e Tenore de Oresei, a traditional male vocal group from Sardinia. This was a fascinating sound with a mix of sacred and secular songs. The music often contained long drones with one person singing words. I loved the throat singing – it’s a different experience hearing this live than on a video.
Tomorrow, there are two round tables: I will moderate “What do Children’s conductors need” and speak at “The status of singing in European School Curricula”. At the end of the day, my colleagues and I will hold a lounge about “Working with young Singers”.