FREE ESSAY ON CHOIR TERM PAPER

CHOIR TERM PAPER

I recently attended a Christmas concert at St. Augustine's Church in Elkdridge. For the
most part, the choir blended well together. Sometimes the sopranos could be heard more
clearly because their section seemed to be the most powerful. The choir had very clean
cutoffs, which made them seem very unified. They communicated the text pretty well. It
was easy to sense the mood of the piece from the expression they put into it. However,
their dynamics could have been better. They used some dynamics, but the range from piano
to forte wasn't as wide as it could have been. Their diction was excellent; they
enunciated their consonants and their vowels were pure with very few diphthongs. I think
this was partly because their posture was good and because they sang with the perfect
mouth shape. All of them stood up straight and sang with a dropped jaw at all times. I
could not judge their breath support too well just by looking at them, but I think it was
fairly good because of the energy of the pieces they performed. Even when they were
singing at a piano volume, their energy showed through and could be heard in the music.
Without adequate breath support, this energy would not have been possible. Their breath
support also made for a nice legato sound. They staggered their breathing well enough so
that I never heard any spots in the music where everyone took a breath at once, except
for rests. They were never off key either; their intonation was perfect. The sound was
always pure and on pitch, except when they sang in unison. Their unison was still
perfectly on pitch, but the sound was less pure because individual voices tended to
dominate the group. Overall, I thought this was a spectacular concert. Like the choir
here at Wilde Lake, I noticed some weaknesses, but their strengths easily outweighed
them.
Bibliography
None, all original work.