Sheelagh Chadwick (2011) describes the possibilities of the aural transmission approach she observed in the choral setting with the University of Illinois Black Chorus, a non-auditioned choir open to students of the university and members of the community, including:
the almost immediate possibility for nuance and expression. Even on the first hearing, the choir captures not just pitch and rhythm but dynamics, intensity of tone, accents and aspects of style. Musical expression is part of the music from the start, not something to be added on a week before the concert. (pp. 158-159)
Veteran Sydney choir director Tony Backhouse (2010) describes how he achieves this through the aural transmission approach, to “sing the part with absolute conviction, the way you want it sung, over and over until people do the same” (p. 5). Backhouse has quite a lot in common in his practice with the two directors discussed here, as the three became involved in the Australian a cappella choir scene as it emerged in the mid to late 1980s (Backhouse, 2003; Rickwood, 1998, 2010). Backhouse's
one-sentence summary of his teaching approach, while simple, encapsulates all the dimensions Chadwick identifies as being transmitted through the approach. He later expands on this saying, “demonstrating the parts with the requisite dynamics, attitude and feel is valuable” (p. 31). These descriptions, however, only skim the surface and the following analysis aims to provide some more detail regarding this approach, what it achieves and how directors use it.
In contrast to the common approach for teaching a song to a group discussed above, the two directors do not focus on the notes first and add dynamics, expression and musicality later. Instead groove, style and musicality are given the highest priority and are inextricably linked to the notes from the start. This results in a musically satisfying experience for the singers almost immediately, rather than several weeks down the track. I next provide some examples from the two directors to illustrate how this occurs in the rehearsal context.
The first director taught the popular song “Mad World” by Roland Orzabal (recorded by his band, Tears for Fears) to the workshop group. He told singers “don’t worry about the music for the moment, I just want to teach you the first phrase.” On this premise, singers were happy to part with their scores (something directors report many choristers do not like to do), meaning they could develop an aural relationship with the song first. Backhouse (2010) does this also, preferring to “teach the song aurally and hand out scores later once everyone feels comfortable with their parts” (p.
31). The director started softly singing the first phrase of the bass part with a pure, gentle tone. He got the basses looping this, and then started singing the alto part over the top in the same pure, gentle tone, looping it until they were solid. This meant that half the choir was already singing within the first minute of the session. The bass and alto parts formed a bed for the sopranos to sing over. The director added the soprano part in the same way, singing with them in a gentle falsetto, at pitch. In this way, each voice part hears their part in relation to the underlying harmony of the other parts on the first listening.
The soprano line consisted of a series of notes on the offbeat. The director used physical transmission to get the singers to embody the syncopated rhythm. He encouraged the singers to feel the syncopation by doing “a couple of rounds where we feel it but don’t sing it.” He showed them how to “feel it in your left shoulder” by lifting his shoulder in the syncopated rhythm against the other vocal parts. By combining both physical (singers embodying the rhythm) and visual (observing the director embody the rhythm) transmission approaches, the syncopated feel was established before the sopranos sang a single note. Following this, the director used copious amounts of imagery (aural transmission) to help the singers achieve the feel such as “when you’re syncopating, it’s hard not to get excited about the beat. It’s not being lazy and not being anxious. It’s casual” and “you’re on the front of the beat; try to be in the middle of the beat or on the back of the beat.” He used words like
“chilled,” “groovy relatedness” and “relaxed syncopation.” Ensuring the feel was right from the very beginning contributed strongly to the immediate sense of musicality. Imagery was also important for communicating the desired sound, timbre and vocal quality he sought, using words such as “it's really luminous and light.” For the vocal technique of a register change for the altos he said, “I recommend a more smiley kind of yodel” and encouraged them “rather than pushing your loud voice, use your lighter voice” to encourage head rather than chest register. Similarly, he warned the sopranos to “resist the temptation to be grandiose” and demonstrated vocally what
he meant by that. He related this to the intention behind the song and how that affects the way you sing it, in particular the melody: “This is a naïve song, if you like, someone looking at the world with devastating simplicity. It’s a simple song, so you present it simply.”
The overall effect of this approach is that by the end of the forty-minute session, the group could sing through the whole song with a strong sense of the musical style, rhythmic feel, harmonic structure, appropriate tone and expressiveness. That is not to say that the song was perfect (the minor tonality was causing the pitch to drop significantly) but the musical outcome in the same period of time was quite different to the common approach discussed earlier.
The second director also invited singers to “learn it by ear for the first little bit.” She often put parts together earlier than other directors, and perhaps before the singers knew exactly what was going on and how the parts would fit together. Rather than explaining, she preferred to just show them through bringing each part in by singing with them. For example, in her arrangement of the song “A Little More Time” by Stephanie McKay, after teaching sustained harmonies to the basses and tenors, she taught a section of melody to the sopranos and told them “you don't come in straight away. You sort of come in on their rise. You all right? You just wait a little while and then I’ll point to you?” So the singers didn't know exactly when they would be coming in but just had to trust her. The singers were not anxious about it because she appeared confident in herself and showed confidence in the singers to be able to do it successfully. Once they had learnt a section and put it together, she looped the section a few times so the singers were secure about what they were doing. While doing this, she switched between vocal parts to cue parts or pick up parts when they got lost until everyone was comfortable.
Her approach was generally to talk less and do more, which usually meant less stopping and starting, allowing the music to continue uninterrupted. In a similar way to the first director, she taught the first eight bars to each voice part quite quickly.
There is a rhythmic vocal percussion part that pins down a considerable portion of the song and establishes the groove. She got the altos to cycle the groove while she was teaching the other parts, meaning parts were combined immediately, hearing their own parts in relation to the groove, so the joining of parts was not a separate process.
Like the first director, demonstrating parts with the expression and articulation she envisioned was an essential part of her approach. As a singer-songwriter, she sang melodies as if she were performing them solo, with all the expression and articulation she would use in her own interpretation of a song. This translated to the group imitating this interpretation and resulted in a very expressive performance including all the scoops, accents, phrasing and timbre. These expressive techniques are not all communicated via the score. Similarly, they cannot be communicated via a keyboard, which many directors used to teach parts.
It should be noted that the repertoire these directors teach (particularly in workshop situations) is usually from popular and world music repertoire, which frequently have simple structures and/or are relatively short. This approach, therefore, would not necessarily be successfully adapted to larger or more complex songs. The choice of repertoire and the care with which the directors write or arrange the songs for their choirs and workshop groups are crucial in the success of this approach.
Conclusions
Table 1: Common Approach Compared to Expert Approach, seeks to summarize the findings of this research, comparing features of the common approach to teaching a song with the expert approach of the two directors in this study.
Table 1
Common Approach Compared to the Expert Approach
Common approach Expert approach
Demonstrate on voice or an instrument Demonstrate vocally
Add dynamics after the notes have been learnt Demonstrate at the desired dynamic
Attend to vocal tone after the notes have been learned
Demonstrate with the desired vocal tone and attend to vocal tone immediately
Add expression and articulation after the notes have been learned
Demonstrate with the desired expression and articulation and attend to these immediately Hand out scores at the very beginning Develop an aural relationship with the song
before using scores Teach each voice part for a section and then
combine parts
Combine parts as soon as possible - often over a groove or bass riff
Teach in larger sections Teach in small sections to facilitate combining parts as soon as possible
Aural and visual approaches for rhythm Embody the rhythm (especially when syncopated) - physical transmission
Use imagery to fix the sound or feel after the notes are learned
Use imagery (for feel, vocal tone, timbre and vocal technique) from very early in the learning process
Verbally explain what is happening in the music Show rather than explain
This research is extending knowledge of the practice of choir directors in Australia, in order to assist learning and practicing choir directors. The practice features that set the two expert directors apart from other community choir directors lie in the immediacy with which they can achieve musical nuance with choirs. This is done by bringing groove, style, dynamics, articulation, timbre and expression to the fore very early on in the rehearsal process, rather than teaching pitch and rhythm first and worrying about those aspects later. Effective vocal demonstration as well as visual and physical transmission play an important role in achieving this.
Acknowledgements
Many thanks to all of the participating choir directors for their generosity in sharing their experience.
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