Origin From: Total Vocal
Author: Deke Sharon
Date: 2010-07-08
I’m on the plane to Dallas, preparing a workshop for educators, and figure I might as well just make it a blog as well.
The following suggestions are aimed at educatiors - primarily High School, but elementary through college as well - as I know they know how to run a rehearsal, how to tune a chord, how to turn little black dots into music.
And yet it is these very experienced directors who I most often find asking me for help in teaching contemporary a cappella. At first, I didn’t quite understand, as all music is music - direct a Shakespeare play, direct Ionesco, same thing. But in time I’ve come to realize there are a few differences that are important; nothing terribly difficult, but nonetheless central to coaching your group to properly sing and perform contemporary a cappella.
1) Connect to the music.
First of all, this starts with you, the director. You have to understand the song, musically and historically. Why? Because it will help inform decisions you make - about tempo, feel, phrasing, lyrical meaning - and give you inspiration and focus which you can then share with your singers.
You understand Bach, you studied Beethoven... but do you know what “Hey Jude” is about? Understand what U2’s “One” addresses? Know why Britney Spears sang... ok, sometimes a song is just a song. But you should know when there is something behind it.
Most importantly, you need to care about the song, and have something you want to express through it. It could be as simple as “being young is fun,” which of course is something your students hopefully can relate to, if inadvertantly.
Once you’re excited about a piece of music make sure your students understand and subsequently share your excitement, your vision, your inspiration. If they don’t, it’s your job to get them excited. Bored pop music is a waste of everyone’s time.
What if it’s something your students love and you don’t care for? Try to figure out why they love it. Learn from them, feed off their enthusiasm and inspiration.
If no one cares, please pick another song. You’re just wasting everyone’s time.
2) Remember that the arrangement is merely a roadmap.
Music is expression. Communication. Do not let your performance (or any performance, for that matter) be the empty recitation of words.
You know first hand the horrors of a blank faced, glazed performance. You’ve seen it, perhaps you’ve presided over it on a bad night. Vow not to ever let that happen again, and then take that commitment to the sheet music and to the rehearsal.
The syllables in the chorus sound dull? Change them to something that excites your singers. Want the song to be longer with some oompf at the end? Repeat the chorus up a step. The only right or wrong in music is if the music moves the audience. Do everything within your power to get your singers expressing, and if it means changing the sheet music, you shouldn’t give it a second thought.
3) Trust Your Instincts
Unless you listen only to classical music at home, never turn on a television, visit the grocery store with earplugs, and generally lead an astoundingly hermetic existence, you know popular music. You grew up listening to popular music.
You might think you’re detached, out of touch, unprepared, but I’ll let you in on a little secret: everyone is. There is no rule book as to how to teach high school students to perform with gusto ala Glee; we’re making this up as we go along, using whatever experience we have, knowledge we’ve gathered, and gusto we’ve mustered. Perhaps one day there will be national education initiatives to help the nation’s music teachers learn the best way to get the alto section to sound like Kelly Clarkson, but until then we’re on our own.
So, trust your instincts. You know how to run a rehearsal, how to motivate teens, how to read a score, put on a show. And you know popular music far more than you might realize.
4) Make mistakes
As teachers, we’re often careful when around students, as our culture positions the educator as someone who already has all the answers.
But in life, there are often no answers. Or, the best answer can only be found through trial and error, a process the entire class, teacher included, must go through together.
What does this mean? Take chances: try a song faster, then slower. Up a step, then down. More softly, more angrily, while bouncing around, while still.Ask for suggestions from the singers, then see where they take you. The journey will bring you all closer, and these trials will result in a more unique, more custom fit, more successfully unified vision allowing a more powerful performance.
5) Get your group performing as soon and as often as possible
This might seem daunting when your program has three scheduled concerts a year, but believe me it’s worth the effort.
Popular music requires an audience to make sense, and your singers will learn more from performing than they will repeating a song in the rehearsal room.
Get them in front of the student body during an all-school assembly, or have an impromptu 3 song set during lunch in the courtyard. Sing for nursing homes, elementary schools, homeless shelters. Make new fans at a farmer’s market or street fair.
This serves several purposes: it helps your singers gain confidence, it helps them learn how to really reach an audience through song, it gives them a chance to try different interpretations, and it helps them become a more cohesive unit both on and off stage.
And most of all, it makes the music meaningful. Rehearsal is no longer a class, a task, an educational excersize; it’s a means to a very important, very fufilling end, and you’ll find you learn music twice as quickly and twice as enthusiastically when your singers realize there’s an eager audience awaiting them in 3 days.
I hope these tips help. Please post any additional ideas you have below.
