Monday link - Cantilena on TV!

Check out this TV segment on Cantilena's concert last Sunday!

Great Cantilena concert, and a nice review!

I'm happy to say that Cantilena's "Poetic License" concert on Sunday went splendidly. The premiere of Scott Wheeler's "Jabberwocky" went particularly well - we kept a zippy tempo and high energy all the way through! There's a chance I'll be able to share a video later on, but I'm not sure yet. And I got lots of happy feedback after the concert, so I think everyone enjoyed it quite a lot.

And we got this review from the Boston Musical Intelligencer! (My favorite quote is that on the first piece, "Cantilena surprised with a burst of volume filling the sanctuary." I worked very hard on getting them as loud as possible at the end of Gwyneth Walker's Now I Become Myself - glad to see it paid off!)

Monday link

This is a great TED talk about body language, projecting power, and how your body language can shape your thoughts and emotions and even who you are, not just the other way around. Great reading for everyone, but obviously very relevant for conductors!

Fabulous concert weekend!

John Tenniel's illustration of Jabberwocky.

I hope you don't have any important plans for this coming weekend, because it is going to be a GREAT concert weekend!

Being the second weekend in May, of course there are a billion choral concerts. But the one I want to call to your attention is, of course, my own! Cantilena will be performing their spring concert, called "Poetic License." This performance is in honor of Mordena Babich, a member of our alto section who passed away last spring. She was a writer, so in her honor we have chosen musical settings of all the best poets. Jane Kenyon, E. E. Cummings, Yeats, Shakespeare, and others will all be represented. And we will be performing the world premiere of a commission by Scott Wheeler, his setting of Lewis Carroll's "Jabberwocky" for two cellos and women's chorus. It's a very exciting program and I hope you can come! For more about our commission, check out the interview I did with Scott Wheeler.

If that is not enough choral music for you, I also feel that I owe a nod to Musica Sacra, who always has the most interesting programming, and this weekend is no exception. This year is the 150th anniversary of the Emancipation Proclamation and the Gettysburg Address, and Musica Sacra will be celebrating these events. To quote from their press release, "In this Saturday's concert, music from and about the Civil War period will be interspersed with readings of texts by Frederick Douglass and Abraham Lincoln, performed by drama students from Cambridge Rindge and Latin High School."

I greatly enjoyed Musica Sacra's March concert, "Baltic Inspirations," where they explored some stunning Northern European music that had a truly head-spinning quantity and variety of languages. (And I felt a little guilty for not reviewing it on the blog!) So go check out Musica Sacra for a very patriotic Saturday...and then come see Cantilena for a poetic and inspired Mother's Day!

Friday cat post!

Hat-tip to my mother: Feline film festival makes cats the stars.

Walk for Music follow-up

I just wanted to post a follow-up to my post about the Walk for Music. April 28 was the most beautiful possible spring day in downtown Boston - everything was blooming and flowering, and the sun was out in a clear blue sky, and it was absolutely beautiful. We had more Cantilena walkers than in any previous year, and it was altogether a delightful afternoon!

And I'm happy to say I beat my goal, which was $250, and raised over $300! Thanks to the following people for helping me out with that goal:

Anney Barrett, Derek Bruneau, Jody Doyle, Peter Eldredge, Dave Galvin, Eve Goldfarb, Edwin Henneken, Adrian Martin, Jack Martin, Molly and Terry Martin, Sophie Michaux, Mary Parker, Vicky Reichert, Nancy Robertson, Chartis Tebbetts, Ron Wallace, Jeff Watson, and Todd Weber.

Now don't forget to come to the Cantilena concert this coming Sunday at 7 pm at First Parish Arlington!

2 job openings

Both of these positions look interesting!

Mak'hela, the Jewish chorus of Western Mass, is looking for an Interim Director to lead rehearsals in Northampton on Tuesday evenings.

 The Rhode Island Children's Chorus is looking for a conductor to lead one of their choruses one evening a week.

Be fruitful and multi-apply!

Monday link - Scott Wheeler interview

I haven't done any "Monday link" entries in a while, but this one should make up for it!

Check out this video of an interview I did with Scott Wheeler about the piece we commissioned him to write for Cantilena. He set Lewis Carroll's "Jabberwocky." It is awesome, and we will be premiering it in 6 days (on Mother's Day, this coming Sunday!) at 7 pm at First Parish Arlington. If you have never been to a Cantilena concert, now would be the time!

Friday cat post!

I think what today needs is a picture of a cute kitty in the middle of some spring flowers, don't you?

Courtesy of my brother, here is one of his cats Porkchop!

 

You may remember Porkchop, who is the younger and newer housemate of Oomi. Porkchop recently had a little...operation, and now he is also free to roam outside!

Walk for Music - I need $5 of support!

I'm happy to say I'm doing the Walk for Music again this year on April 28! This fundraiser supports all types of music programs in Boston's neighborhoods and surrounding communities. 100% of the pledges raised will go straight to these music programs (and are tax deductible)! I will be part of the Cantilena team, and my personal goal is to raise $250. It's extremely ambitious, but my goal is to get 50 people to give me $5 in the next week and a half!

This is an important fund-raiser for Cantilena. A big portion of our annual budget comes from donations and fund-raisers; ticket sales cover a very small part of our operating costs. And we have a special goal this year; we have started a new music fund! This fund is in honor of former alto Mordena Babich, who was a beloved member of the chorus for a long time. We are committed to commissioning new works for women's voices (already while I have been the director we have commissioned three works, and we will be doing a premiere by Scott Wheeler on May 12! You will be hearing more about that soon; it is a FANTASTIC piece.)

I hope that you are able to support me with a pledge of $5! Checks can be made out to Cantilena and sent directly to me at Cantilena, PO Box 380702, Cambridge, MA 02238. Or you can use the "donate" button on the Cantilena web site (www.cantilena.org). Or you can hand me $5 when you see me!

$5 for new music and women's voices singing together! Spread the word!

Job opening

A chorister forwarded this on to me - the UCC church in Davis Square is looking for a music director. Looks like a great congregation!

Monday link

RIP Sir Colin Davis.

Friday link

Earlier this month I was lucky enough to visit my parents in Austin, TX (where it was either 80 or 90 degrees, sunny every day, and there were flowers out everywhere in the city.) They took me to see the movie Quartet while I was there, which was utterly delightful. It is a movie about a home for retired musicians, and the process of putting on a gala concert there. Everyone's performance was marvelous, and the whole film was utterly charming. One of the best things about it is that many of the roles were played by retired professional musicians, not actors, and Dame Gwyneth Jones had a cameo. I heartily recommend it. You can watch the trailer here.

Today's link is Maggie Smith being interviewed. Even though she clearly is not the biggest fan of tooting her own horn, she is quite funny, charming, and honest!

Weekend Concert/Service calendar

Hey, it's Holy Week! So the chances of great choral concerts are more slim, but there is a lot of good choral music going on this week! Feel free to leave a note telling us what crazy-awesome music is going on at your church this weekend.

And if you are on the South Shore, stop by First Parish Cohasset at 10 am on Sunday, where you can fill your needs for Handel and Sweelinck and folk and gospel all at the same place!

Audition announcement!

This is an audition announcement for any sopranos looking for an a cappella singing opportunity during Wednesdays before noon. The Notables, a group that I used to direct, is looking for both soprano 1's and 2's. They are a tremendous amount of fun, and a really generous group of ladies - the purpose of the group is to go sing in retirement homes in the MetroWest area. Details are below!

NEEDED!!!

SOPRANOS (I and II)

for a

WOMEN’S A CAPPELLA GROUP

“THE NOTABLES”

• 16 member FUN group made up of women of all ages from the western suburbs

• Rehearsals and most of the concerts are Wednesday 9:30-11:30 am, September through May

• Approximately 16 concerts bringing music to a wide variety of independent and assisted living and nursing home venues

• Wide repertoire of songs from the early 1920’s to the 1970’s in 4, 5 and 6 part harmony, occasional kazoos and choreography

• Under professional direction; audition required

Interested? Find out more and come see us sing!

Contact : Alice Moylan 781-899-9397

Kay Wynant 781-894-4102

(E-mail addresses also available, just leave a comment.)

Great job, Boston Gay Men's Chorus!

I am sticking my head back into the blogosphere to congratulate the Boston Gay Men's Chorus, who gave a tremendous concert today. I was looking around last month for a concert I could share with my college singers, and since the title of today's program was "Seize the Day!" and we sang that song last year, I thought it would be a great show to take them to. I also knew that the BGMC often has a Broadway bent, and lots of my kids like Broadway, so it seemed like a great fit. I had no idea how right I was!

I didn't think anything was going to be able to top Ricky Ian Gordon's multi-movement work Only Heaven, settings of the poetry of Langston Hughes that was arranged for the BGMC and also stunningly danced by two great dancers, Christian Bufford and Bradley Gibson. This is a work that people should absolutely look into (solo sopranos, it was originally a song cycle for you!) Kudos are also due to the Wellesley High School Select Choirs, who sang in the middle of the show. But Stephen Schwartz's work Testimony, based on words from the It Gets Better Project, was definitely the high point for me - it brought me to tears. It was written for the San Francisco Gay Men's Chorus, whose performance is in the video below. Hearing a stage full of hundreds of gay men singing full-throated and full-hearted "It gets more than better, it gets amazing and astounding" was a really powerful moment. The concert is over now, as today was the last performance, but you can hear "Testimony" below and you can go to the BGMC's next performance! I was very impressed at their professionalism and quality; they really assembled a program that perfectly played to their strengths and had a powerful emotional impact. Bravo, guys!