Thanks to those who attended the Choir Zoom meeting on Friday. It was good to see everyone and to catch up on news of families, vaccinations and things in general. We talked about possible new repertoire. Here are recordings of some of the suggestions:

Underneath the Stars by ate Rusby performed by Voces 8

The Shepherd by Karl Jenkins performed by Polyphony

Like a River in My Soul by Tim Osiek performed by Covenant Choirs – Chamber Singers (an interesting uniform!)

In honour of St. Valentine’s weekend we are looking at The Glory of Love. The Dukeries Singers introduced us to this when we combined with them last year; it is an arrangement that is not demanding but goes down well with audiences.

Here is an information sheet with background to the song and an analysis. There are links within it to the original Benny Goodman recording and other performances by Bette Midler and Paul McCartney. The Glory of Love is the most popular and famous of his songs, the others are very Western and Waggon Trail. There are recordings available on YouTube of those listed in the information sheet.

Here is a performance of the Jay Althouse arrangement by an amateur American choir for you to listen to critically. This choir is not as proficient as us but there are lots of good points including diction and clarity. It is interesting how “English” they are with their diction, especially in the verses. What have we got to do to avoid collapsing into the ends of verses and to successfully manage the ending? I’ll make some suggestions next time.

Here is the latest Technical Work video combining vowels and consonants relating to Steal away. You will need this arrangement to work with. I will link it to the Ken Burton arrangement on a later date. .. and something for your amusement referring to the consonant work from last week.