Choral Warm-Up Video

Choral Warm-Up

Choral Warm-Up

1)    Physical

·      Start by hanging like a rag-doll; feel weight in your arms.

·      Slowly start to rise, and remember to keep your shoulders relaxed as you are doing this.

·      When you are standing normally, reach your arms all the way up to the ceiling.

·      Stretch to the left, right, and in the center.

·      Roll your shoulders to the front, and then roll your shoulders to the back.

·      Move your head, pivoting to the right, then the left. Remember not to move your head all of the way around, because this can be unhealthy.

Why is it so important to stretch before we sing? We stretch before we run… We do this because we use a lot of muscles in our bodies, and if we do not stretch beforehand, we may end up pulling a muscle or injuring ourselves. It is very important to stretch and get the body loosened up before we start to sing for this very reason. When we sing, all kinds of muscles and other delicate body parts are being used in our bodies such as the vocal chords and the larynx.

     2)    Breathing

·      This breathing exercise uses not only our air, but our arms. This exercise works particularly well with small children, because it helps them feel where the breath is.

·      Inhale for 2 beats, exhale for 4 beats.

·      Inhale for 4 beats, exhale for 8 beats.

·      Inhale for 8 beats, exhale for 16 beats.

In my opinion, breathing is one of the most important parts of the warm-up. It is important that we warm-up our lungs and diaphragms to get us ready to sing. I find that if I skip the breathing portion of my warm-up before I sing, it is harder to get through long phrases.

     3)    Diction

·      Start on an A (going up the major scale – 5 notes) singing “oo-ee, oo-ee, oo-ee…”

·      Each time change the consonant at the start of each sequence (ex. too-ee, roo-ee, loo-ee, koo-ee).

·      Move up by semitones.

Diction exercises assist us in getting our faces active, moving, and ready to sing. This exercise is meant to help us get better control of our tongues, and help us realize that our faces/lips really do play a roll in the pronunciation of words.

     4)    Resonance

·      Hum chords with the choir.

·      Ask the basses to sing the root of the chord, the tenors the third, the altos the fifth, and the sopranos the seventh (MM7 chord).

·      Ask the basses to sing the root of the chord, the tenors the minor third, the altos the fifth, and the sopranos the diminished seventh (dim 7^th chord).

Humming is a great way to develop resonance in your choir. When you hum, it is very important to remember to keep your jaws relaxed, and opened. Humming helps to focus the voice, and it should make it easier for us to listen to the person next to us.

     5)    Flexibility

·      Lip trills work great for flexibility.

·      Start on a C and work your way down.

·      If we were in the key of C the exercise will be like this: C – G, B – F#, Bb – F, etc.…   

·      We will go down by semitones in this exercise.

Flexibility exercises will help the choir with difficult slurs and making a connection between notes. In this exercise it is important to hear every note in between.

ChoralNet Discussion

Attached below is the link of a blog entry that I found interesting. This blog is titled "ChorTeach Preview: Reflections on the Conductor's Role and More!" This post highlights short segments of four articles by world renound musicians/conductors/writers. Although this is only a preview of the full articles, there is a lot of information we can gain from reading it. 

The first paragraph we read is a segment by Joseph Flummerfelt and it is titled "Reflections on the Conductor's Role." This is the section I would like to focus our class discussion on. 

Flummerfelt explains that "conducting is more about connection and far less about controlling." I love this quote! I believe that our role as a conductor is to remind our players of different ideas (such as tempo and dynamics) and interpretations of the music, but it is not our job to be controlling, and dictate every musical decision they make. It is VERY important not to have an ego! 

The reason I enjoyed this article was because we have all had conductors who believe that they are the most important part of the ensemble. It is important for us, as future condcutors, to remember that this is not the case and we need to insure that we are not a controlling leader. If we trust our students, and their ideas, it will be our job to guide them, and make a connection between musical ideas. 

http://www.choralnet.org/2016/09/chorteach-preview-reflections-conductors-role/

Davids Chapter 12 and Williams Interlude G

2 A-HA moments/comments:

    1)   I particularly enjoyed the section on “Attention to Dynamics” (pages 194-195). In this section of the book, Davids talks about how “blend is improved when all singers within a section produce the same dynamic level.” I am sure most of us have been in choirs before where there is one singer that sings above all of the rest. I feel as if it might be a bit of a tough situation sometimes, trying to explain to that student that they need to learn to “blend” and trying not to come across as rude at the same time. I recently visited a choir where this was happening and the director kindly told the student to move one row back for a particular piece, because she wanted a more blended sound. This is a great way to go about blend in my opinion, and I will definitely use this in the future.     

    2)   I like the “easy” examples of images Williams gives us on page 173. Words such as “bright, warm, ringing, and dark” are words that should be easy for our students to understand when we are asking them to sing in a particular style. Williams then goes on to list some more difficult words, such as “clear, open, rich and full.” I can see how these words may make your students feel a little lost. I believe this will help me in the future, and it is a great tip for everyone who leads a choir.

2 Questions:

    1)   On page 192-193 of Davids book, we see ways to help blend a choir (tuning, diction, color and balance). What are some ways/exercises we can help our singers stay in tune, or teaching them to sing in tune? In my choir experiences, we have never focused on tuning, so I do not have any exercises or approaches to helping a choir sing in tune.

    2)   On page 174 of “Teaching Singing to Young Students” I see that telling your students to sing with a “yawning sensation” can be disastrous for the singer… I had no idea that this was not a healthy thing. I have often heard my choral conductors tell us to sing like we are yawning before. What is another way we can help our students keep an open throat while singing, without damaging their voices long-term.

Pecha Kucha Presentation - Choral Resource Teaching Kids to Sing by Kenneth H. Phillips

Pecha Kucha Presentation Write-Up - Choral Resource Teaching Kids to Sing by Kenneth H. Phillips

Slide 1: I would like to start off my presentation by saying that Teaching Kids to Sing is a great book and a great resource for us future choral conductors. It was written for children and adolescences from grades 1-12. Throughout my presentation, we will look at some of the topics covered in the book and some great information we can use and take from the author.

Slide 2: Dr. Kenneth H. Phillips was a professor at The University of Iowa. He received his BM from Westminster College, his MM from West Virginia University and his Ph.D. from Kent State University. He has written a number of significant books and he has received several awards.

Slide 3: Phillips dedicated this book to the children he has taught, the authors he has cited, the illustrator – Donald Alvarado, and his wife, Donna who supported him throughout his many accomplishments. He also dedicated it to Lowell Mason, “the father of singing among the children.”

Slide 4: This book is divided up into two sections. The Young Singer, and Vocal Technique for Young Singers. “It consists of ninety sequential techniques grouped by five major areas: respiration, phonation, resonant tone production, diction, and expression.”

Slide 5: Part one; The Young Singer consists of five chapters.

   1.     Vocal Pedagogy for Young Singers

   2.     The Psychomotor Process

   3.     Vocal Parameters

   4.     The Child and Adolescent Singer

   5.     The Healthy Voice

Slide 6: Vocal Pedagogy for Young Singers – This chapter consists of multiple sections explaining vocal pedagogy for young singers, such as: Philosophical and historical perspectives, the song approach, the roots of systematic vocal instruction, change in philosophies, and a real life example of a student named Justin who disliked singing. Phillips also speaks about Lowell Mason (the man in the picture), and how Mason believed that “all children were capable of singing.”

Slide 7: The Psychomotor Process – This is a process that is divided into four steps

   1.     The teacher provides a model or stimulus

   2.     The student perceives and decodes the model

   3.     The students imitate the model

   4.     The student analyzes feedback regarding their effort

The diagram shown on the slide represents the levels of taxonomy of psychomotor behavior by Elizabeth Simpson.

Slide 8: Vocal Parameters – Is a chapter that reminds me a lot of what we are reading in class. It goes through the changing of the voice through adolescence, and focuses on different grades of students and their vocal ranges.

Slide 9: The Child and Adolescent Singer – This chapter explains many different traits found in young singers voices. The first thing talked about is the characteristics of vocal development in the pre-school singer. The list on the slide represents “a suggested procedure for discovering or learning to use the upper-adjustment voice.”

Slide 10: The Healthy Voice – This was one of my favorite chapters. As shown on the slide, there were many diagrams like the one to the right that helped show what is happening inside the body as we sing (the larynx). One thing I believe that all of us future teachers can use is the image to the left. This is a worksheet called “Knowing Your Voice.” There are a series of 14 True/False questions for students to answer about voice health. I highly recommend doing this with your students!

Slide 11: Part two; Vocal Technique for Young Singers consists of seven chapters.

   6.     Vocal-Technique Curriculum

   7.     Respiration

   8.     Phonation

   9.     Resonant Tone Production

   10. Diction

   11. Expression

   12. Vocal-Technique Summaries

Slide 12: Vocal-Technique Curriculum – This chapter highlights topics such as The Rationale for Teaching Children to Sing, The Curriculum, Curriculum Goals, and Vocal Technique Evaluation Forms. The picture on the slide is the Vocal Technique Evaluation Form. This is another great resource in this book that I suggest would be a good thing to use with your students on a regular basis. It outlines each of the fundamentals of singing covered in this book, and gives a 1-5 ranking, 1 being Poor and 5 being Superior. It also lists explanations next to each ranking.

Slide 13: Respiration – This chapter was great because it had numerous photos. Although the style of the clothing may be outdated, the pictures really work. This chapter highlights how important it is for teachers to start demonstrating breathing right away and as early as possible. This will help the students’ long term.

Slide 14: Phonation – This was another great chapter because of the high use of photos. The image to the left on the slide demonstrates “voice placement” and an exercise we can do called “Focus on the Mask.” The image to the right focuses on the intrinsic muscles of the Larynx and labels each section. It is then explained what should happen to the vocal folds when we produce sound. This chapter was very similar to what we are learning in class.

Slide 15: Resonant Tone Production – The image to the left is called a Vowel Color Chart. The goal of this chart is to help “the student… develop the technique of uniform vowel color for resonant singing, through exercises involving shaping of the vocal tract, increasing resonance, and legato movement.” I thought this was cool! The picture to the right uses the image of an elastic band to show correct and incorrect vowel formation.

Slide 16: Diction – This chapter speaks mainly about the use of the International Phonetic Alphabet, the consonant IPA is shown in the diagram to the left. This is a great tool for us teachers who haven’t studied voice. What is also great about this chapter is that it shows some exercises that we can show our students and help them through. The image to the right is a “Forward Tongue Exercise.” The exercises are explained in the book and the images are present for each one.

Slide 17: Expression – This chapter is another one of my favorites. This chapter covers a number of different topics on expression such as, phrasing, dynamics, and tempo. In the images on the slide is a diagram of dynamic levels and tempo markings with their meanings in Italian. I believe it is important to post these in our music classrooms for our students to see. This will help them develop an appreciation for music long-term. 

Slide 18: Vocal-Technique Summary – This chapter gives the reader an “overview of each of the main areas of vocal development in the method: respiration, phonation, resonance, diction, and expression.” It is very brief and it is a great/simple explanation of each of the topics covered. In the photo on the slide is an example of a way we can keep a record of our students. It is implied in the book that we can rate our students out of 10 across from each exercise listed in the book.

Slide 19: Criticisms – The only criticism I have about this book is the lack of picture-imagery used in the first 5 chapters of the book. I understand that it is not always easy to use pictures, but they helped me understand in the last 7 chapters of the book what he was trying to explain. Pictures are a nice touch!

Slide 20: Conclusion – This is a GREAT book for choral teachers. Two things I really enjoyed were: at the beginning of each chapter they had a goal listed to remind us as readers what each chapter was supposed to help us with. The second thing I enjoyed was that at the end of each chapter they had “Study and Discussion Questions.” These questions remind us what we should be asking ourselves at the end of each lesson or practice. They remind us of the goal.

Phillips, K. H. (1992). Teaching kids to sing. New York: Schirmer Books.