Rudsamblog

Ollie will be at the Wexlers next Monday and Tuesday [27 and 28 July] for extra practice. Let him know if you'll make it. And PLEASE come to all rehearsals even if you aren't singing at the next concert as, apart from the wedding or a specific event, much of the repertoire we are learning will be sung at other concerts. Holidays now over [unless you're about to go!] so please make every effort to be at the next 2/3 rehearsals for the wedding and St Giles. And DON'T ring/text Ollie 5 minutes before the rehearsal to say you can't make it , unless you are suddenly ill or car emergency etc. It p......es him off, understandably! There is a calendar for known absences. OK, nag over.

Thanks to Jenny for a fun animal and tongue-waggling warm-up!! Do we have a volunteer for notes next week?

1. Wedding -Sat 8 August, St Brigid's Church, Newmains, Wishaw. G42 OJN.

I have Rachael and AnnaLauren as NOT singing. Is this correct?

The hymns are now as on the attached sheet, ie Lord of all hopefulness, Colours of day dawn and I watch the sunrise. Ollie will get copies of the first 2 of these -you have I watch the sunrise. So destroy the copies you took 2 weeks ago, = Abide with me, and Take our bread, we aren't singing them. The responsorial psalm is Love is his word [we are checking as this doesn't seem like a psalm to us traditionalists!]

We are singing in the gallery. We will sing a variety of music from 12:50 for 10 minutes before the wedding, all from the August St Giles repertoire [see Ollie's recent email] so bring it all in case the bride is 20 minutes late. The most likely and first to be sung will be the Gorecki lullaby [Usnijze mi, usnij], Dieu! qu'il la fait, En une seule fleur and The Spring time of the year. When Douglas and his daughter arrive we will sing Take my Hand [Wedding song -Sheena and Peter].

During the signing of the register Helen will sing Ave Maria with me on piano [Ollie is checking whether there is one in the church] or organ or keyboard [or possibly all 3 at once!].
HELEN: Google Ave maria gratia plena lyrics and you will find a Latin version with Andrea Bocelli singing it. Latin score also found, see separate email to you and Ollie].

Then we all sing the Irish Blessing.

Those travelling with me or Helen will need to be at the church for 11am so we can practise the Ave Maria. Others should arrive by 11:30am. Allow about an hour to get there from central Edinburgh, more if you're picking up all over the place. Google maps say it's about 38 miles and 47 minutes from Morningside on the M8 then A73, or 33 miles and 56 minutes if you use the A71. We'll try to take full cars and Douglas has given me money for petrol so keep a note of your mileage.

There will be a short break to eat a sandwich before we sing at 12:50 [or make a drink if you're there early] so bring your own food, drink etc. There is a kitchen where there is a kettle but bring your own supplies.

We will sort out lifts next week. NB the Wexlers may not make it so we'll organise lifts accordingly.

2. Rehearsal

Yes, we did do quite a bit of singing after sorting out all the above! We ran though the psalm and hymn - I watch the sunrise. Ollie to confirm whether it's unison or harmony [for the altos, on the version we have].

Ollie then took the men to rehearse the MONTEVERDI [Sfogava] and the women all tried to sing AVE MARIA from my one copy. All quickly agreed that it would be much better sung as a solo by Helen! So that gets us off the hook, much to Helen's delight [??]

I then took the men aside to play with their parts [some of us get all the best jobs].....in NACHT UBER MOSKAU.
The main issues were the German. Remember "v" is always "f" [eg von is fon], "d" at the end of a word is often "t" [eg "wird"], "z" is always "ts" eg "Zauber", "s" sounds like "z" in many words, eg Sonne, Einsam, so....Geh'n is not as in the English diphthong "gay" but a cleaner sound more like a French é.

Sebastian says we should sing it a bit OTT , full Russian sound but with tongue in cheek!

Meanwhile the women were with Ollie on their TORMIS swings. As I missed most of this, just make sure you know your parts!

We warmed up with Thuma mina

• Twice through each verse.
• Straight on - no fermata - from the end of the line back to the beginning every time until the very last.
• As suggested on the printed music, tenors and basses can do "rhythmic improvisations" instead of singing their lines as written.
• During the last minim of the second time through each verse, Sebastian will give us a lead with the first word of the next verse.

We then had an extended notebashing session.

Akanamandla

• We are going to move from Thuma mina straight into Akanamandla, and to simplify things we will probably sing Akanamandla in F (same as Thuma mina) rather than A.
• Twice through each verse.
• At the end of each repetition except the very last, no fermata, and definitely no use of the coda bar marked with the segno. Observe the repeat marking back to the beginning every time. The coda bar is for the very end of the whole piece.
• Stick to the rhythm as written, with all its syncopations. Resist the temptation to sing the syllables of "Haleluya" on the beat.
  

Sfogava con le stelle

We notebashed as far as bar 35. There's not much more to say, except that Ollie is taking full advantage of the freedom granted by the parlante markings to sing those bars with natural speech rhythms.

Sopranos and altos then worked on another Tormis piece, Kiigel kartlik
I have nothing to report, except that it sounded great when they came back and sang it to us.

In the mean time, tenors and basses did some more work on Sfogava, and then sang a few times through their lines of Holy Thursday.

We also had a hand-out of music for Douglas' daughter's wedding: three hymns, for which I think we are required to sing the melody line in unison

• I watch the sunrise
• Abide with me
• Take our bread

and what is described as a responsorial psalm

• Love is his word