Huh? I couldn’t believe my ears. So I perked up and listened more intently.

He explained that during rehearsals, it is the job of the director and music team to teach the members each song, such as the dynamics, interpretive plan, and mood. It is in the learning stage that the singers must depend on the director.

However, as we approach performance time – and here’s the part that hit me right between the eyes – the job of a music director is to get out of the way and let the singers sing.

Wow! Could that be why I sensed that the guys are not singing with confidence? I’m good at the teaching part, but haven’t been so good at the letting go part. So I took his advice back to my chorus, and decided to make a change.

I am my own road block

Some members of my chorus had confided in me that they were not confident in the songs in last year’s show. My first reaction was to somehow blame them. After all, I was confident. I was prepared. It must be their fault. I couldn’t have been more wrong.

Once I explained that I was going to gradually step back as the learning phase moved into the performance phase, the guys began to realize that it was up to them to carry the song. There were some nerves and uncertainty, sure. But after a while, they knew that I meant it. I could hear them slowly take command of each song. I could hear them start to rely on each other more. In short, they started to “own” the songs. Is this what confidence sounds like?

Wean Thee of Me

It makes sense. The more that I empower the members to take control of the music, the more each song becomes theirs. After all, the director makes no sound! In rehearsal, I am the director. On stage, I am the facilitator – helping to start and stop the sound, and to assist in the interpretive plan of the music. The rest is all theirs.

Thank you, Dr. Drummond, for waking me up. What I learned is this: When singers take hold of a song and I get out of the way, beautiful things happen. My chorus is proof, and I couldn’t be more proud.

I realized that we sang the notes and words, but didn’t sing the songs! There was no soul in the music. One look in the mirror and I saw the reason.

Getting out of the way

In Director’s College this past August, I was instructed to turn the ownership of the music to the singers. During rehearsals, I am the director. The singers depend on me to convey how I want a song performed. At the same time, I must also encourage the chorus to take ownership of the music so they don’t depend on me on stage.

We barbershoppers drill on techniques, practice our breathing and vowel targets, do vocal exercises, and rehearse the choreography. Perhaps we don’t spend enough time on teaching how to sing with soul. I know I haven’t, but that will change.

To me, singing with soul means to first be able to understand what the music is trying to say. Then the singers must have the ability and training to convey that feeling through the voice, tone, body, and energy.

This crystallized for me today while listening to some very beautiful polyphonic chants on my local classical radio station. I realized that, although the harmonics were lovely and the singing accurate, there was no emotion in the sound.

We barbershoppers have the opportunity to sing with emotion, to sing with soul. I will not pass up another chance to train my singers in this valuable tool. Rehearsals are so much more than learning notes and words. Rehearsals are for finding the soul of the music and sharing it with the audience.

To be honest, I think singers often throw their music into the back seat of the car after rehearsal and then forget about it until the next rehearsal. I can tell which singers do this because I have to remind them of the same issues week after week. What singers fail to realize is that people around them know when you haven’t memorized your music. The audience knows, too.

Muddied sound

In many instances, there’s a split second time lag when the singer, who didn’t take the time to learn the music, leans on the singer who did. The result is a muddied sound. In extreme circumstances, a section or the entire chorus can forget the correct notes and words on stage. It’s as if a school of fish spontaneously turns in unison and goes in a different direction. I refer to this as a brain fart, and the few seconds that it takes to recover are excruciating. Nobody, especially the director, feels good about that.

It occurs to me that singers don’t instinctively know how to get off the music. I asked the MountainAires Music and Performance Committee for suggestions, and here is what some of them said.

• Use the “one hour” rule – Take at least ten minutes a day, six days a week, to study your music.
• Write out the words either on paper or on a computer. Writing out the words can reveal some patterns in the lyrics that can make memorization easier.
• Set expectations for each song. When a song is introduced, set a realistic date in the future when that music must be committed to memory.
• Let the singers know what you expect of them, and then “act as if . . . until.”

This last bullet point is difficult for a lot of volunteer singers. I once left a community choir because the music director wasted precious rehearsal time going over the same material covered in previous weeks. When I asked why, he said he didn’t want to set expectations because members of an all-volunteer choir might revolt if pushed too hard. What he failed to realize is that, by not setting expectations and following through on them, those who work on their music feel held back by those who don’t. Managing to the lowest common denominator is not always the best approach, and can be detrimental to the vitality of the group.

But how do you strike the proper balance between pushing too hard or not at all? What is the middle path? If you have some suggestions, please add a comment to this post. You’ll need to register to make a comment as a means to minimize blog spam, but I’ll approve your registration quickly. We all could benefit from your experience and ideas.

I was once a member of a male/female chorale. I got frustrated when the director continually went over the same material week after week. When I asked him why, he said that it was all he could expect from a mostly volunteer group of singers. As a director myself, I don’t buy that.

How many times have you sat through the same repetitive instructions, or heard the director remind the members how to sing a particular word or phrase? How many times has a director stopped a song in mid-phrase, only to reiterate a lesson we’ve supposedly learned during the warm-up?

I have two suggestions to fix this. First, make sure that you are not contributing to the problem. What I mean by this is we all need to take responsibility to learn the correct notes, words, phrases, breathing, expression, and everything else that goes into a song. Study your music between rehearsals. If you have trouble reading music, get learning tapes or CDs to guide you. Ask your section leader for assistance. Be proactive.

You’ve heard the expression, “A chain is only as strong as its weakest link.” Applied to singing, a section or chorus is only as good as its weakest member. Do everything in your power to ensure that YOU are not that weakest member!

Secondly, once you have mastered the first suggestion, then and only then are you in a position to offer to help others if needed. We are a brotherhood or sisterhood of singers, and we achieve together. Criticizing or complaining only fosters unrest. Make a positive difference. Lead by example.

In my chapter, I have asked each member to recite a “pledge” at the beginning of rehearsals. It goes like this: “I pledge that I will be a better singer when I leave tonight than when I came into rehearsal.” This pledge is especially powerful if you grasp its underlying message: It is up to ME to become that better singer! I need to apply the lessons. I need to do the work. I need to do things differently in order to improve. No one else is going to do it for me.

Whether you are in a competition chorus or not, whether you have 100 members or 10 in your chapter, the truth is still the same. Take responsibility to be the best singer that you can be, every week, every rehearsal, every song you sing.