So I know all of you have been rabidly hungering for another of my riveting displays of wittiness, but alas, these lovely strings of works have been far out of reach over the past...very long time. So to all my beautiful readers (all five of you) you must know this: it is quite difficult to just whip one of these up out of nowhere, and that in order for this whipping up of these to occur, an event consisting of acceptable magnitude, humor, and not-being-difficult-to-criticize-ness also has to occur within a time period of, at most, 48 hours beforehand. And the whipping up must take an extensive time of intense care in my work, even more intense editing, about an hour of fearing my composition's inadequacy, and then a few seconds of concern for the feelings of people I probably offended (actually that only refers to my last blog post, which I'm not even really sorry for) before I can muster up the courage to finally log in and post it.
And sometimes I forget my password, which slows the production chain down a bit.
Also, I've been sick, and I have a lot of homework and tests and Christmas concerts and rehearsals for Christmas concerts and practicing music for Christmas concerts and OF COURSE running through the venue during a cue to cue of the Christmas concerts without falling and breaking my nose. And for the sake of those readers who are my mother, let me just say that I also locked myself out of my room, which has all of my books I need to study inside of it, which is why I am writing this. Not that I really need to study because she did such a wonderful job homeschooling me.
I love you.
So speaking of Christmas concerts, I have one this weekend, and the people in charge have almost sold out two shows. That's 9000 people who are PAYING to see a lot of college kids execute the musical phenomenon that is choreography, also known as the flailing of the arms to a rhythm. It is also possible that they will hear us sing, if we can force down our coughs for long enough. Some of us also get to hold plastic candles. That should be a real treat.
But being completely honest, I really enjoy Christmas concerts. You can learn a lot from them. For instance, there are about a hundred and twelve different ways to express the birth of the Messiah. "The first noel the angel did say!" "Lo how a rose e'er blooming!" "De virgin Mary had a baby boy!" "You'll go down in history, like Columbus!" They are also good ways to reconnect with your family without having to spend gas money. (And by that I mean your gas money. They should be happy to blow theirs on something other than your tuition.) The best part about Christmas concerts, though, is when they're over, and you can put another notch in your belt of how many Christmas concerts you've sung in. It gives you a lot more prestige in the wonderful world of choir and such.
Which brings me to this. Today I realized, while trying to write a facebook status,
[DISCLAIMER. Facebook statuses take up way too much of my life. They are not merely an expression of "what's on my mind," but a measurement of my social life. And my standards are way too high. For example, if a status does not have at least ten "likes," reread and consider deletion. I have a problem.
DISCLAIMER FOR THE DISCLAIMER: I've already blogged about this.]
that even though there are a lot of things that bother me about choir, and it goes against many aspects of my personality and is honestly something really random for a biology major to be involved in, it has become so integrated and fused to my being that not being stressed over a Christmas conert is more unnatural than becoming sick because of one. I've been in choir for about six years, if you don't count singing in little baby choir when I was...a little baby. Which is why I have compiled this list (we're just getting to the list NOW?! That's one heck of an introduction!!) of things that I have discovered during my first year of college choir. Oddly enough, you might recognize some of them, and should probably be embarrassed if you do. Well. Maybe. It might just be me.
YOU KNOW YOU'VE BEEN IN CHOIR TOO LONG IF...
1. You're learning your fourth arrangement of a song.
This summer, I got a batch of music and voice parts, and I realized that not only did I already know one of the pieces, but I knew other versions of it as well. I'm actually not sure why I found that strange. Maybe because I had never really considered the idea that being in a musical group for all of middle school and part of high school could actually be pertinent to my undergraduate choral adventures. Or maybe I was bothered by the song the first time and was wondering why directors liked it so much. It's called "How Can I Keep from Singing," and with a few years of experience under the right conditions, the answer to that question will become very clear to you.
2. You know the song already, but not the voice part.
This happens most often during Handel's (in)famous "Hallelujah Chorus." I hear worried people all the time saying, "I DON'T KNOW WHAT PART TO SING BECAUSE LAST YEAR I LEARNED THE SOPRANO BUT NOW I'M AN ALTO AND I DON'T KNOW WHAT TO DO BECAUSE THIS SONG SAYS THE SAME THING 80 TIMES SO I DIDN'T LEARN IT THE FIRST TIME ANYWAY." And I concur! The best approach is just to pick a part and sing it, no matter where your director puts you, because it will be different every year. Which brings me to my next point...
3. You don't know what voice part you are.*
This is actually the opposite of what you might think. You would guess that someone with 6+ years of experience would be able to say something like, "Oh yeah, I'm a baritone." But you, in fact, are wrong. The ranges of different voice parts actually overlap enough that you can be put one above or below pretty easily. So using math, I can say that since the more recent voice parts I've sung were Soprano 2 and Alto 2, I'm probably an Alto 1. But a lot of people think I'm a soprano. And I could probably carry a tenor part if the planet was counting on me to release it from some sort of music-depraved tyranny. So there's really no way of telling.
Sometimes, during my junior year in high school, I snuck over to the other side of the class where the altos sat and sang their part instead.
4. You know jokes about other voice parts. Or just sopranos.
What's the difference between a soprano and an alto?
An alto can read music.
What's the difference between a soprano and a howler monkey?
Lipstick.
What's a soprano's best excuse for escaping an awkward conversation?
Vocal rest. (That one I made up, but it's actually true.)
5. You've used vocal rest as an excuse to escape an awkward conversation.
And now you can never use it again.
6. You've walked into a concert venue panicking because you're late, and suddenly realized that this isn't the first panic attack you've had in this hallway.
This is a semi-creepy way of saying you've used the same location for a concert before and didn't realize it until being smacked in the face by deja vu. Which is actually what happened to me today, and inspired this post. Basically, after running back and forth through the same hall trying to figure out how the HECK to get onto the balcony, I realized, not only did I know how to get onto the balcony, but I probably knew the building better than 85% of the people there. And every other building around. I'd eaten in some of them, slept in some of them, changed in some of them, and sung in most of them. It's a weird feeling, walking past a bathroom that looks oddly familiar and thinking, "Hey... I peed in there!"
7. Guys in tuxes don't phase you.
There comes a point after being around guys in collared shirts and ties for days and then guys in coat tails and cummerbunds for days and even guys in snazzy gray suits with purple ties (which definitely takes the cake in the awesome choir outfit category) that even if a guy has his bow tie straight, is working his tux like nobody's business, and is holding himself with a poise that matches and even surpasses the intensity and class of the outfit he's wearing...
...no one cares.
8. You refuse to sing the melody.
If you hear a song on the radio you know, harmonize. If you hear a song on the radio you don't know, harmonize. If you sing a song in church and you absolutely must, sing the octave. No...actually that's no good either; try a third above. Singing the melody is not just the easy way out. It's sign of weakness.
9. Your current choir director's wife was your director's accompanist in eighth grade, you sit with their daughter, who was also in your choir in eighth grade, in chemistry, and almost all your male friends are in your brother choir, which is under the direction of your high school choir director's choir director, because you randomly ended up going to the same college as he did.
And you're not even a music major.
*voice parts for the musically uneducated:
Soprano 1- squeaky high women's part
Soprano 2- moderately high women's part
Alto 1- every Disney princess, ever.
Alto 2- manly women's part.
Tenor 1- really manly women's part, or sometimes men.
Tenor 2- normal famous person's range.
Baritone- indecisive man's part.
Bass- people who talk so low you can't even understand them.
