We Are In the Listening Business
WE ARE IN THE LISTENING BUSINESS
Let’s face it people, we are in the listening business. In order to be great singers, we have to listen all the time. And I’m sure you understand there is a big difference between listening and hearing. Hearing is just the main physical activity where sound is processed into your brain. Listening is actively processing that sound for content.
To what should you be listening? How about…
-The director
-The tonal center
-The singers around you
-The vowel shape (formant)
-Entrances and cutoffs
-Music you love
-Music you don’t love
-Music you don’t know
-Music you on which you are currently working in your choir
-Other groups like yours
-Multiple versions of the same song: multiple ensembles performing the same song in the same style or the same song covered in different genres
-Static noises around you like the refrigerator, the air conditioner, the beep beep of a truck backing up, or even the fire alarm. Can you harmonize with them?
-Groups better than yours for inspiration
-Groups worse than yours for perspective
I used to sing in a barbershop quartet, and we were coached by a woman named Jean Barford. Before she would coach us, she would listen to CDs of champion quartets. She told us she was calibrating her ears.
Choir Bites Interactive Slides can enhance online/hybrid lesson plans or be used as supplemental assignments. Your singers’ awareness will rise as they engage with these simple, “sticky” concepts! Click here to learn more!
That’s what listening is. We take in information through our ears, analyze it, and use the processed data to improve what we do. We’re not just calibrating our ears, we’re calibrating our musicianship. We’re calibrating ourselves.
