"New" Timberliners' Songs

The RoseCity Timberliners Chorus, that I have the honor of directing, has just premiered three songs in their song set.

The jaunty song "Harmony Leads the Way" simply asserts that music and harmony can bring a better world,  but doesn't give much evidence, so it takes other songs to make the point.  With [bass pickups] and (other guys), the words are:

[One way to live](One way to live), one way to be.
[We are one}(One people joined) in perfect harmony.
*[For ev-ry race](For ev'ry race) for ev'ry creed,
[Yes indeed](for what we need) is perfect harmony.
Arm in arm and heart to heart, soul with soul right from the start.
*[Let it begin](Let it begin) with you and me.
[We'll create](We will create) a world of harmony.
Harmony leads the way, a lifelong cabaret,
Ev'ry day's a harmony holiday.   :||
Ev'ry day's a harmony holiday. Harmony leads the way.

When we :|| repeat from the beginning and sing "loo" between the stars *, our EmCee says:

    "Joined in Harmony" is a pretty good description of folks getting along despite their differences. We barbershop singers make harmony with each other every time we get together. And we make harmony with all you folks when we sing together. So let's make harmony.

"Amazing Grace" was the 1779 result of British sailor and slave-trader John Newton's epiphany in 1748.  He set aside that life in 1755 to join the clergy.    Truly, "a wretch like me, I once was lost."

"Battle Hymn of the Republic" started as a anonymous camp meeting song around 1850 as "O, Brothers will you meet me... on Canaan's happy shore", later gathering a "Glory, Glory, hallelujah" chorus.   The tune became a US. Civil war marching song  as "John Brown's body lies a-mouldring in the grave...his soul is marching on" with every regiment adding lyrics of their own.  The song still keeps getting new lyrics.   You might have heard "John Brown's baby has a cold upon its chest", or "I wear my pink pajamas", or any one of a dozen variations that sports teams use, but the best-known nowadays is Julia Howe's lyrics written in 1861 after hearing the soldier's ditty on the request the regiment chaplain.   That tune still keeps bringing people together. 


The long 24 song set still includes "In the Good Old Summertime" and "God Bless America" and "Darkness on the Delta" with histories that are only a little less interesting, but are pure Americana.


We're just starting to learn the classic 1939 tune "(Somewhere) Over the Rainbow".   Our performance will be more like the Oscar winning song Judy Garland song in "Wizard of Oz" than the medal-winning "Second Edition" quartet" performance, and completely unlike Israel Kamakainwo'ole's 2010 platinum rendition because it's more familiar and easier to learn and sing.    We might even premiere it in 2017.

Timberliners Yuletide 2016

The Rose City Timberliners  Chorus does sixteen performances this December.   The guys wear a colorful collection of winter sweaters, vests, scarves, red hats, and even antlers as they travel all over the Greater Portland area with half-hour and hour concerts of Yuletide favorites. 

Winter 2014 Timberliners

Hear them in a lovely public setting 7 pm SUNDAY, DECEMBER 18 at

The Grotto Festival of Lights

8840 NE Skidmore, Portland Oregon

It's not too late to invite this group to your event.  Merry Christmas!

I Heard the Bells.

Here are the Lyrics:
"I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day"  1867
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882)

I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day
Their old familiar carols play,
And wild and sweet the words repeat
Of peace on earth, good will to men.

I thought how, as the day had come,
The belfries of all Christendom
Had rolled along the unbroken song
Of peace on earth, good will to men.

And in despair I bowed my head:
"There is no peace on earth," I said,
"For hate is strong and mocks the song
Of peace on earth, good will to men."

Then pealed the bells more loud and deep:
"God is not dead, nor doth he sleep;
The wrong shall fail, the right prevail,
With peace on earth, good will to men."

Till, ringing singing, on its way,
The world revolved from night to day,
A voice, a chime, a chant sublime,
Of peace on earth, good will to men!

I love this song for several reasons:

Every verse takes a different mood, as the author takes an emotional journey through observation, cogitation, rejection, recognition and revelation.   Henry felt real emotions when writing this on Christmas day 1863:  He still bore physical and emotional scars from a 1861 fire that killed his wife Frances, when he heard that his soldier son Charlie had been badly (possibly fatally) wounded in November 1863 in the US Civil war that Henry did not support.  In reading or singing the words, every verse takes a different tone, speed and feeling while still repeating (like the bells) the words "Peace on Earth, good will to men".

Several very good composers have written melodies to the poem.   Johnny Marks has a version of it, written alongside the songs he wrote for the 1964 stop-motion "Rudolph the Red Nose Reindeer".  It it was not included in the TV production, but it is often recorded beautifully by solo singers from Bing Crosby above   to Rockapella. 

The melody and harmony in the "Yuletide Favorites" book (without all the lyrics, thus this post) was made in 1872 when the British church organist and composer John Baptiste Calkin discovered that a melody he'd written in 1848 named "Waltham" fit the poem flawlessly.  His music is found across England and back to the USA in many hymn-books.   Choirs and congregations still use Calkin's melody.


 
The Timberliner's Chorus  will add this song to their Yuletide repertoire for 2012.  We already own copies, the harmonies are well-suited to barbershop style, and I'm especially fond of the "mu" chord first heard on the word "wild".

Barbershop vs Opera

Letter in my inbox:

I'm having vocal difficulty while singing Barbershop Tenor or Lead. I sing flat sometimes, and it really bothers me just how fast that I can drop in pitch. I struggle with it constantly. It's one of the main things that we're working on in my vocal training. Also, my voice cracks a lot more than it use to. We're working on that too.

Should I go back to singing tenor? or Lead? or not at all? I'm told that I should not push at all in barbershop tenor. I'm not sure that style of singing is compatible with my classical training. I love classical singing, but I also love barbershop. My voice teachers think that my voice is better suited for classical. I want to make myself happy, but I love to make others happy as well.

Yours, T.

They are right: you do not push at all singing barbershop tenor... or any other part, either. It strains the muscles and sound, is not pleasant, and often under pitch. You hear singers doing that in both styles of music, and it's unpleasant in both.

Yes, I do sing both classical and barbershop, and do well at both. The "Do Not Strain" rule is true in both classical and barbershop. so is "Beauty At All Costs." You have to make them come true for yourself. No director or coach can MAKE you do it. They can remind you, yes, but you still, every note, have to do it yourself.

I see only a few reasons to choose one style over the other. One is what suits your personal voice best. Luciano Pavarotti is a fabulous opera tenor. That voice as barbershop tenor, or even lead would not be a good fit. There is also the matter of availability of opportunities and competition for performing spots in your area: If you have many opportunities to sing and perform in one role and few in another, that will be a factor on what to chose. Another reason is time. Every minute you are working on barbershop tenor, you are not learning classical or operatic literature and technique. You might only have the time to master one. Which do you chose? What fits best. If you have all the time you want, do both.

Yes, there are different techniques... you have to consciously shift back and forth - chest, head, heavy, light, full, falsetto - between styles and within styles. Do both? Sure. just realize it's two separate studies with much in common and some at odds. Keep them straight, you will do fine.

The last part - you need NOT make a permanent decision. Ever. Try both. Try one. Try neither. Change you mind. It's all good. What makes you happiest? What makes more of everyone else on the planet happiest? If you make a wrong choice, as long as you don't burn any bridges, all is well.

Yours, Gary Shannon
I teach online voice lessons! www.voice-mentor.com My passion: Your art.

Power Quartetting

This in my inbox:

Have you ever thought that it would be a lot of fun to learn and sing
such challenging songs as "South Rampart Street Parade" (Westminster),

"You Don't, You Won't" (Crossroads)



or even "Eine Kleine NOT Musik"(Gas House Gang)?


If this kind of challenge inspires you, you could be
the caliber of singer that would enjoy the Power Quartetting weekend.
Check it out at http://www.powerqt.com/portland/

 From: "Harry Buerer" hbuerer@spiritone.com hfbuerer
Date: Wed Jan 26, 2011 4:29 pm ((PST))

Portland Power Quartetting weekend June 3-4, 2011

2120 NE Tillamook St. Portland OR

Harmonic Vocabulary

Dear Hal,

You raised a fabulous question I've been chewing on: "dumbing down arrangements", especially on "Almost". Since I write in a lot of styles, it's a conscious choice for me, and I'll explain why:

it's a matter of using a vocabulary your audience understands.

If the audience was just you and me, for example, we could sing 12-tone rows and poly-chordal arrangements, and groove on those. I've written some of those. Contemporary acapella lovers can go pretty far afield with nameless chords, poly-rhythms and hair-pin changes of style - if that's your audience, you write for them. I suppose the far extreme might be cartoon character Hank (King of the) Hill saying "I like both kinds of music, country AND western." - for Hank's ilk, you don't even sing a 6th chord because they'd hear those chords as "errors"

Kinda like singing in Latin or French - right for the right crowd & wrong for the wrong crowd - depends on how well your audience knows the vocabulary by the time you are done.

Now consider what little we know of the judges of the Forest Grove Barbershop Ballad competition and the opinions of the coach we had who has judged that event. Recall in "Nose to Nose" that his ear objected to the no-fifth chord at the end and wanted a full chord. In "Wink", one sixteenth note of an open fifth chord ("old jalopy") needed a third to be fixed, and we did it and will do it. But this gives us a strong clues on what vocabulary his barbershop audience will understand - and it doesn't include 2 note chords. By extrapolation, most of the audiences we will have will understand BBS style, since our agent Tom's contacts are in that world.

"Almost" uses vocabulary the barbershop crowd will ALMOST but not quite understand: open fifth beginning, (to that ear, making our first sound to sound "wrong") major 7 9 6 chords in tag ("al-most like"), and the swipe ending the intro.

Generally, the mutually exclusive alternatives are:

• present and teach a new language entertainingly.
• let the audience dislike what you are doing.
• cater to the audience's familiarities
  

For this barbershop competition, the choices are

1. re-arrange the tune to the style (I don't like the idea - the arrangement we have has it's own quirky charm, and I personally LIKE those quirks, so we use it in less judgmental moments in performance)
2. accept the distrust the audience will give us by doing it the way we like, but hopefully redeeming ourselves by educating those ears to a new vocabulary (Don't like this risky plan, either) or
3. choose a different tune for that audience.

Simplest and most respectful answer: choose a different tune.

Yours, Gary