ISLAND CITY CHORUS

GREATER MONTREAL CHAPTER

SPEBSQSA Inc.

The Little Chorus that could!

MINI PITCH

Date: January 6, 2003

It is a mystery, but the date of the March Show is changed back to March 29, to accommodate our Director and we are looking for a guest quartet. Unfortunately, The Gas House Gang are not available on the 29^th.

We have a hall, a director and hopefully we will be able to find a quartet, all available on March 29, 2003.

Stay tuned in the meantime.

Work continues on the preparations for the International Convention taking place in a little over six months from now.

We are starting to accumulate the reserve of volunteers needed to make this a successful convention. If you know of any former members, friends and acquaintances who would like to see an International Convention from the inside, we can offer them a fun week and a souvenir golf shirt for their time and effort.

[From an announcement on the Harmonet] Mark your calendars now for Tuesday, July 1, 2003 (Canada Day!). Hopefully many of you are familiar with Rockapella, the 5 man a cappella ensemble.

Joining them on the stage of the Bell Centre will be the Gas House Gang, celebrating their tenth anniversary of winning their gold medals in Calgary. The Gang will be doing a full show set of your favourites, as well as some new stuff. We're proud to have one of the best singing and entertaining quartets in the Society join us for our benefit show.

If that weren't enough, opening the show will be a new quartet that doesn't even have a name yet. You probably won't care what they call themselves after you hear who's in the group. Do the names Greg Clancy, Tony DeRosa, Gary Lewis, and Jeff Oxley singing together pique your curiosity? Join us for their first international performance (but definitely not their last....).

As last year, tickets will be priced at $35 and $25. In addition there will be a limited number of $75 VIP seats (best in the house) that will include a post-concert reception with all the performers. Order forms will be in the March Harmonizer.

A portion of your ticket price will be a tax-deductible contribution to Harmony Foundation, the fund raising wing of the Society. Proceeds from the concert will help fund Society programs aimed at preserving our four part Barbershop musical legacy. What a great idea... a wonderful concert with proceeds going to help preserve our hobby!

Need a really effective way to assess how well each person in your chorus or quartet knows the notes, words, rhythms and breathing plan of a song, and how much vocal artistry they display? Let's be honest. Often we play a game of hide and seek with this. We hide the bits that we don't know so well and the chorus director and music team have the job of seeking out the mistakes and correcting them. Peer Note Checking puts the responsibility for notes and words squarely where it needs to belong: with us; the singers! Here's how it works:

When we are the checkers, we are listening for both accuracy and artistry. Any incorrect note, word, rhythm or breath is counted as an error. (Note that breaths in a "staggered" section are only considered errors if they come in an obvious place, such as the end of a phrase.) The scoring is handled as follows:

• 5. Artistic - no errors of any kind, and your friends would pay money to hear this person sing solo.
• 4. Perfect - there are absolutely no note, word, rhythm or breathing errors
• 3. Good - there are a small number of errors, perhaps less than five
• 2. Passable - there are quite a few errors or one or two "trouble spots"
• 1. Trouble - there are many errors, or the person doesn't know the song very well
• 0. Default - the person is unable to sing the song

• We listen to tapes we have recorded. We use the 4 + 4 + 1 method. We do what we know works for us.
• Now it's PNC time; time to find out what, if anything, we have missed, so that we can do the best possible job of singing our part.

• We gather a small group, at least three, who know the music or can accurately read it as another sings. Perhaps all the group wants to take a turn at getting checked.
• The checkers get the singer's music and make notations on it while it is sung to them by memory.
• The checkers use the singer's music to show the singer any errors that have been made and a score is agreed upon.
• The names, songs and scores are entered into the Peer Note Check Form. (Copies will be made available, if the chorus wants to try this out!) The score sheet is submitted to the Chapter VP for Music and Performance or his designate who keeps a record for the purposes determined by the music team.

• We can use the information to qualify members to sing for different events
• We can design specific help for individuals who need it
• We can simply provide feedback to the singer, asking him to reach a certain level of proficiency for the good of the group

Here is our current and future repertoire list:

Practice is something we do at home, every day, between rehearsals!

Rehearsal is where we reinforce what we have been practising every day!