New Year's Eve at the Virginia (part five)

The annual New Year's Eve concert at the Virginia Theater in downtown Champaign, Illinois, isn't like anything else that happens all year. This year's concert packed itself into a trim two-and-a-half hours and contained choral and solo singing, instrumental solos and accompaniment, colorful commentary and jokes, audience participation, a pretty full house, and plenty of time to go celebrate the New Year afterward unless you just wanted to go home and sleep.

Before the show begins I play the Wurlitzer for 15-minutes. The Virginia is an old Vaudeville Theater which was built in the early 1920s and boasts a theater organ dating from the same time. Like the Theater itself, it had fallen into disrepair and been kept going on wings and prayers, or in the case of the organ, rubber bands and duct tape. The organ owes its continued existence to two gentlemen, the last of whom, Warren York, played the organ at this concert until the year before I started doing it. He was a beloved figure in our town, along with Dan Perino, who led the second half singalong into a couple of years ago. Both gentlemen have passed away. Warren York used to always wear red socks, which is why I wear them every year in tribute. Last year after he died the entire men's section of the Chorale wore them as well!

Unfortunately I can't seem to find any pictures of the Wurlitzer. I tried taking one myself--at the concert--you can imagine it didn't look like anything! The Wurlitzer has recently been restored by the Buzard Pipe Organ company of Champaign, Illinois, and looks and sounds great.

The concert is bookended by the 70-voice Chorale singing sets of a half-dozen pieces. In between, guest artists fill in with songs and instrumental music, and the audience gets to join in with the popular sing-along.

This year I was one of the guests. I played about half-an-hour of piano solo music of the lighter variety. In addition to the Grand Sonata in Rag which I've been discussing in other posts in this series, I played Gottschalk's "Union" and a little novelty piece called "Nola." One of our former college scholarship winners, Caitlin Caruso-Dobbs, returned to sing Irving Berlin's "Alexander's Ragtime Band," "My White Knight" from  The Music Man, and "The Girl in 14G." I was also the accompanist for her.. Since I double as The Chorale's regular accompanist as well, that meant that I was on the stage or in the pit for the entire concert, playing everything. Since the concert began at 7 and finished up at 9:30 (minus the 20-minute intermission plus 15 minutes before on the Wurlitzer and also 5 minute before the second half also at the Wurlitzer) I spent 2 and a half hours in concert. No wonder I'm still a little tired! I told someone backstage that I had set a new record that I wasn't planning to beat.

The Chorale usually goes "American" for this concert, and this year was no exception. We began with a very intriguing arrangement of "Take Me Out to the Ballgame" by David Dusing, which was introduced by real-life radio man Jeff Bossert (who sings with us). We were then joined by a fellow named Josh on the harmonica, the first time either of us had collaborated with the other instrument. The occasion was Mark Hayes's arrangement of "Home on the Range." We then sang arrangements of "the Lonesome Dove" before concluding with a Gershwin pairing of "I've Got Rhythm" and "The Real American Folk Song is a Rag" which introduced Caitlin's rendition of the Berlin and the Rag Sonata. Fade to intermission, complete with a harmonica player strolling the lobby and later some more grand sounds from the Mighty Wurlitzer.

The sing-along always features music from the 30s and 40s, which was a little before my time, and the words are projected on glass slides that date back to the early days of the Theater. Sometimes they also have wisecracks on them.

Eve Harwood leading the singalong

I often have to go to Youtube to familiarize myself with these songs. This year I was at the airport waiting for my flight home from Dallas, listening to them through headphones from my Android and writing them down on a stray piece of staff paper. I notated the melody, hinted at the chord structure, and away we went on Tuesday night!

I should mention here that I had my second pleasant sing-along experience of the holidays season (the first was at the 7 o'clock Christmas Eve service) where a large gathering of people know the tunes well and are obviously enjoying singing them. The first thing you realize as organist is that you don't have to play the melody very much, and that you can even not play at all for a few beats here and there, creating a real accompaniment part under the congregants because they really don't need any help from the organ to sing out and even if you use a healthy selection of stops you are only going to be the junior partner in the proceedings, which allows for more creativity as you simply soak up the sounds and add a little pizazz at intervals. It was terrific! (I also remembered not to look down from the hydraulic lift!)

On the second half, after Caitlynn's singing and my other two numbers, the Chorale came back to sing more Stephen Foster--Oh! Susanna, attractively arranged by our friend Alice Parker. Then came a haunting version of "Poor Wayfaring Stranger" by Michael Richardson (I think he has Illinois ties). Ed Harris's arrangement of "Bound for the Promised Land" uses the original minor key version of the tune. Then we finished off with rousing renditions of "Who Are the Brave?" and "America, the Dream Goes On."

We finish the concert every year by holding hands (both out in the audience and on the stage) and singing "Auld Lang Syne." We sing it through once, then the organ modulates up a half-step (although this year I discovered a small cipher on the low f#--that's when a note won't stop sounding--so I went up a whole step instead. I hope Warren York's spirit won't mind!). This year the ceiling at the Virginia has been refurbished so there wasn't any "snow" as we got to the final chord. And yes, I managed to get a picture of the warm and fuzzy moment, even if I had to play 8 bars with one hand to get it:

It's not much of a picture, but the moment was pretty special.
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This year one of the funnier moments occurred when the Chorale had just finished singing their first set. The curtain came down quickly and our director, who was going to introduce the singer, was trapped on the wrong side of it. There I sat at the piano, alone in front of the curtain, while a pregnant pause threatened the production. So I played the moment a little, looking wistfully into the wings and giving signs of being very alone at the piano with nobody else on stage. The audience laughed and the show went on after a few seconds. Apparently it was convincing because I was asked later if that was part of the show! Somebody else told me they realized that I am really a ham!

onward to part six, which, I believe, is nearly the end. Thanks for reading this far. Seriously.

New Year's Eve at the Virginia (part four)

I've been telling you about the piece I played at the concert this week. Let me interrupt the flow of my narrative for a bit to tell you about the concert itself.

The Chorale is a community choral organization that began over thirty years ago as a handful of persons cobbled together to sing Christmas carols in the town of Mahomet, north of here. Still under their founding director, Julie Beyler, they've since transmogrified into a group of about 70 rehearsing every Sunday night and giving three major concerts a year (with occasional additions). The first of these is always the first weekend in November; the second is on New Year's Eve at the Virginia Theater in downtown Champaign.

I should see "us" instead of them, because for nearly six years now I've been part of the group. I serve as the accompanist.

The New Year's Eve concert at the Virginia is an experience like no other. Read on, I'll show you!

To start with there is the dress rehearsal the evening before. It helps if you have done a few of these before because they require some patience. There is no tech rehearsal except at the dress so everything is being done at once. The Virginia is a pretty dry theater so the singers have trouble hearing each other and the piano, I have trouble hearing myself, and the monitors are very far away. The piano is generally overmiced at first so you have the impression that if you were to suddenly strike a loud chord you would blow up the stage! There is occasional feedback. Eventually they get the levels set and the feedback mostly goes away. We have to try to ignore all this and just get on with the business of rehearsing.

In addition to the sound, there is a visual feast going on as well--they are trying the lights. One moment the stage is all green, the next it is all blue, and then suddenly you can't see anything for a few bars. We've all gotten somehow adept at continuing to sing and play without being able to see anything. I think my favorite memories in this regard are from the year pianist Jacquieline Schwab was our guest. She has to be the nicest person I've ever shared a piano with, and in her polite New England way she kept jumping up from the piano bench with her arm in the air and addressing herself to the sound booth in the back of the hall saying, "um, excuse me,....ah, I can't see the keys!" I'll try to give you a vague idea of what all this looks like:

I didn't manage to take any with the lights out. The only reason for the existence of these is that I've developed a talent for being able to play with one hand while taking pictures with my cell phone! But I did get one with the spotlight on me. Like the others, it is a very tame-looking representation and in no way conveys the full sense of disorientation that accompanies this sensory burst:

Some of the other challenges include remembering not to look down when the Wurlitzer organ is at the top of the hydraulic lift, and not tripping on the stairs in total darkness while hurrying from the organ (which is in the pit) to the piano (which is on the stage). One also needs to have faith that there is indeed an audience during the two-and-a-half hour show as most of the time the theater is pitch black--only the stage is lit--and one is addressing total darkness.

I'll tell you about the performance next time.

Some concert!

Wow.

If you're dialing in from Saskatoon or Zanzibar or any other place that isn't Champaign-Urban Illinois, and you weren't in the audience of about 300 who packed First Methodist Church in Urbana last night to hear The Chorale perform it's annual Celebration of Life concert, you missed an event.

The Chorale sang 15 hymns and spirituals largely from arrangements by Alice Parker and Robert Shaw. Tenor Davion Williams, a former Chorale scholarship winner, sang three lively pieces by African-American composers. I played a set of pieces you can hear by checking out Friday's blog. We were led for most of the evening by a man Artistic Director Julie Beyler referred to as "our Principal Guest Conductor" since he has been with us now five times in the last decade, Dr. Craig Jessop. Dr. Jessop was the director of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir until 2008 and apparently doesn't mind conducting our "chamber ensemble" of a mere 70-80 members from time to time!

What can I say about this man? He has a pile of energy. I don't know where he gets it all, but it is certainly necessary when working with groups of that size. Even better, it radiates outward to the members of the ensemble and makes it seem we will never get tired and that there is no place we would rather be than right here right now making this glorious music. What a privilege!

Energy is all the more important because whenever we invite a guest clinician to work with us, which we do every 18-months, the group rehearses for a few hours on Friday night, all morning and afternoon on Saturday, then again Sunday afternoon for a couple hours, and the concert is in the evening. It is hard not to be exhausted by the time the concert begins, never mind when it is over, and those last two hours are of course when you'd like to be at your best. (By the way, I don't know what most folks do with their down time, but I usually have 4 church services to fit in there as well, and sometimes a wedding, too.) Until I actually see Dr. Jessop looking tired I'll not believe it.

This year's venture was a bit different than previous ones, and in some respects the load was lighter. We had no orchestra this year and all of our rehearsal time was spent directly with our guest. Not only was there no orchestra but most of the pieces were unaccompanied. I only played the organ for the final piece--the organ was actually positioned so I didn't have to cock my head at a funny angle to see the director or keep whispering to choir members to leave space so I could see the director. No, I had a straight ahead shot, which is a rarity. One of the two pieces with piano accompaniment was scored for piano duet so we invited a terrific accompanist from the university to join us. The rest of the evening was spent listening to the Chorale, seated at my usual premium position at the piano (although the sound is actually better in the back of the hall) and giving pitches. I remember after the first half being asked to take a bow and thinking I'd never actually taken applause for such a simple thing as giving pitches before.

Only it wasn't quite like that. I've been fortunate to work with several conductors who seem to worry about the boredom of their accompanist when the concert is filled with a cappella music and the accompanist's entire job is to play the opening chord for the choir a note at a time (bass, tenor, alto, soprano) and then sit and listen. On Friday night for some reason Dr. Jessop asked me to "noodle" a bit in the key of one of the pieces (and then to do it in the style of Aaron Copland). After that he would ask me occasionally to do some improvising to set the mood for the piece, and by the time of the concert I had a new function: to prelude every unaccompanied piece with a short improvised introduction on the piano.

It was an intriguing task. From the audience point of view the effect was to link the pieces together (Dr. Jessop asked for no applause between numbers) so that they sounded like an extended "meditation." From the choral point of view it not only set the mood, and the tempo (an important function of the conductor that Dr. Jessop graciously ceded to me), but as the final rehearsal minutes went past I started taking notes about what he told the choir to focus upon for each piece--when a particular rhythmic gesture was critical, when the piece needed to dance, or not drag, when the altos needed to sing a particular line with more force--and tried to include references to those musical moments in my "miniatures" as if to say to The Chorale, "now remember what needs to happen when we get to this part!" secretly, in music, so the audience need not be aware.

I started at the end of one of the pieces for this reason, and included parts of the chorus in another--one of the improvisations started with the aforementioned alto line. I second-guessed myself a couple of times when the results from The Chorale weren't what I'd hoped and I wondered if I didn't remind them of the right character. Although I suppose we are not all given to subtlety and those rapid reminders may not have always hit home. Also, we didn't actually tell them they should be listening for those things: they just sort of dawned on me as we got close to the concert. But as he says often, "music is 90 percent craft and 10 percent art." (That might be from Robert Shaw) So in addition to the interest the audience shares in just "playing whatever the spirit prompts at the moment" there is also attention to how to say it, and why.

Dr. Jessop and I had a system: I would look at him near the end of each improvisation so he could start his preparation beats. In at least one case the "passing of the baton" went so well that the choir starting promptly on the very next beat with all of the energy of the last chord of the piano.

There were some disappointments, certainly. The energy of our conductor was not always transferred to the singers, who may have been too engrossed in their music, or too rooted in each note to think in phrases and groups, and to get the spirit of the thing which really only comes in those moments when we are completely free of the page and its demands and can get to that next level and make art. But then there were the moments when it happened.

The Chorale is an amateur ensemble. It is not necessary to audition to get in. Anybody who loves to sing is welcome. Under those circumstances it is not likely the group will sound like a bunch of music majors who have devoted their professional lives to honing their craft, touring the world and recording masterworks of the repertoire with precision and skill. And they don't, much of the time. But here is what is amazing: sometimes, they actually do. There were a few moments during the all-day Saturday rehearsal when, at a suggestion form Dr. Jessop, suddenly the blend, the ensemble, the precision, the choral sound could have passed for that of a truly great choir. It is incredible that there are such moments--it isn't even fair to those of us who have spent thousands of hours and dollars and blood and sweat and tears to get there to have a non-professional group reach such heights.

But occasionally they do, even if only for a few measures. And it is really intriguing. That a group of basically regular folks can actually sound that good if they really focus, and spend enough time in practice with someone who not only knows how to get the sound out of them, but persists in trying. It happens. And it rocks me back every time, and I think...."Wow! That was The Chorale you just heard, folks!"

And it shouldn't be a mark against our regular leader, either. Artistic Director Julie Beyler is correct when she points out that she tells the choir most of the same things, but it seems to help to hear them from an exalted guest. Heck, I even had a moment when Dr. J. was reminded the fellas to hold their music at a certain angle so they could see him as well as their notes and I said to may piano duet partner, "I told them the same thing last week [in sectionals]!"

That can be naturally frustrating, of course, but like Dr. Jessop, I say that in love. It is hard to produce fine music. It takes extraordinary amounts of discipline, focus, and perseverance. I get frustrated with myself endlessly. (By the way, I wasn't satisfied with some portions of the pieces that I played during the concert, either.) But, in the end, that's the path you have to travel if you want to get there from here. Dr. Jessop proved that. A few times he had the choir drilling passages on rapid-fire repeat, going for an effect by singing the passage multiple times in order to make excellence a habit. Pianists, he reminded the group, do this sort of thing all the time. And he even practiced things like holding a pose as the last chord died away and not moving before the piece is really over.

In the process, I'd say he showed that it's really hard work, rather than native talent, that has the lion's share in making the pretty decent pretty wonderful. This was evident in the way the group sounded at times over the weekend. That's highly unfair to us professionals. But's its also pretty awesome.

Because I can hear it and say, "wow, that wasn't the St. Olaf Choir you just heard there, ladies and gentlemen. That was The Chorale!"