L.A. Master Chorale High School Festival Videos on YouTube!

The Los Angeles Master Chorale (LAMC) has posted videos of all six song selections we performed at the 2011 High School Choir Festival.  Relive the experience!

Chindia

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Sure on This Shining Light

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Alma Llanera

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Ubi caritas

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Ain’-a That Good News

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Hallelujah (from Messiah)

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The LAMC has their own YouTube channel and Facebook page.

Alma Llanera

The Llanos ("Plains") of Venezuela

All parts are recorded at 60 bpm.  This is slightly slower than the indicated tempo of 66 bpm.  This selection is marked allegro con spirito and moves right along.

Knowing how to navigate this piece while reading your music can be a bit tricky and ambiguous.

First, this symbol  means segno or sign.  It’s just a mark or symbol used (like a signpost) to jump to a particular place in the music.  In this song, our segno, or sign, is at the beginning of measure 2 (m. 2).  (Segno is the Italian word for “sign” or “mark.”  Al segno means “to the sign.”)

So, here’s the breakdown:

Let’s call pages 2 and 3 “section A.”  Then “section B” would be pages 4 and 5.  So, the order of singing these sections would be

A, A, B, A, B

Here’s the order, section by section:

1. Section A: Sing the first four measures (mm. 1-4) and repeat. Then, sing through the first verse which begins at measure 5 (m. 5), and take the first ending (m. 31), al segno (means “to the sign”), back to the segno at measure 2 (m. 2).
   
2. Section A: Sing mm. 2-4 and repeat the first four measures (mm. 1-4).  Sing the second verse and take the second ending (m. 32).
3. Section B: Sing mm. 33-60 – taking the first ending, also marked al segno.  Jump back to the segno at m. 2.
4. Section A: After singing mm. 2-4 and repeating mm. 1-4, sing the SECOND verse and take the SECOND ending (m. 32).
5. Section B: Sing mm. 33-59 and take the SECOND ending (m. 61).  The end.

Please make sure you understand the navigation.  It’s easy to get lost while listening to the recording if you don’t know where to go in the music. It may seem confusing, but if you read ALL the symbols and notations in your music, you’ll be able to follow along.

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Audio Player:

Soprano:

Alto:

Tenor:

Bass:

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Download Links:

Alma Llanera – soprano

Alma Llanera – alto

Alma Llanera – tenor

Feb. 23: Checked the tenor link; it seems to be working fine.  If you still can’t download it, then leave your email address in the comments, and it’ll be sent to you.

Alma Llanera – bass

This particular blog post completes the recordings for all six of the songs we are performing as part of the LAMC Festival Chorus.  The full list of songs can be found here.  Clicking on the link “2011 LAMC Festival” which can be found along the right-hand column under “Categories” on any of the blog pages will show all the festival blog posts at once.

Ain’-a That Good News!

Attention: For students from LPHS (La Puente H.S.) and LAHS (Los Altos H.S.), the version posted here is different, so do not use it.  Please go to lpchoir.wordpress.com, instead.  There you will find the correct arrangement for our festival.

(I apologise for the mix-up.  In spite of having identical publishing information, arranger, copyright date, SATB, etc., as well having the same arrangement on the first page, we discovered, in class, that my copy of the music was not the same after all. <sighs>)

For Bassett students: The recordings for this selection reflect the changes in tempo that occur in three separate sections as indicated by:

1.  (♩ = 104), pages 3-4

2.  (♩ = 76), pages 5-6

3.  (♩ = 104), pages 7-11

For learning purposes, your parts have been played a bit “under tempo,” i.e., slower than the indicated tempo.

Also included are some of the accents, staccatos, caesuras, and fermatas, where appropriate.

As always, beats are counted aloud before particular entrances that are preceded by a long rest.  (But not always; I’m trying to transfer more of the sight-reading responsibility to you.)

Audio Player:

Soprano:

Alto:

Tenor:

Bass:

Download Links:

Ain’-a That Good News! – SOPRANO

Ain’-a That Good News! – ALTO

Ain’-a That Good News! – TENOR

Ain’-a That Good News! – BASS

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Image is used with permission from public-domain.zorger.com

Sure On This Shining Night

This is the fourth of our six LAMC Festival choral selections whose practice recordings are posting to this blog.  (Two more to go, for those keeping score.)

All recordings are dubbed at 50 bpm as denoted by the metronome marking, ♩=50.

Similar to Ubi caritas, this piece has different time signatures that occur throughout.

The bulk of the piece is in 3/4 time, but notice the two separate measures of 4/4 time (common time) on page 5 as well as a bar of 2/4 time on page 4.

Remember, common time means 4/4 time, as printed in your music.

Audio Player:

Soprano:

Alto:

Tenor:

Bass:

Here’s all four parts together…

SATB:

Download Links:

Sure On This Shining Night – soprano

Sure On This Shining Night – alto

Sure On This Shining Night – tenor

Sure On This Shining Night – bass

Sure On This Shining Night – SATB (all parts together)