September Song

September arrives, and it's time to start new projects as the air crisps up. C4 is preparing for its first concerts of the season (in November, on the 18th and 20th). The theme is duality: the repertoire will reflect splits, schisms,and differing viewpoints, whether in the music or the text.

This means that you will be hearing some double choir pieces, which you would expect, but also pieces in which texts are drawn from contrasting sources ... texts may be about doubt versus certainty, or may be ancient versus modern, or urban versus rural ...

Although the program is not quite finalized at this point, I should drop a few names to pique your interest and make you eager for the Facebook invite and so forth. How about: Tarik O'Regan, Hayes Biggs, Nicholas Maw, Thomas Stumpf? Not to mention members of C4 itself ...

I note that nobody has done an arrangement of "September Song," which I suppose is beyond the scope of C4's mission (Weill penned that heart-wrenching tune a lot longer than 25 years ago), but I almost wish we could do it anyway ... the words refer to one of those romances between a very young person and a very old one. And September is almost more of a transitional month than January: right now we look back at the summer we just left at the same time as we look forward to the musical season ahead and wonder what it will be like, what new satisfactions we will find, what we will learn ...

Be well, people, and thanks for reading!

Martha Sullivan for C4

For Restless Voices: Audition

You want to sing something completely new. But you also love the familiar feel of singing with other voices. You love Bach and Brahms and Britten, but new vocal rep is brewing all the time, and you want a taste. You adore orchestras, but would like to explore new sounds with a smaller combo ...

Maybe you want to write new music, or conduct it.

It's obvious that you'll consider auditioning for C4, the choral composer/conductor collective (http://c4ensemble.org). It's that time of year again, and the group would love to hear you.

There are always questions, though. What happens in an audition? What pieces do you sing? What are the auditioners looking for? What's the audition really for, anyway? The singers wonder all these things. The auditioning committee should, too.

As for what happens, you probably already know the drill: Show up early and fill out any paperwork ... enter the audition space, smile, sing a prepared piece (for C4, that will be a choral piece we send you; you prepare your line in the texture, and members of C4 will sing the other lines around you) ... sightread (for C4, you'll be given one solo line to test your skill reading pitches, another to test rhythm) ... show off other interesting things about yourself (vocal range, resume, wit, prestidigitation, etc., depending on who you're auditioning for ... and conducting skills, if you want to be a C4 conductor).

But what's this all for?

An audition for a vocal contractor (who puts together many ad hoc groups made up of singers on her master list) is to show off what you've got, what kind of voice you have, what particular skills, so she knows where you'll be most useful.

This is also true for a group with regular membership, like C4. But there's more.

The group and its new members need to be a good fit.

For C4, that means:
Does new music excite you?
How's your musicianship? Can you read well? Can you pick up music quickly?
Do you get so psyched about new music that you practice it outside regular rehearsals?
Are you willing to try new things? (In its last concert, C4 improvised vocal lines to onscreen projections, a musical score of colored lines, abstract flowers, fishes, and an ominous chair ... the concert before that involved choreographed match-lighting ... )
Can you sing for five or six different conductors in one rehearsal, integrating all their musical ideas?
Can you do all of this while making beautiful sounds?
Come to think of it, are you willing to make ugly sounds if needed?

The C4 audition should stretch you musically; it won't be a walk in the park. But on the other hand, since you'll get music in advance to look at, you'll have time to put the music into your voice so that you can show off the beauty of your own instrument ...

This writer's favorite auditions to SING have been those that were a stretch for the ear but also allowed a chance to shine vocally, and that were long enough to explore a variety of challenges ...

This writer's favorite auditions to HEAR have been ones where the singers knew that their 10 or 15 minutes were just a very short performance, a chance to walk in and blow the listeners away ... a chance to give an intense bit of joy to a very small audience, and to walk away with some, too.

When you audition, remember that you only have to be at the top of your game for 15 minutes, not for the hour or so of a choral concert or, longer, an opera ... it's a distillation, a good chance to practice being in the moment ...

So, please, if you want to sing music that's happening now (C4's mission commits it to music that's 25 years young or less), and if you would like to stretch your musical, vocal, and improv chops, check out the C4 auditions, coming soon to a studio space near you.

Write for more info: info@c4ensemble.org

-Martha Sullivan for C4