Below are enriching music activities to help us continue your music education this year. The exercises below are meant to further your skill set while we are apart. Use these as a starting point to really take your singing to the next step!
Check out these vocal exercises to keep the cobwebs out of your voice! Have a family member or pet who isn't used to hearing you sing? Make them belt it out right along with you! Share your knowledge of the voice with them.
Bobby McFerrin ("Dont Worry, Be Happy") is an incredibly skilled singer who specializes in improvisation and extended techniques for the voice. He starts "Drive" creating all the sounds of a car and with an impromptu choir who is learning their parts right on the spot!
Elaine Hagenberg's setting of "The Music of Stillness" is one of the most beautiful pieces of choral music composed in recent years. It perfectly expresses finding comfort in difficult times through the power of music, which is something we can all relate to. Take a moment to read the words and really soak in its message.
Sometimes you just need to mess around with your choir friends and sing ALL the parts! Anyone can sing any voice part, they just have to have the correct technique and believe they can do it.
Alberto Grau's "Kasar Mie La Gaji" is an example of music expressing the full range of human emotions. Not all music is supposed to be happy and beautiful, because we're not always happy and beautiful. This song mimics the apocalyptic event of the earth dying, and it is not at all comfortable! It has crunchy chords and strange rhythms, and the director of this particular choir chose to add weird choreography to make you even more uncomfortable...but that's how you would probably feel if the world was ending, right?
A cappella and barbershop styles of singing have become increasingly popular after the show Glee and groups like Pentatonix rose to stardom. Vocatve's a capella version of the "Star Spangled Banner" is so powerful, especially at the end. It's a great way to honor all of the essential workers who have stepped up during this time, our military, and our country.