'You should be able to sight-read your music. Good musicianship is an important skill for choral singers, since it would be tedious and almost impossible to learn everything you'll need to know by ear. Most professional rehearsals don't involve teaching each line of music, but rather concentrate on perfecting the overall sound of the ensemble.' (Sheppard;N.A)
In my opinion a large aspect of becoming a successful singer is picking the music up fast and learning it efficiently, which is why this is one element of my musical development I have particularly made a conscious effort to work on.
Recently I was a part of the Rocket Opera Chorus for Rocket Opera's 'Festive Treats' and had the opportunity to sing with professional singers, conductor and a full orchestra. Being in this environment it was expected that you knew your music promptly and within a short space of time. I got my score on the first rehearsal, so my sight reading skills were quickly tested, but this gave me the opportunity to push myself as a musician and better my knowledge of operatic choral repertoire which normally I wouldn't have had the opportunity to sing due to singing as a soloist for the majority of my performances.
The Pieces
which we sang were ‘Chers Tyriens’ from Berlioz’s ‘Les Troyens’, ‘Les voice!
Les voice!’ form Bizet’s Carmen and two excerpts from Johann Strauss’s ‘Die
Fledermaus’ which were ‘Mein Herr Marquis’ and ‘Champagne Finale’. It was
really interesting singing in the chorus for ‘Mein Herr Marquis’ as it is
something I have sang before as a soloist- both in English and German. Another element which
this opportunity allowed me to explore and improve on was my languages as we
were singing in French and German, this was also good as I usually sway to
singing in Italian more than any other language. it gave me the opportunity to improve my knowledge of the languages and also pronunciation.
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