During the pandemic, the wonderful music team at MGUC has continued to bring hymns, anthems, preludes and postludes to you every week. Here’s how:
Deborah selects the music and checks to make sure we have the copyright license to post the music online. Deborah forwards that information to Al Wheable who maintains the records and reports to the appropriate licensing groups. Al also responds to any copyright challenges from music posted online.
Deborah packages the music and takes it to the home of choir president Carol Gilchrist for choir members to pick up from her front porch. Latterly the music has been uploaded to Google drive. Carol is the wonderful point person who keeps multiple weekly communications winging between Deborah and choir members, keeping us all up-to-date.
Choir practices have been virtual, with only Deborah and Eran, and then Deborah and her brother-in-law, Ian Sadler, at the church. Deborah talks the choir members through each piece, then she conducts while Ian plays the accompaniment as we practice while muted in our homes. We cannot hear each other, and Deborah and Ian cannot hear us sing.
Deborah records practice tracks for each part to help us learn and puts them up on Google Drive. The choir members practice with the recordings during the week leading up to choir practice. When the choir is ready to record an anthem, a video is recorded of Ian playing the accompaniment and Deborah conducting. This is then uploaded to Google Drive. After much practice, and with many retakes, each choir member records his/her own part. This means that we listen to the accompaniment using headphones while watching the video of Deborah conducting on one device and record our own part on another device.
Audio only hymn accompaniments are also sent to choir members so they can sing and record the hymns for each service. It is impossible to guess how many hours each choir member spends weekly learning and recording music! We are blessed to have Deborah’s sister Catharine singing with the choir in her professional soprano voice. We send our recordings to Deborah who imports them into a software program where she aligns and balances multiple tracks.
In addition to that, Ian and Catharine make video recordings of Ian playing our pre- and postludes in our sanctuary, and recordings of all the hymns with Ian playing the organ. Occasionally some of the handbell choir, the Belles, get together to practice and then make a video of their piece. Oh yes, and Mike Ware on his accordion, Pat McKee on guitar, Ron McKee on his trumpet, and Patty Wanless on drums sometimes record extra embellishments to our pieces, which Deborah incorporates with the singing.
All of the music gets sent to Joan Vinall-Cox, and sometimes Al Wheable and JC Berubé, who use their talents, skills and dedication to put it all together with the rest of the services they have recorded in the sanctuary.
And voila!
You have a service filled with music prepared lovingly for you by Dr. Deborah Henry, our amazing Director of Music, and your bell and chancel choirs and accompanists. We hope it adds to your pleasure and your spiritual life.
Cathy Dodge Smith
Examples of the Maple Grove Choir’s accomplishment:
– Gabriel Fauré’s Sanctus – including an onscreen English translation of the Latin lyrics
– Mozart’s Laudate dominum – Soprano-Catharine Sadler – also including an onscreen English translation of the Latin lyrics
For more of the choir’s singing, check out the Singalong posts: https://maplegroveunitedchurch.org/sing-along-hymns-from-march-13/