Two Christmas Shape-Note Scores & Recordings

Here's two Christmas tunes for the Western Harmony, scores & sampler demo recordings - I brought them on Monday, but things got a little confusing with the floor being waxed, et cetera.

The first one is the melody of Tchaikovsky's snowflakes, the harmonies have been changed to protect the innocent. The second is a nativity fuging tune with text inspired by the apocryphal Infancy Gospel of James (hence the title). I apologize for the sloppy production on the recordings, I only intend them as demos to test the harmonies. There's also a pdf here if anyone across the series of tubes wants to print it out. (& the mp3s here & here.) Happy Christmas & see you all again in the Obama era.

I'm not the All-Cal Chair, so why am I having stress dreams?

Seriously, I had the craziest Sacred Harp dream ever. It was the All-Cal, and we couldn't even get people to sit in their parts-- we were all seated auditorium style, and then moved into a square, but even then, no one was sitting where they were supposed to. I even ended up in the bass section by mistake for a while.

I was secretary, but I couldn't find the arrangers to get the reg cards, and was trying to figure out how to spell people's names phonetically as they were called out. I even forgot to list the first few songs! And I FORGOT TO COOK. Yup, showed up to the singing empty-handed.

While I was having this mini-meltdown, the rest of you weren't faring much better. We were so hysterically off tempo that Natalia stood up and kept time with exaggerated arm movements and emphatic foot-stamping. And to top it off, Rebecca publicly chastised someone for giving the pitch wrong.

That's when I woke up. Whew.

Baltimore Sacred Harp on the Radio

Very occasional UCB visitor Kevin Moreno is interviewed, along with Carly Goss and others from their Thursday night singing. The producer/host really captured their singing well.

How to set up this blog as an RSS feed

I love the UCB Sacred Harp blog. But I find I don't visit as often as I wish, however, and don't always get the most recent news. So recently I set up the blog to show up in my email reader (Mozilla Thunderbird) and on my igoogle homepage. Below are some notes on my experience in case anyone would like to do the same.

On my igoogle homepage:

1. click [add stuff], then [Add feed or gadget]
2. type in http://ucbsacredharp.blogspot.com/atom.xml

In Thunderbird:

1. Click on the [tools] menu, then choose [account settings] (That's on a PC; on a Mac [account settings] is under the [preferences] menu.
2. In the dialog box that appears, click [new account]
3. When the wizard comes up, click [RSS News & Blogs] (then [next])
4. Set [account name] to "UC Berkeley Sacred Harp" (then [next])
5. Click [Finish] to get out of the wizard
6. Back in the Account Settings window, click on the UCB Sacred Harp account and choose [manage subscriptions].
7. On the window that opens, click [Add], and type "http://ucbsacredharp.blogspot.com/atom.xml" into the [Feed URL] field.

Portland Convention

Several weeks have passed since the Portland convention and I haven't seen any reports, which is a rotten shame since the world should know what a terrific show they put on up there.

I'll start, of course, with the food. With 215 convention registrants(!) I was worried about being last in line for dinner. My doubts were relieved, though, when I saw Julie Griswold's three tiers
of quiches. The fact that Portland has actually had to resort to incorporating multiple tiers of food on their serving table is I think representative of the abundance and attentiveness that characterized the whole convention.

For instance, it's easy to think of the Pacific Northwest as being "too eco for school," but the Portland singers wear their ecological sensibilities so gracefully that one feels not pushed, but inspired. This was accomplished in part through their use of metal utensils and cloth napkins, but moreso through their endless array of incredible vegan offerings - which were so satisfying as to leave no one wanting (except for recipes). And though half the table each day was labeled
vegan, there was no lack of falling-off-the-bone ribs and knee-weakening cheese grits for the lard-leaning among us, and fancy-schmancy pear-brandy-ganache pies and "I *must* have that recipe" apple cakes for us aspiring diabetics. (And though I spent close to $100 on pastries over the weekend at Portland's top-notch bakeries, I never found a scone I preferred to Marie Brandis's tea table offerings.)

Choose any other aspect of the convention, and it was equally impressive. Marie chaired the convention with efficiency and delicacy. The socials - a low-key Denson book singing at a neighborhood coffeehouse on Friday night, Carmen Doerge's well attended (and well
provided for) Saturday's evening social featuring, among other things, plenty of Northern Harmony singing, and Sunday's decompression at Heather Ikler's (and didn't we sing at a bar somewhere in there, too?) - were a great respite of informality amidst the more decorous daytime singing.

And what singing it was. After starting Saturday morning with an engaging singing school by Judy Caudle that was a welcome mix of information, participation, authority, and invitation, we launched into the fine singing of the day, which only improved after dinner. Sunday's singing similarly grew throughout the day, punctuated only by a personal and moving memorial lesson by Carmen, Connie Stanton and Lyle Lindsey, and by another incredible dinner.

It was great to see such far-flung singers as the always present and always appreciated Mike Hinton, honorary Portlandeers Bridget Hill and Judy Caudle, Reba Dell and Bill Windom, Sharon DuPriest and Daphene Causey, and Louis and Janice Hughes stopping off on their road trip down the Pacific coast, and others from, if I recall correctly, at least seven states. But the truth is that Portland needs no help from outside to stoke their fires; that group is a raging inferno on its own, incredible to behold and a great light for others.

Once final note before closing - about the hospitality of the Portland singing community. It rocks. It so raises the bar for all of us who would like out of towners to come to our own singings that I'm tempted to not mention it at all. But it would be a great untruth to not mention all kindnesses they showed me and the other non-locals, from airport pick-ups to last-second housing scrambles to, say, helping us pick out shirts when we left our dress clothes in Berkeley. The Portland singing community is an inspiringly kind and generous one.

Thanks for everything.

Election Night Singing at Inder's Place!

In addition to our regular Monday night singing, I am also hosting an Election Night Singing on Tuesday, November 4, 2008!

So, vote, and then come sing! (We'll be checking the TV periodically to see how it's going as they start tallying up those votes from the East Coast.)

The singing is at the home of Inder, Rebecca, and Steve in Oakland (Lake Merritt semi-adjacent), from 6 p.m. to 9p.m., from Denson, Cooper, and other books. There will an informal, low-pressure potluck dinner - bring a dish if you can. Non-alcoholic beverages (if you haven't heard, I am with child and on the wagon!) are also very welcome. I'll be making a big pot of mac & cheese (and maybe a pot of beans - is anyone vegan?), and my man can cook a fine chicken, so if you're too frazzled to cook on such a busy day, please come anyway! There will be tons of food.

We'll be arranging a BART pickup for anyone coming from San Francisco or beyond. I have been informed that Oakland feels like the outer reaches of space to some, but our place is actually closer to SF than our regular Berkeley singing locale! (Am I selling this hard enough?)

Email me at inder dot baudonnet at gmail dot com for exact location, directions, and carpool or BART pickup information.

BUSH - shape-note score & solo-quartet recording

I finally have my sexy new digital microphone, The Samson CO3U, & this is the trial run, a demo solo-quartet overdub of the new tune we tried to sing at Mark's house. There is a downloadable pdf file of the score here, & to download an mp3 of the below podcast-player go here. The lyrics were composed in Liverpool this July:

BUSH

On this planet I spin around in anguish & grief.

If heav'n is more beautiful than California, then I want to go.

In the light of the moon, a little egg lay on a leaf,

So like a caterpillar will my love grow.

In my vineyard plague-locusts have devoured my belief,

The cankerworm has eaten up the palmerworm, I sow only woe,

In the light of the moon, a little egg lay on a leaf,

So like a caterpillar will my love grow.

Horrible Jokes from the Halmonster, part 2

So this harp walks into a bar. He goes up to the bartender and orders
a beer. While the ancient, craggy bartender is puttering around
behind the bar, finding a glass, washing the glass, drying the glass,
the bartender starts telling the harp a story, to keep him
entertained. Well, this is one of your long, drawn-out shaggy dog
type stories. It goes on for 5 minutes, 10 minutes, and the harp
still hasn't gotten his beer. Eventually, out of frustration, the
harp exclaims, "Will you quit stringing me along?!"

---

See you all at singing tonight!!

Special Singing

Mark went all out in honor of Jessica Beer's visit: homemade pasta with 3 different sauces, garden salad, bread...
...baked eggplant, and a fabulous apple tart for dessert (thanks, Carolyn).
This is at least less blurry than the other picture I took before I finally gave up.

Horrible Jokes from the Halmonster, Pt. 1

Jimmy: 'Hey, Mike! How's your new pet fish doing?
You told me he was really something special.'

Mike: 'To tell the truth, I'm really disappointed in
him. The guy who sold him to me said I could
teach him to sing like a bird.'

Jimmy: 'What? Let me get this straight... You
bought a fish because you thought you could
teach him to sing like a bird?'

Mike: 'Well, yeah. After all, you know, he's a
parrot fish.'

Jimmy: 'Now listen, Mike, while you might be
able to teach a parrot to sing, you're never
going to get anywhere with a parrot fish.'

Mike: 'That's what you think! It just so happens
this fish CAN sing. The thing is, he's terribly
off-key and it's driving me crazy. Do you
know how hard it is to tuna fish?'

---

Now, I'm an old school Unix geek. Back in the day, there was a hidden comment inside the manual page documentation for a program called tunefs, which included a more concise version of the joke that went: You can tune a filesystem, but you can't tuna fish.

If you know any other good singing jokes, please send them my way. You can send bad ones too, come to think of it.

---

The smilings of Thy face,
How amiable they are;
--503 Lloyd

Special "Beer" singing on Tuesday September 30

Mark Miller and I will be hosting a special singing for our friend from Portland. There will be dinner and singing. If you are in the bay area and would like to join us, please send an email to me at halmonster(at)gmail(dot)com.

new books

Not only was I lucky enough to have a work conference in Nashville last week adjoin the Lookout Mountain convention on one side, and the Young People's, Lacy Memorial, and Shoal Creek singings on the other, but due a singing room being required for an election on Tuesday night, Fort Payne, Alabama's regular monthly singing was moved to Friday evening, allowing me (and Jessica) to catch a fourth singing in as many days.

Among the many interesting aspects of this singing (by the way, Darlene Dalton, formerly of Las Vegas and frequent Golden Gate and All-Cal attendee, sends her love our way), I particularly want to draw attention to the fact that in this singing we sung not from the normal 1991 Denson revision, but the White book - which has, unsurprisingly, a white cover, but which gained it's name from its compiler, J. L. White. Originally published in 1911, it has several gospel tunes, but on the whole it is the most traditional of the turn of the century revisions (Cooper, White, and James); for example, well over half the tunes - many familiar to us from the 1991 Denson revision, have only three parts.

The book has recently been beautifully retypeset, and republished last year. I was given one as a gift, and will bring it to upcoming singings; I'm curious to see if/ how the harmonies compare between that book and our Densons. I'll also bring a James book (also from 1911), which as I understand is between White and Cooper with respect to gospel-ization. (Will, please correct me if I'm wrong.) And while I'm on it, I seem to have compiled a surprisingly large tunebook collection; if anyone is ever interested in borrowing a Colored Sacred Harp or Southern or Missouri Harmony, or... let me know; I'm more than happy to lend them out.

Don't worry; the Denson book isn't going out of style; in fact we just bought 3 new boxes of loaners, since we're selling so many, and in anticipation of the upcoming All-Cal.

Portland Convention

Hey all, let's start a dialog for going to the Portland convention. Here are some things I know so far:

- My original post to UCB FaSoLa was wrong; the convention is not 10/25-26, but 10/18-19.

- Carolyn is looking, perhaps, to ride up with someone, then make her own way back

- There's a good chance I'll be looking for a ride back, after getting up there myself.

- Chris, Caroline, and Hal have all expressed interest in attending. (I'll guess Hal and Chris are planning to fly)

ASTHMATIC KITTY ARTISTS APPEAR ON SACRED HARP COMPILATION ...

The much awaited news is here. But stop hyperventilating - Sufjan Stevens does not appear to be involved as we were led to hope. I know. But it looks cool anyway.

Field Trip to Poway

Carolyn, Inder, Betty and I headed to Poway last weekend for the 12th Annual Marilou and Don Jolly Memorial Singing. It was a relatively small singing, but the sound was great and there was adequate coverage on all the parts. We all took extensive turns on the front row, so I don't have many pics, but here are a few:
 the awesome treble bench

"What are those people DOING!?!

Carla leading (taken over Carolyn's shoulder)

 Betty leading

Jerry and the chaplain, whose name is escaping me

It was a lovely singing, totally worth braving Comicon madness to attend. Oh, and above all: the food was to die for!

The trials of Hal Eisen

Hal -- in a tie!

I want to shout out to Hal, who was kind enough to come to the Kalamazoo annual Sacred Harp singing -- our 10th anniversary, and it was nice to have ten states and provinces represented. It was too bad that 'mechanical problems' forced Hal to spend Friday night in Salt Lake City rather than Kalamazoo, which meant he missed the Michiana singing in Goshen on Saturday. 

I am glad to say that we led "Few Happy Matches" (96) together. 

Singing Sacred Harp? Thank a Quaker!

Paul L. from Minneapolis and I were interviewed at the Friends General Conference Gathering about Sacred Harp singing by Matthew Streib (scroll down to the July 5th podcast to hear it). Matthew is taking a few months to bicycle around the United States for his American Pilgrimage project, in which he visits unusual and uniquely American religious communities and experiences. Matthew used my favorite parts from our interview, but I will say that we must have inadvertently led him a little astray... He credits the revival of Sacred Harp singing to Quakers. While there are many social movements that evidence God's grace in the world for which Quakers could rightly claim leadership despite very small numbers (e. g., abolition of slavery and women's suffrage), I really don't think we can count the Sacred Harp revival as one of them. Still, it's a fun little interview that includes a clip of us singing 40 Lenox.

Wailin' Jennys at the Freight and Salvage

This is only very tangentially related to Sacred Harp singing, as I once heard The Wailin' Jennys sing White on Prairie Home Companion. Though there is no guarantee they will sing any Sacred Harp tunes at all on July 20, anyone want to hear the late show at the Freight? Doors open at 7:30, show at 8. 

Bound for Canaan

...or Poway, CA, at least.

The lovely San Diego singers who make their way to the Bay Area for our singings are hosting a one day singing in Poway July 26, as well as a brunch and alternate book singing on the following Sunday.

I'm taking Amtrak from Emeryville to San Diego on Thursday* so I won't be a wreck on Saturday if the train is late. The itinerary is too complex to post here, but leave a comment with your email if you are interested. Post a comment if you are going with your travel info.

*actually, I MEANT to make the reservations for Thursday, but made them for Wednesday instead. I'm going to think about if I want to keep them and play around in San Diego for a couple days so it feels like vacation, or change them.

Remember you are hastening on/To death's dark, gloomy shade

Or in other words, I am having a birthday party: 6 pm July 12 at the Berkeley Friends Meetinghouse. If you somehow didn't get the Evite, you're still invited. Bring your Denson book and a potluck dish to share.

Hidden Dangers of Cooper Book

I love the Cooper book. Not as much as the Denson, but I do love it. However, I must admit that there is a higher proportion of catchy tunes in the Cooper than the Denson. Hence, since our second mixed book singing, I have been humming Mercy Seat about 50 times a day. I've even caught myself by surprise-- I was singing it before I even realized I was singing. I like Mercy Seat, but come on already! If Mark considers this my just deserts for not picking songs from the Norumbega I may not have a rhetorical leg to stand on.

Pre-Singing this Monday

In an effort to squeeze all the singing we can from our Portlandery friend Ms. Jessica Beer, in town for the weekend with her band*, we'll be singing at 6pm at All-Saints, getting a quick, cheap bite to eat down the block before regular singing at 7:30. We'll open up the Eclectic Harmonies, break the spine on our new Cooper Books, sing whatever photocopies someone puts in front of us, and, if we're lucky, have our new Norumbega Harmonies by then. (Bring yours if you have one.)

Hope to see you there,
Mark


[*] The band is 3 Leg Torso, a sort of Balkan/ Jazz/ Tango ensemble from Portland, playing tonight (Saturday) at the Blue Six (3043 24th St. (at Treat St.), in SF). $10 suggested donation for shows starting at 6:30 or at 9.

Ingalls Christian Harmony recordings

It was a delight to be with you all this past Monday. We sang a few Ingalls tunes, and I mentioned that there were recordings on the web from Tom Malone and from his Vermont Christian Harmony singing.

You can find them here: Christian Harmony Recordings.

Travis John

Here is a jpg-image file of that song I brought in a few weeks ago. If you click on it, you can see it larger or print it out. Or download a pdf here. It was my advanced notation skills that typed the score into Finale, but I can't get all of the 'fas' into perfect triangles.


It's an arrangement of a song by Kate Power, a Portland songwriter, the story of a fallen American soldier. She said the spirit of Travis John came to her & helped her write his story. The folksinger Tracy Grammer sings it & hands out copies of the music, to spread it around as a latter-day war memorial. Hence the shape-note arrangement. The full story of the song is here.

To see what it sounds like, I sang all four parts using my ancient retro-ghetto synthesizer & sound-editing software. Warning, the sound of a quintet of my voice accompanied by old synth noises may induce nightmares! But, it's a rough idea of the harmonies.

Cooper 2006 tunes not in Denson 1991

I've compiled a list of tunes in the 2006 Cooper Sacred Harp that are not found in the 1991 Denson edition of the Sacred Harp. I used Gaylon Powell's Tune Comparison Index to make this list, which can be found at:

http://www.entish.org/sh/cooper_not_in_denson.txt

If you can't find a tune that you expect to be there (Angel Band, for example), check Gaylon's list; it's probably listed under another name (in this case, the Land of Beulah). 

Use it for good, not for evil. 

And thanks. Linda, for setting me up to post here.

Golden Gate '08

The short version

We came. We sang. We ate. We sang some more. We went to Philip's house for the social, where we, suprisingly, ate and sang. Some of us went home, but some of us showed up on Sunday and again on Monday, to... you guessed it: sing and eat. 

The longer version, with pictures

Here's Katie leading Vernon with Will's help. We miss you, Katie. San Francisco isn't THAT far, really!

Here's Connie, who came to Berkeley Monday night, too. Hooray!

Here's a shot of the alto bench, partially obscured by the front-row trebles beating time. You may be noticing a trend in the photos: shots of tall people and the far right side of the room. You may wonder at the absence of certain people from the photos. That is what happens when you spend most of a singing sitting behind very tall men. 

Here's Marion from San Diego:
Susan is from Stockton now, but I first met her when I attended the Twin Cities local singing last summer. It's great to have her with us. She even makes the drive from Stockton on some Monday nights. Brave woman.

Hal did an amazing job of outreach, finding friendly singers to help the new and nervous. As a result, the newbies look like pros. We got the idea from the Portland Convention, and Hal carried it off wonderfully, preventing all those awkward moments that must arise when a new person stands up all by themselves in front of a hundred expectant singers.

Here's Bruce, getting a little help from Chris:

And here's Melissa getting some help from Inder. Inder is cracking up, because she had no idea what she was getting into when she agreed to help-- a page-turning, fuguing tune in a major key, no less (Inder just loves those minor tunes). They pulled it off just fine, though.
Far too soon, the singing was over. Here are Lara and Will, giving thanks to all the folks who contributed to the singing. 

Battle of the Bands, Sacred Harp Style?

While nothing can touch the awesomeness of the Denson book, a little change is character building. So to that end, we are having a special singing Monday, May 19 at 6 p.m. in the All Saints Chapel. We'll sing from the Cooper book (loaners available), Norumbega Harmony (bring yours if you have one), Eclectic Harmony (loaners available), and whatever else you bring enough copies of for us to sing. We'll break after an hour for a light supper/hearty snack. Bring something if you can, but don't sweat it if you can't. Just come heavy laden with all your tunebooks.

Golden Gate '08

Will says:

     "I've put MP3 files of the 2008 Golden Gate Singing at:

     http://entish.org/sh/gg_2008/

     Unfortunately, only the afternoon session was recorded. Still, enjoy!"

Thanks, Will!

Here are some of my trademark bad photos:

Tenors!



Jessica leading:



More tenors!



Connie leading:



Lara leading:



We had a lot of wonderful visitors from out of town, and Shelby passed on something Charles said that I thought was really apt: "This is what it looks like when people are cooperating." Thanks for a great singing, everyone!

MP3 files - Live EP?

Hello, friends - - I cut up the recording, so it was mostly just the music, & I think it makes a nice little "Live EP". I think we sound great.
You can download them as mp3 files here.
-James

Our KUSF show!

Will from Kalamazoo, Michigan recorded our appearance on M. Theo's KUSF show Classics Without Walls and had it posted on his web space within minutes of our completing the show.

He writes:

Hello all,

I stayed up too late listening to you all sing on KUSF tonight (till
after 2 am Michigan time!)

I recorded the show and you can listen to it at the following URL:

http://www.entish.org/sh/KUSF_Sacred_Harp_2008.m4a

There are a couple of minutes of non SH music at the start, and a bit
of static in the middle, but you might be glad to hear what it sounded
like.

Good job on the commentaries, by the way.

Thanks, Will!

I thought it went well too; thanks again to David for arranging it.

What are you bringing to the potluck?

The Golden Gate Singing is upon us (this Saturday!), so it's time to start cooking!

I mean that literally, of course. We live in the Bay Area, a place rich in amazing food. I mean, there are already strawberries at the farmer's market! So how are we going to impress our guests, foodwise?

Some thoughts and suggestions:

-Main dishes are always needed! Salads and side dishes are always welcome, but every once in a while a potluck happens that is nearly all salad. Bring a main dish! We want everyone to be well fed.

-Delicious desserts are key.

-Casseroles are traditional and always go over well.

-We tend to be heavy on the fats and starches and less well represented in terms of meats and vegetables. Bay Area singers tend to lean toward vegetarian food, which is fine and reflects our local culture. But I challenge you to think beyond the potato gratin. (Not that a potato gratin would go unwelcomed!)

-The more food the better.

* * * * *

A call for ingredient awareness:

We tend to think of foods as containing the obvious. Like Fig Newtons, we would suspect, are made up of equal parts fig and Sir Isaac Newton.

But thanks to the corporatization of food production, this is rarely the case. "Foods" contain ingredients that are only technically edible. Things are processed together that you never thought possible. You look on the label of a packet of cookies and it says things like "may contain traces of prawn powder." And first you are shocked that cookies could go with prawns, and second you are shocked that prawns come in powder form. (Unless you know from Asian food, of course!)

Most of the time this isn't a big problem (well, actually it's a giant systemic problem that we can afford to ignore in the short term).

But some of us have -- shall I whisper it? -- food allergies. Because if you are allergic to prawns you can't go eating cookies with wild abandon anymore. Woe!

When I mention food allergies and cross-contamination, a lot of people treat me like I am trying to suck all the joy out of life. Trust me, I am not. In fact, being aware of ingredients helps prolong my life. And nobody is telling you not to cook with whatever you want or eat whatever you want. But it can't hurt you to be aware of what's in your food. Because... do you want prawn powder in your cookies?

For instance, bread presents a big problem for me because it's often processed with nuts. So any time I eat out, I find myself asking the waiter if that delicious bread is nut-free. I usually get a "you are crazy" look from the waiter along with a "well, I imagine so."

Imagine away, waiter-dude, and see where it gets you. For instance, I would imagine that cake flour was totally vegan. But as you see, that is my imagination.



Now, many vegans wouldn't bother with the risk of eating a trace of dairy, because that teeny tiny trace will not send them to the ER. Not so for those with serious food allergies! Ignoring that stuff is not an option -- even if you survive the reaction, every reaction you have makes the allergy worse and makes it more likely that you'll
croak next time. Not good.

Once again, I'm not asking anyone to change their cooking habits; I'm just trying to increase awareness of just how widespread the common allergens are. (As an informal experiment, you can check out the chocolate selection at your local grocery and try to find some that is genuinely nut-free.)

Know what's in your food! It's good for everyone.

Shapenote on KUSF's Classics Without Walls

Several local singers will be appearing live on Monday, April 21 on KUSF's Classics Without Walls, hosted by Mark Theodoropoulos. We'll be talking and singing. The program runs from 10 to 11 p.m., so tune in -- or better yet, come along. Contact David for more details.

Golden Gate job update, once more

Here's the job list, now up to date! We still need a few people for registration...

• Arranging: Betty


• Secretary: Linda and Cindy


• Finance committee: Mark and Inder


• Chaplain: Jim


• Resolutions


• Set-up
  
  
  
  • Supervising (if you are not sure what to do, ask her!): Susan
  
  
  • Cindy
  
  
  • Inder
  
  
  • Betty
  
  
  • Lara
  
  
  • Terry M.
  
  
  
  


• Clean-up
  
  
  
  • Supervising: Susan
  
  
  • Betty
  
  
  • Gretchen
  
  
  • Peter
  
  
  • Lara
  
  
  
  


• Registration: Rebecca and ...
  
  
  
  • 8:30-9:30 Philip
  
  
  • 9:30-10:30 James
  
  
  • 10:30-11:45 ??
  
  
  • 11:45-12:45 Peter
  
  
  • 12:45-2:00 ??
  
  
  • 2:00-3:00 Mark
  
  
  
  


• Hospitality: Carolyn


• Public Relations: Chris, Hal, David


• Refreshments: Terry B.


• Supplies: Carolyn and Cindy


• Green committee: Carolyn


• Social: Philip and Inder


• Food: Shelby and Jill


• Location: Carolyn


• Betty will make name tags and bring pins

May we all go home a-praising / and rejoicing in Thy love

Well, I couldn't make it to the party, so here's my unfinished business - and it's even singing related. Linda explicitly requested a report from the Western Mass convention. Be careful what you ask for! I'll try to be concise and keep the gushing to a minimum. If you didn't know already, WMSHC is my favorite holiday. It's like some kind of ultimate Christmas/family reunion montage of all my friends together, new babies, too much food, too many trips to the airport. Followed by that time of year when we compulsively check for pictures online and start counting the days until the next convention (340).

Uh, there's some singing in there too. Some of the best singing around. After an unprecedented year away, I'd started to chalk my yearning for Northampton singing up to nostalgia, but then I walked into the chapel on Tuesday night and it was better than I remembered. (As much as I love California, there's nothing like a little New England fervor.)

Thanks to the officers and everyone who made the weekend what it was, particularly those responsible for the seamless arranging.

Let us turn to photos, all shamelessly stolen from those more talented than I.

God bless Sheldon Finlay and his unmatched singing photography. This year's convention was so well attended (412 registered, it was standing room only on Saturday) that many people led in pairs or groups, which was a lot of fun and made for excellent photo ops. Such as this one, featuring my very best friends, who've just set their wedding date! (In the interest of not embarrassing Katie further, I will point out that contrary to popular belief, Richard is not about to kiss her in the middle of the square. He is merely leaning over to remark, "Oh, I don't hate this song!")



And this one of the Wojcik family.



The children's lesson, led by Jenna and Kelsey. (courtesy of Kevin, another Sacred Harp photographer extraordinaire)



Leyland del Re leads. (also courtesy of Kevin)



Look, you know this guy! (courtesy of Mary Whitehouse)



In conclusion, come sing with us next year! In fact, the WMSHC board is extremely generous in providing travel grants.

And perhaps Mark can provide us with something more resembling an objective report? Much obliged.

Only Marginally Related to UCB Sacred Harp

I'm hosting an Unfinished Business party at my house this Saturday, starting at 3:30. Bring your portable unfinished chores/crafts/projects and get something accomplished while we eat, drink, and make merry. There's no tedious task that can't be improved by good food and good friends. And if your unfinished business includes burning Sacred Harp CDs, organizing digital pictures of singings large and small, and/or composing blog posts for this site, then this post just might be singing-related after all.

Leave a comment if you'd like to come and I'll get back to you.

Late for the singing

Great singing this afternoon, and excellent spread. In honor of my tardy arrival and general nostalgia for new england:



(From now on I promise to use my posting power for good rather than gratuitous youtube embedding. Not a guarantee.)

SF Quarterly Sing

Sunday, March 16th

Holy Innocents Episcopal Church

455 Fair Oaks St., SF

4:30-8:00, potluck @ 6pm

Who's coming from the East Bay? Can we carpool?

Golden Gate job update

Jobs that are taken, jobs that need taking (edited 3/10/08):

• Arranging: Betty


• Secretary: Linda and Cindy


• Finance committee: Mark and Inder


• Chaplain: Jim


• Resolutions


• Set-up
  
  
  
  • Cindy
  
  
  • Inder
  
  
  • Betty
  
  
  
  


• Clean-up
  
  
  
  • Betty
  
  
  • Gretchen
  
  
  
  


• Registration: Rebecca and ...
  
  
  
  • 8:30-9:30 Philip
  
  
  • 9:30-10:30 James
  
  
  • 10:30-11:30
  
  
  • 11:30-12:30 ??
  
  
  • 12:30-2:00 ??
  
  
  • 2:00-3:00 Mark
  
  
  
  


• Hospitality: Carolyn


• Public Relations: Chris, Hal, David


• Refreshments: Terry B.


• Supplies: Carolyn and Cindy


• Green committee: Carolyn


• Social: Philip and Inder


• Food: Shelby and Jill


• Location: Carolyn


• Betty will make name tags and bring pins

Possibly my best idea ever

I'm fettered and chained up in clay; I struggle and pant to be free...

Three words, people: election day singing.

What do you think?

Golden Gate delights!

The 4th annual Golden Gate Singing will be held on the Saturday before the fourth Sunday in April (a.k.a. "April 26") at Potrero Hill Neighborhood House in San Francisco (unless something odd happens).

Ah, the Golden Gate. I remember when that all started. Jill was new to the Bay Area and raring to go, and caused us to have a singing school and an brand-new annual one-day singing. Jill was the first chair, and Carolyn and I spent the whole day cutting up arranging.

We had a boatload (carpool-load?) of Portlanders come down to support the new singing, and a pretty great crop of SoCal folks, too. PHNHH was packed. Oh, what a good singing that was. That was 2005, I guess. Before I had even taken my qualifying exam! Wow. It was also before I owned a digital camera, which would explain why I do not have pictures.

The second Golden Gate, in 2006, was chaired by Betty. I cannot even tell you what a great chair Betty was. People all around her would be freaking out about one thing and another, and Betty would just turn around and fix it. This was also the year in which the distinctive Golden Gate paper name tags were introduced, and I believe it was also the year of our making it a "green" singing: cloth tablecloths (thrifted! yes!), metal silverware (washed by Chris), and composting (taken care of primarily by Carolyn). Yes, that was a great year for the Golden Gate.

The third Golden Gate, i.e. last year's, was chaired by Mark, and went very well. Betty and I were the arranging committee that year, because for some reason a lot of people trust me with the registration cards (fools!). Composting and such went forth as usual, and we outdid ourselves with the food that year, due primarily to some well-placed threats on Mark's part (go Mark!).



Oh, the food. Let me just say that Susan and Shelby have always handled the food with incredible elegance and efficiency. As a nut-allergic person, I had a deep love of those little tags that said whether the food contained nuts (although I have my doubts about how many people actually know what is in the food they make, since most of them say unwitty things like "bread doesn't have peanuts in it!," but that is another rant for another day). I am sure the tags were also useful to vegetarians and vegans.

And that brings us to the fourth Golden Gate. That's this year! It's going to be great.

Mark, bless his trusting heart, for some reason let me be the vice-chair last year, which means that I'm chairing this year.



What's the matter? Don't I look like a responsible chair?

So, lemme see...there are some jobs to assign!

I've already gotten Susan to agree to be vice chair. It gives you confidence in the future of the Golden Gate, doesn't it?

Some of the other jobs have already been claimed/delegated, but here is a list of jobs (most of this is cribbed from a list Mark made last year, by the way).

• Arranging committee: coordinates the order of the leaders and the general flow of the singing. This job is a lot more complicated than you might think, which is why I am glad Betty is going to be in charge of it this year.


• Secretary: takes minutes, turns the minutes in, and makes a report at the end of the convention (number of leaders, songs led, and states represented). This job isn't hard per se, but you constantly have to keep your wits about you. The secretary typically works closely with the arranging committee (to ascertain name spellings, etc.). Linda will be secretarying this year, along with one or more others (pending!).


• Finance committee: passes the hat, counts the money, makes a finance report at the end. I think Chris has done this in the past?


• Chaplain: says the opening, noontime, and closing prayers.


• Resolutions committee: gives a report at the end of the singing thanking the appropriate people etc.


• Set-up and clean-up committees: this is self-explanatory, but I would like to have a leader for each of these jobs. Usually there is a passel of helpful singers that shows up early or lingers late to help with set-up/clean-up tasks, but we wind up wandering around like confused monkeys because we're not sure what needs to get done and what goes where. So we'll need some people to promise to set up and clean up, because we don't want to be caught short-handed, and we also need someone to be the point person who can tell everybody what to do.


• The registration table is really important, but it's also an easy job and good for a new singer. Best of all, you can take it in one-hour shifts. You get everyone to fill out a registration card, distribute name-tags, keep an eye on the cash box and loaners, sell loaners as needed, and get registration cards (for those who want to lead) to the arranging committee. So it's a lot of little jobs, but usually not all at once, and they're all pretty self-explanatory. I recall liking how the Portland singers had a box on their registration cards that you could check if you wanted to lead but needed help. We should think about doing that this year.


• The hospitality committee coordinates housing for out-of-towners. It's best if this person knows a good number of locals. Locals with spare room in their abodes. This job also entails having contact info listed on our propaganda.


• Public Relations: get us advertised! Handle flyers, mailings, PSAs, community calendars, etc. I must admit that I myself am crap at this sort of thing.


• Refreshments: coordinates refreshments on the day of the singing, like coffee, water, and lemonade. This person needs to have a valiant heart. And a car.


• Supplies: makes sure we have all the supplies we need (napkins, compostable paper plates, etc. -- I've got a list somewhere) and buys more of anything we're missing. Currently, our supplies are housed in these big green tubs in Carolyn's garage.


• Green committee: handles recycling, composting, and the washing of the silverware.


• Social: someone has to organize it, and someone has to host it. It would be convenient if these two people were the same person, and Philip's house is really nice (hint)...


• Food committee: In the past we've had one or two people coordinating this job, and a few minions to help arrange food in a logical order, direct the traffic, unwrap/uncover food right before lunch, etc. Shelby has already volunteered to do food, but she'll probably be needing some help, because food is a big job. At least, if we do it right!

Which leads me to add that if you have a kitchen, you should bring food. We do not want people to have guilt about taking the last piece of lasagna, or, heaven forbid, to go hungry. (That said: why does everybody bring lasagna to potlucks? Granted, it's a pretty good potluck food, but we only need a couple of lasagnas, tops. Not twelve of them. The same goes for green salads. I'm going to be pondering good potluck recipes between now and April, for sure. Perhaps Rebecca could share some recipes...)

Holy crap, that's a lot of work. But now I expect the singing masses to rise and volunteer to do it all so I can just sit around stressing out. Whoo-hoo! This is going to be fantastic.

(P.S. - Inder posted on the Time magazine article!)

More All California Convention

Natalia and Inder gave better reports than I could, and there's also some nice comments from out-of-towners on the fasola singings list.

Right now, anyway, you can see my pictures on the slideshow on our sidebar. You can also see my pictures here, and  you can see Chris Thorman's pictures here. 

Inder's First Convention

I second Natalia - San Pedro was pretty dang nice. And loud. I'm so inspired! I want to go to all of the singing conventions all over the country. I think I could manage it. I just need approval from work. And my husband. I'll work on it.

Check out this room!


I took a lot of really bad photos. Here's one of Jim leading:

Here are the Altos - Erica and Susan are the ones I recognize:

Here's Cindy:


Here's Natalia - you can always depend on her to look at the trebles (and yes, that's Richard's nose, which seems to make its way into a lot of photos). Also, I'm doing my best to balance things out after the Linda-blitz:

All-California Convention

Well, the California Convention in San Pedro was pretty dang nice.



Pat Keating (pictured above with Richard's nose) was a gracious and with-it chair, and the L.A. local singers were excellent hosts. Rick Russell and Bruce Hayes arranged; Laura Boyd Russell pitched, with assistance from Richard DeLong.

Mary Rose valiantly tried to keep it green, although L.A.'s recycling regulations didn't turn out to be quite as liberal as originally thought (let's face it; nobody believed for a second that those waxed paper cups were recyclable).

I liked how this convention was friendly to beginners while still keeping things together -- i.e., the front bench always had responsible singers on it, with few gaps.
Several new singers led, and were well supported by the class. The convention also drew visitors from all over, including many excellent leaders who stretched the class (in a good way!).

It was great to see Ted, Anne, Steve, and Lisa from Chicago; Richard from Georgia, Claire from New Mexico; Leyland and Mary Chris from Virginia, Kiri and James from Rhode Island; Jerry, Carla, Carroll, Midge, and Jeff from San Diego; Steve and Karen from Eugene; the Los Angeles singers; and some semi-locals like Cindy and Jeanette, who live nearby but who I don't sing with that often for various logistical reasons. There were just boatloads of people there with whom I'd sung before, and with whom I was glad to sing again. I'm missing tons of names in this list.

Lots of Bay Area locals went down, and it's always fun to see how we behave when not in our Bay Area bubble. Every Bay Area singer led, including Caroline, who claimed she hadn't meant to sign up to lead, but in fact led really well.

I wasn't able to take that many pictures before my camera batteries crapped out, but here are a few.


This is Linda in front of the Korean Friendship Bell in Angels' Gate Park. No, Linda, you can never escape the paparazzi.


Here are a few pictures as the convention was beginning on Saturday:

Mark, Ted, Carolyn, and Carroll (who was also the outgoing chair).


Claire and Susan


Wade from Utah, Cindy, Inder, and Xaris. Xaris, a treble, claimed to be a new singer but sang everything perfectly, including the shapes. Which makes me wonder: how many singers would be willing to make a dark Faustian pact in exchange for sweet Sacred Harp skills? Is that Darlene's secret?


Here are some leaders:


Anne from Evanston, IL -- who always rocks.


Carla from San Diego


Inder!


Kiri


Laura and the dude from the hostel, whose name I did not catch. Also, part of Leyland's face, because that is the nature of taking pictures from the second row.


Susan and, um, Richard's ear.


Betty from Oakland: my sole singing shot on Sunday before my camera ate Linda's batteries.


Here are some random singing shots:


Linda and Chris in the tenor section


Linda and Chris in the tenor section, with Chris taking a picture. He probably has some awesome ones; hopefully he'll post them.


A piece of the tenor section: Richard, Carolyn, and Mary Rose.


Some basses: Ron H., Steve W., James B., and Paul L.


Here are some (poorly taken) photos of the social:


Linda and fellow tenor Kasia


David and Susan, at whom I tried to pitch a truly brilliant film idea while they smiled and nodded and checked their watches


And finally, the Korean Friendship Bell:




In conclusion, why do we have a "Sacred Harp" label? Aren't all of these posts Sacred Harp posts?