Dear Chalice Choir,

I loved our rehearsal last night. Thanks for hanging in there with me and with each other.

We now have 62 on the roster, 38 women and 24 men, which is powerful, humongous and awe-inspiring!

And we may have up to a dozen more singers to join us for our December 10 performance of Britten's "Ceremony of Carols."

Everybody should now have a reading buddy, which I hope provides our learners with solid, ongoing help in figuring out what to sing and how to sing it.

This Saturday, September 30, Ruth Ann Hanlin is offering sectionals at BUF - no RSVP, just show up - as follows:

9:30am Sopranos
10:15 Altos
11:00 Tenors
11:45 Basses

She will be going over "This Little Babe" and "A Mighty Fortress"

This Sunday please be on the risers ready to sing by 9:45am

We're going to do Guantanamera and There Is More Love for the service which starts at 10:30am.

Please wear black on bottom and a solid color of your choice on top (what we're calling a box of crayons)

Regards,

Kevin

Dear BUF Chalice Choir,

Because we want our choir members to feel loved, competent and comfortable, we are implementing various schemes for skill building and team building.

Last night we started setting up a music reading buddy system. This is a work in progress. As people settle in, we may need to fill in and reshuffle a bit, but please feel to start learning the songs together now, even outside of rehearsal, if you like.

This Saturday, September 23, I will be leading an “Introduction to Choir Singing” group session from 9:30-10:30am at BUF.  Then, from 10:30-11am, I’ll follow up with the attendees for short, user-friendly, one-on-one vocal explorations, if wanted. No sign up required, just come.

Starting Saturday, September 30, Ruth Ann Hanlin will be leading her much-beloved sectionals at BUF to help people learn their parts for upcoming choir performances.  Her schedule:

9:30-10:15am        Sopranos

10:15-11am          Altos

11-11:45am          Tenors

11:45-12:30pm        Basses

Again, no sign up required, just come.

Ruth Ann will start with the song “This Little Babe” from Britten’s “Ceremony of Carols.”

She plans to offer further Saturday sectionals on October 14 and 21 plus November 4, 11 and 18.                     

Don’t forget that you can practice with Al Heezen’s on-line rehearsal tracks 24 hours a day by going to bufchoir.org.

There, now don’t you feel loved?

Sincerely,

Kevin

Hi Phoenix,

Here's the lowdown:

Please practice Simple Gifts so that our 2017-2018 debut on Sunday is all that it can be. Here is a YouTube take using our SSAB version that you can sing along with:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jJfncDtZn5U

We'll rehearse on Sunday at 9:30am. Please wear SOLID Fall colors, like yellows, browns, orange, etc. You can always wear black on bottom, with the other colors, on top.

A special shout out to Andrew and Melanie for tackling the very challenging piano and flute parts !!

Thanks,

K

Little Recruiting Push 9-19-17

Dear BUF Chalice Choir and friends,

We had a great start to the BUF choir season with performances the last two Sundays.

Good job learning all those notes!!

We rehearse from 6:45 to 8pm on Wednesdays. Tomorrow evening, September 20,  we'll be welcoming a number of newcomers and returnees and we'll be introducing the repertoire for our Thanksgiving and Christmas programs, including Benjamin Britten's spectacular "Ceremony of Carols."

This 30-minute classical masterpiece for choir and harp is a thrill to sing, and with the strong leaders that we already have in the BUF Chalice Choir leading the way, it will be a chance for singers new to choir to be a part of something grand and inspiring. We have engaged the area's finest harpist, Jill Whitman from WWU, to play harp in our performance on Sunday morning, December 10.

Now is the time for all of you to bring your friends to try us out, before we get too far into this season's music.

The next time we'll give a little recruiting push will be in January.

Looking forward to the enthusiasm and joy of tomorrow’s rehearsal :)

Kevin