Stay At Home Choir

12. September 2021 · Comments Off on Stay At Home Choir · Categories: Can't Stop the Music!

I’ve enjoyed these for a while now and here is a new one:

From the YouTube page:

The Stay At Home Choir presents ‘Locus Iste’ by Gareth Malone, performed by 1500 singers from around the world, accompanied by Gareth Malone on piano and Gabriella Swallow on cello.

‘Locus Iste’ was specially written by Gareth Malone for the Stay At Home Choir to perform. This moving but optimistic piece is a new setting of a traditional Latin text used to consecrate churches: “locus iste a Deo factus est (this place was made by God)”. Written during lockdown, the song inspires us to find the sacred in our everyday spaces.

Our global choir took part in the ‘Locus Iste’ project over four weeks in April-May 2021. This final video is the culmination of online rehearsals, masterclasses, and global socials led by Gareth Malone, choirmaster Graham Bier, and Stay At Home Choir co-founders Tori Longdon and Jamie Wright.

JOIN THE STAY AT HOME CHOIR

The Stay At Home Choir is a global community of 27,000 members from 75+ countries around the world. Our mission is to make high quality music-making accessible to a worldwide community of musicians. We welcome all singers with any level of experience.

To learn more and join our next project with The Swingles, visit https://www.stayathomechoir.com.

We provide opportunities for our members to learn from, and perform with, some of the best artists in the world. We’ve collaborated with I Fagiolini, Gareth Malone, The King’s Singers, The Swingles, VOCES8, John Rutter, Marin Alsop, The Sixteen, and the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra.

You can also find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram: @stayathomechoir

SUPPORT US

Our projects are Pay-As-You-Feel and, thanks to the generosity of our members and supporters, we’ve provided hundreds of free places to those who need them.

You can support the Stay At Home Choir by donating here:

First Symphony Concerts, Over ‘n Out

09. September 2021 · 2 comments · Categories: Ramble

We had our two Symphony Silicon Valley concerts this past weekend. They were outdoors, so I wasn’t as apprehensive about playing them, but I must admit I was quite surprised at the number of unmasked audience members. Of course it was outdoors, and odds are it was safe, but it still just was jarring to see nearly 3,000 people and so many with no mask.

After the second concert two students came down front to say hi. It’s been ages since any of my students have come to one of my concerts, so I was quite pleased. One even brought me flowers! What a surprise that was, and I was able, then, to send a thank-you card made using one of my flower photographs. (If you haven’t visited my photography site please do go enjoy some flowers there.) I’m always quite diligent in sending thank-you notes to students. Many are very good at saying (and writing) thank-you, but not all. So I teach more than just oboe sometimes. (When did sending thank-you notes … or even saying a simple thank you … go out of style, I wonder?)

Next up is our opening set for our regular season. I play very few notes, but every one of those notes will be heard: we are doing Dvorak’s New World Symphony and I play the English horn for that. I honestly can’t remember when I last played a symphony concert on which I had a big solo.

And yes, I get nervous.

CONCERT!

03. September 2021 · Comments Off on CONCERT! · Categories: Concert Announcements

From the Symphony Silicon Valley site:

Two glorious concerts — absolutely FREE — on San Jose State’s Tower Lawn

Symphony Silicon Valley and Opera San Jose team up to present a free outdoor musical extravaganza to celebrate Labor Day weekend, and to welcome Live Music back to our community. These 75 to 90-minute programs will feature full symphony orchestra, operatic soloists, and the piano instrumental magic of San Jose’s very own Jon Nakamatsu, Gold Medalist of the Van Cliburn International Piano Competition. The programs, under the baton of conductor Peter Jaffe, will present the music of Gershwin, Sibelius, Mozart, Puccini, Brahms, Tchaikovsky and more. There will be some chairs and water bottles provided, but you can bring your own lawn chair or blanket, as well as a picnic dinner.

WEARING A MASK IS ENCOURAGED.

Saturday: 7:00 performance. Sunday: 5:30 performance, both south of the library on the corner of 4th and San Fernando at San Jose State University. Highly recommended!