Heads up: this blog post will be a bit all over the place. It’s much more the synthesis of a collection of thoughts around a temporal location (i.e. – a diary/log) than around a topic (i.e. – an essay). To that end, I’ll put things in bite-sized categories with headings. It’s not my favorite format, but that’s life sometimes!
Contents
Events & ‘Firsts’
Mar 9, 2023
First day
SO many inside jokes!
Apr 15, 2023
Joined NBC (& BHS)
Voted in the previous Thursday.
Aug 3
First quartet rehearsal
‘Dance With My Father’ with Greg, Tony, and Bill.
Aug 5, 2023
First Harmony College
Notes & impressions
Oct 8, 2023
First Show
St Columba’s Church
Oct 20, 2023
April 18, 2024
First Regional Competition
I doubt that this is an exercise I’ll go through in future years. (But who knows?)
Songs Learned
I learned 31 songs in my first year (all Baritone parts).
The strange thing is that, while I believe that’s (objectively) a lot in hindsight, it didn’t seem like I was scrambling too much to learn songs. I guess I’ve discovered that learning new music (see the ‘Learning Songs’ section) is something of a natural strength of mine.
| Song | Month | Impetus |
|---|---|---|
| Over the Rainbow | Apr ’23 | Chorus |
| Shalom | Apr ’23 | Chorus |
| Keep the Whole World Singing | Apr ’23 | Chorus |
| Lullabye | May ’23 | Chorus |
| Oh Shenandoah | May ’23 | Chorus |
| All of Me | May ’23 | Chorus |
| I’ve Gotta Be Me | May ’23 | Chorus |
| Wizard of Oz medley | Jun ’23 | Chorus |
| Heart of My Heart | Jun ’23 | Chorus |
| I’m Feeling Fine | Jul ’23 | Chorus |
| Overture (This Is It) | Jul ’23 | Chorus |
| Come Fly With Me | Aug ’23 | Chorus |
| Sweet Caroline | Aug ’23 | Chorus |
| God Bless America | Aug ’23 | Chorus |
| ‘Till the Season | Aug ’23 | Chorus |
| Dance With My Father | Sep ’23 | Quartet |
| Have a Holly Jolly Christmas | Sep ’23 | Chorus |
| Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas | Sep ’23 | Chorus |
| Stompin’ at the Savoy | Sep ’23 | Chorus |
| O Holy Night | Nov ’23 | Chorus |
| Happy Holidays | Nov ’23 | Chorus |
| Happy Together | Jan ’24 | Chorus |
| Caroline | Jan ’24 | Quartet |
| Lullaby in Ragtime | Jan ’24 | Quartet |
| A Son of the Sea | Feb ’24 | Chorus |
| I Got Rhythm | Mar ’24 | Chorus |
| Smile | Mar ’24 | Quartet |
| Sweet and Lovely | Mar ’24 | Personal |
| I’m My Own Grandpa | Apr ’24 | Quartet |
| My Wild Irish Rose | Apr ’24 | Quartet |
| Sixteen Tons | Apr ’24 | Personal |
For this year, my extra-curricular learning will mostly focus on learning the 12 harmony brigade songs and the 18 remaining Barberpole Cat songs (and, of course, whichever songs NBC has on the schedule).
Learning Songs
[May 2024 Update: I stumbled across this very instructive blog post from BHS that outlines the best way to learn new songs. It seems that I re-invented the wheel (which is simultaneously neat and dumb)! If you’re interested in this section of my post, you’ll likely be even more interested in their take.]
Because I get bored easily (and generally switch between hobbies every 3-6 days), I tend to learn songs best in a ‘barn raising’ style. I put in a concerted effort in a short period of time that gets me to 99% (off-paper) familiarity with a song. As you’ll see below, for a 3-minute song, this takes somewhere between 1 hour and 45 minutes to 3 hours per week; about 2% of a week’s waking hours. Not a bad deal!
Because I’m in my car for 9-15 hours a week – commuting to and from work – most of my practice is done with the audio learning tracks. That’s just what works best for me. In the case where I don’t have a learning track, I make a rough approximation of one in Musescore and upload it to my weekly learning playlist.
Occasionally, when I get home, I’ll make some notes in the song’s chart (usually circling “problem areas,” marking ideal breath spots, arrowing up pitches that are higher or lower than I naturally tend, etc.). I typically do this in the lull before bedtime when Liam’s watching TV (and I’d otherwise be doom-scrolling Twitter).
I categorize my phases of learning in 2 ways: my relationship to the song (a thing to ‘run toward’) and what I’ll avoid in the hypothetical where I have rehearsal tomorrow (a thing to ‘run away from’):
Session 1: Aware (or “won’t be lost”)’
Listening:
– Full mix: 3 times to get the shape of the song
– Section: 3-5 times to get the shape of the part
Singing: none. Just listen. Singing will only get in the way.
Chart annotations: none (unless there’s some non-obvious “shape of the song” thing)
Total time (assuming a 3-minute track): 20-25 minutes
– Don’t go too far or too long or advance to the next step. This part is lightweight on purpose.
Session 2: Acquainted (or “won’t be embarrassed”)
Listening:
– Section: 5-10 times to get to 50% note knowledge
– Identify which sections/measures/notes don’t “go as expected;” these likely will be my problem sections in the future
– Pay attention to the interplay between lyrics and composition
Singing: none, if you can help it (it’s hard to not hum along starting around the 5th playthrough)
Chart annotations: circle (or otherwise call out) problem sections/measures/notes
Total time: 20-30 minutes
– Again: Don’t over-rehearse. Cap your time here at a half hour. Otherwise, your brain will move too far into “pick and shovel” mode, try to cram too much in there, and you won’t recall much come morning.
Session 3: Familiar (or “won’t be frustrated”)
Usually just before I start this session, my brain has a “if you put a gun to my head, I couldn’t tell you a single note in how this song goes” moment. It’s fine. Trust the process. 2 cords in, it’ll all come flooding back to you (and you’ll never have that mind fog with this song again).
Somewhat ironically, this is also the section where, during and after, I wake up with the song already playing on a loop in my mind.
Listening:
– Section: on repeat as many times as it takes to get to 85% note knowledge
– I often Sebastian this, two phrases at a time: stop and repeat the track just after 2 phrases until I do it with (near-)zero errors. Then stop and repeat the track at 4 phrases until I do it with zero errors. And so on until the song’s over.
– You’ll likely come across some non-obvious notes/lyrics that you can’t quite parse from the track. Check those out on the chart when you get home.
Singing: sing along with your part
Chart annotations: update your problem sections as you introduce/master them
Total time: 45-90 minutes
– Feel free to go long in this section. For me, this tends to be where “flow” occurs the most often. Listen to your body.
– If necessary, break this into 2 sessions across 2 days. (I find it typically unnecessary to expand to 3 sessions.)
Session 4: Friendly (or “won’t be on paper”)
From here on out, it’s a less intense endeavor. You’re over the hump; most of the heavy lifting was done in Sessions 2 and 3. This will be a nice, simple workout; you’ll mostly be locking in yesterday’s gains.
Listening:
– Section: on repeat as many times as it takes to get to zero mistakes 2x in a row. (It’s easier than it sounds, at this point.)
– Start paying attention to ideal breathing spots and potential phrasing flourishes (word emphasis, dynamics, etc.)
Singing: sing along with your part
Chart annotations:
– update your problem sections as you introduce/master them
– breathing spots
– phrasing thoughts
Total time: 20-30 minutes
Session 5: Comfortable (or “won’t be uptight”)
Full mix track (even better: section-less track) 5-10 times
Listening:
– Full mix (even better, a section-less mix!): on repeat as many times as it takes to get to zero mistakes 2x in a row. (This usually means 3-6 times for me.)
– Pay attention to which parts are predominant at any given phrase. Should you back off? Be stronger? If you know music theory (I don’t) and which voice should be predominant in any given chord (I don’t), this should be a bit easier.
Singing: sing along with all parts
Chart annotations:
– update your problem sections as you introduce/master them
– not which chords/sections require which level of strength
Total time: 10-30 minutes
Challenges
Aside from the culture shock of being “the new guy,” I didn’t have too many challenges this year. For our chapter, forming a quartet seems to be a near-insurmountable obstacle. But I’m confident that it’ll happen with time.
In most skills, there are several ‘plateaus’ at which, until you climb up, you can’t make much progress. Here are my current plateaus:
- Theory: For me, this will be music theory. As mentioned in the ‘Learning Songs’ section, a lot of understanding volume, phrasing
- Composition: I have a ton of songs that I’d like to sing, most of which don’t currently exist (as far as I know). I’m starting to read the ‘Arranging Barbershop’ series. But it’s super theory-heavy (see previous item) and slow-going. I could just begin arranging through trial and error, but that seems like a recipe for frustration (and rapid abandonment). I recognize that this is a marathon, not a spring. But I’m impatient to make progress here.
- Breath: I have terrible breath control (basically always have). I can’t hold notes very long. It’s already a problem and, if I start quartetting (like I want to), it’s going to become even more acute. Some of these Lead posts are insane!
I’m sure this isn’t helped by the fact that most of my practice is sitting back in a car! But that’s the hand I’m currently playing. I try to focus on breath control during chorus practices (since, due to my prep practices, I rarely have to focus on notes or dynamics). - Diaphragmatic Singing: this is another one that I’ve always struggled with. The first 15 years of my singing training was with choruses, small madrigal groups, and vocal jazz ensembles; all situations where blending is critical. You don’t want to stand out.
When I took voice lessons in college (and wanted to focus on the musical theatre style) I really struggled with singing from the diaphragm, letting go, belting, etc. This isn’t too much of a problem for barbershop choruses. But (again), when it comes to quartetting, I need to be able to turn this on. (Heck, it might even help with my breath control. Who knows?)
Good luck to me, I guess! If I really want to do something about #4 (and, to a lesser extent, #3), I think I might have to go the ‘voice coach’ route. We’ll see. I expect to make solid progress on #3 this year. If I make non-trivial progress on #1 as well, that’d be great.
