Choir, ensemble, solos, instrumentals…
A deeply appreciative audience, both in person and online…
Lots of preparation, loads of details…
All culminating in a beautiful expression of energy, upliftment, and JOY!
Tonight’s Christmas concert
Hildegard and her music
As usual, a little delving into a topic led to a lot more delving.
One of the many things Hildegard of Bingen is known for is her music. While exploring these videos I was reminded that back in the late 90’s I had a CD of her compositions.
Funny how I had completely forgotten about it until now. Of course, I had to delve even deeper to find it, only to discover it was Hildegard’s music but adapted to a sort of pop/New Age sensibility, with electronic instruments and drums, etc. I must have liked it back in the day, but it doesn’t do anything for the current me.
I appreciate how the St. Stanislav Girls’ Choir (above) brings such calm purity to this heavenly music. Below is another gorgeous example. And if you want to read more about Hildegard as a composer and the part music played in how she expressed her spiritual experience, check out this article.
The choir that sins together…
I can’t help wondering how long it took for someone to notice that the “G” had fallen down!
I’m sure the church staff had a good laugh about it. 😂
Off to a great start
We had close to eighty singers at tonight’s choir rehearsal (for the SRW concert).
Then there are another ten or so who couldn’t make it tonight but will join us for the warm-up rehearsal and concert on Tuesday.
I’m just not sure how or where we’re going to fit them all in!
Choir is back…and dancing!
For the first time in months…
…all our music team members were back from our various travels and present at tonight’s rehearsal.
…the full choir was back at it, with everybody ready to dive into preparations for Spiritual Renewal Week.
The ensemble has actually been meeting and holding down the fort throughout the weeks when Ramesha and I (and also Dambara) were off traveling, but it was great to be back with them again.
And to make things extra fun, Pavani led us in dancing the Horah, in order to get the right unified feel for Swami’s song, “A New Tomorrow.”
It was a great rehearsal. 😊
A joyful ovation
This isn’t the greatest pic (although I’m grateful to our friend, Neha, for capturing a few shots on my cell phone), but hopefully it conveys some portion of the joy that filled the room at the end of our concert tonight.
Hats off to choir, ensemble, accompanists, and tech crew for a job (extremely) well done!
A blast of Christmas joy!
If you’re ready for a blast of Christmas joy, please consider joining us for our annual Christmas Concert, THIS Saturday, December 16 at 5:30pm (PST) in the Temple of Light at Ananda Village.
This year’s concert feels special on several levels. To start with, it’s the first time since 2019 that the full Ananda Village Choir gets to sing on the Christmas Concert.
Secondly, early this year we made the decision to experiment with having a smaller ensemble of dedicated singers who were able and willing to put in the time and effort to take their singing to another level. I believe that outpouring of additional energy is going to bear beautiful fruit in this concert.
Finally, it feels special…just because! I can’t even explain the feeling; maybe the stars are somehow aligned. Who knows? It just feels really, really good.
We start early (5:30pm PST) in order to make the concert accessible to families with small children; that’s also the reason the program only lasts about an hour.
And if you live too far away to join us in person, watch the concert LIVE using this link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bDCI8OPwO0g (or you can just click on the video above).
I hope you can join us in celebrating the love of Christ and the joy of this Holy Season.
Shades of blue
Last night I finally had a chance to share something that’s been simmering in the back of my mind for quite a while.
Namely, to help our choir members understand that it’s not enough to just hit “the note” — because there are as many gradations of “the note” as there are shades of blue.
Blue came to mind the first time I thought of this, because there’s so much blue in the Temple of Light.
When I brought it up during rehearsal last night, I started by asking the other two nayaswami’s in the room to join me up front. Of course, all our shirts were blue, but they weren’t exactly the same blue. Then I called up another singer, who had on a greyish-blue T-shirt. Someone in the choir pointed out a person wearing blue jeans. And then we noted the blue carpet, the blue chairs, and the blue of the spiritual eye.
I think everyone got the point that when creating music together, there is one correct “shade” of note with which we all must align if we want our harmonies to be truly, gloriously beautiful.
A beautiful evening for a lovely rehearsal
Tonight was our final choir rehearsal for this Saturday’s event celebrating Nayaswami Jyotish’s 80th birthday.
Two of the musical offerings we’ve prepared for Jyotish felt rather daunting to pull together in the limited time we had available after the conclusion of Spiritual Renewal Week. But tonight it was clear that both projects were absolutely the right thing to do, and they’re coming together beautifully.
In fact, thinking over the entire rehearsal, I’m feeling a whole lot of gratitude for the harmonious, team-oriented, collaborative way that our music ministry and the entire choir works together.
Sure, there are chaotic moments, but the overall feeling is one of uplifted and uplifting FUN.
What a joy it is to serve in this way.
New vision for Village music
This is what our big meeting last night was about. It went really well; I feel we’re headed in some exciting new directions.
So, this is the new vision:
To broaden and expand community singing at the Village, while also presenting the highest quality and purest musical expression possible when broadcasting worldwide.
Our goal is to have MORE people singing — and in more ways — than before the pandemic. To help accomplish this we proposed three levels of involvement, depending on a person’s life circumstances, individual inclination, and energy level. Each individual gets to choose what’s right for them.
LEVEL 1 – Community All-Sing Choir
Fun and spontaneous; melody only (or parts if you want to); once a quarter sing-alongs
LEVEL 2 – Village Choir
Community attunement; singing in parts; two evenings a month; informal performances
LEVEL 3 – Performance Ensemble
Commitment and follow through; regular weekly rehearsals; perform for Sunday services, as well as possible outreach and recording
What’s really fun is that more ideas came up during the meeting, from people who are enthusiastic about helping to make them happen — specifically regarding more involvement for children and families, as well as more support for “newbies” who are just learning the music.
All in all, it’s an adventurous new phase for music at Ananda Village.