African American Roots Ensemble

Last semester I was able to join the African American Roots Ensemble, which is part of the Contemporary Improvisation Department at the NEC. I was also really excited that the ensemble performed a Kenyan hymn, 'Nimerudi Mashambani', that the Nairobi Chamber Chorus taught the Loruvani and Makumira choirs during the workshop last April. Unfortunately I was in Venezuela for the performance, but glad to have made a small contribution to the group's awareness of East African music.

Part of our rehearsals included preparing for a joint performance with the Agbekor Society from Tufts University. We collaborated on songs that involved a mixture of solos by Nani Agbeli, dancing, and choir singing. It was a challenge to hear each other sing and keep together whilst just behind a group of drummers playing their hearts out! The final product was absolutely exhilarating, with so much energy and vibrancy. It was such a great chance to perform and do some dancing on the Jordan Hall stage too! Below shows myself with other backing singers and Nedelka of the CI faculty for Fela Kuti's Shuffering and Shmiling.

 

The Special Needs Department in Barquisimeto

There has been a lot of coverage of this groundbreaking part of El Sistema's programming developed at the Barquisimeto Conservatory. The program's purpose is the integration of the special needs child: First with the family, the special needs ensembles and then into other musical programs in the nucleo (they aim to bring the students into regular programmes as much as possible).

This integration starts with the family and is the most important part of the program, with the belief that the family is the nucleo of society. There is participation from parents and siblings in the ensembles, but the teachers hope to show the capabilities of the students rather than their inabilities to promote and support unity in the family. The siblings and other students who are volunteers are committed to regular attendance and they have a responsibility to help with supervision from teachers. After an assessment of the students particular needs, lots of private work occurs with a teacher before they are integrated into an ensemble. The programs are deliberately a part of the conservatory programming so the community can see they have and should have the same opportunities. In fact, they have too many requests from other students to be involved, and to be a part of the Coro de Manos Blancas (White Hands Choir) in particular. Groups of students are put together according to cognitive as well as chronological ages.

 

Ensembles

• In the piano studio (Cathedra de piano), students undertake the same repertoire and exercises as the other students, but at a different pace. We saw performances from students who are sight and movement impaired, and autistic.
• The teacher of the recorder ensemble showed us how they teach the songs using pictures of the recorder with the finger holes coloured in for the different notes. Students often start their involvement in the program with recorders as it helps teachers to see how the child will progress with other ensembles.  
• The percussion ensemble has been going for six years, they started with classical repertoire and are now using more contemporary songs. The leader's teaching technique involves listening and repeating - he plays the song on the phone, they imitate using their instruments, and repeat and repeat. During this lengthy process they are creating their own adaptations of the original song.
• The Handbells ensemble seemed to include the majority of the younger students in the program. They can easily start with responsibility for one note in the melody, and participation allows for the awareness and understanding of contrapuntal music.
• White Hands Choir - For many of us, this experience was the highlight of our month's residency in Venezuela. The Coro de Manos Blancas has received the most attention of all the ensembles - the combination of watching the students express the music through their voices and their hands is very moving. Seeing their performances live definitely lived up to the expectations and then some. Whilst preparing for our trip, Ayriole had this great idea to learn the sign language for a simple spiritual she had taught us, 'Yonder Come Day'. With the help of the fabulous Andrea Olivo, who was a member of the choir and now lives in Boston, we rehearsed the signs for this song to perform to the White Hands Choir. This was a special moment as it was the first time a group has performed for them in sign language too! It was awesome to be able to share in some way and to thank them for their performances. Look on youtube for many of their videos...

Braille

An incredible part of this astonishing program is the Braille services they have developed. Three members of staff work on creating music and text in Braille for the students. They described the process: music is put into Finale which is then copied into the Lime Program, which translates the music directly into braille and then can be printed out on a special machine. They also create large print scores for the visually-impaired. If students ask, they will translate school and university textbooks and novels into Braille as well. These services are only available to students already in the program, and are sometimes an incentive for children to join. The department have amassed a vast database and so they often get requests (national and international) to translate material into braille.

They also explained how they have developed the incredibly complex system to codify music in Braille. It is very difficult to learn especially for those who have learnt some traditional music notation previously; there is no stave, separate codes are written for pitch and rhythm, and other codes indicate left hand and right hand in piano music before each note. Once they have read it, then begins the process to memorise it! The learning process is easier if students already know some basic braille. Others find the complex notation system constricting in terms of musical development and interpretation.

One member of the program, Gustavo, composes by dictating to assistants who put his music into Finale and then translate into braille. He is an active member of the program in many capacities. Gustavo is part of the percussion ensemble, starting on xylophone, and now on piano. He has also tried conducting, but translating the music into gestures was challenging, and it is also difficult to know where to signal each voice. Some students are able, however, to participate actively in orchestra and they benefit from their exceptional listening skills so they are not at so much of a disadvantage by not being able to see the signals given by the conductor.

Gustavo (below, second from left) directs an excellent chamber group of 5 male voices who focus on Venezuelan and LatinAmerican choral works. Their performances were full of vitality and hunour. He spoke so eloquently and passionately about the mission of the group in promoting traditional music, and he had arranged some of the songs for the group himself.

Another member of the ensemble, Daniel, (below, centre) sings with the Camarata Larense as well, and participates in their concerts and tours. I was able to have a great conversation with him despite my limited Spanish. I was telling him about my singing experience in Cambridge and he started waxing lyrical about the British choir Polyphony, conducted by Stephen Layton, which happens to be one of my favourite choirs, and not necessarily so well known outside of the UK. Layton is also one of the most inspiring conductors I've had the privilege to work with, so it was great to share that experience. Daniel has a really phenomenal voice, and sang a solo in the joint concert with the Schola Cantorum, including choreography where his fellow singers effortlessly and seamlessly guided him down the raised platform to the front of the stage to perform, and back quickly. That moment encapsulated for me the success of this program in integrating all musicians into ensembles suitable for their musical ability, and that this process is done as a team.

 

Choirs in Barquisimeto

The most fulfilling experience from our time at Barquisimeto for me, was the chance to get to know some choral singers and to participate with them in some workshops with Maria Guinand of the Schola Cantorum of Venezuela.

We met up with the teachers that we had observed in the nucleos at the conservatory during the mornings, where they were more than willing to chat about their experience in El Sistema and answer my long list of questions. Aubree and I caught up with Manual, Jorge, Gustavo and Crismar, who are members of the Camarata Larense, a professional choir based at the conservatory that rehearses every evening. Jorge and Crismar teach at the Santa Rosa nucleo, Gustavo at the Incret nucleo, and Manuel at the Maria Pereira de Daza nucleo that we didn't have a chance to visit.

They are obviously great friends and have spent a considerable amount of time rehearsing, performing, touring and teaching together. They talked about the curriculum they teach and how they have regular meetings so teaching is unified across the nucleos in the area. This allows them to also organise large collaborative performances - Manuel mentioned one concert that involved 1300 children. Some of the singers also participate in the famous Coro de Manos Blancas (White Hands Choir) based at the conservatory.

They were very eloquent when talking about the social agenda of El Sistema and also their gratitude for its founder: "It's all about building relationships" and "Maestro Abreu has worked all of his life for us". They expressed a deep belief in the approach of using music to help others.

Aubree and I went to the last rehearsal of the Camarata before their collaboration workshops with the Schola Cantorum. They were working on a variety of repertoire including Eli! Eli! by C. Bardos and the Crucifixus setting by Antonio Lotti. The choir was founded and is still directed by Livia Gomez, and recently won the Folkloric Music Section at the 2012 World Choir Games in Cincinnati. I was struck not only by the high quality and technique apparent, but also by the unified sound they were able to produce, which must be created by rehearsing together every day!

Maria Guinand & the Schola Cantorum

This was a case of being in the right place at the right time, as Maria Guinand had not taught at Barquisimeto before or collaborated with the choirs there. She led a three-day workshop for choir directors and singers in Barquisimeto nucleos, and joint rehearsals with the Camarata. We arrived a little late to the first session, but this was perhaps not a bad idea as every participant was standing up to introduce themselves. I managed to introduce the Fellows in Spanish!

The workshop started with a discussion of Alberto Grau’s book and his philosophy of choir direction. He was the founder of the Schola Cantorum, a prolific composer for children, and very influential choral conductor. There was then a presentation by vocal technique assistant Jessica, including a lot of eurythmics. Their method is to teach rhythms using the body first and allow children to experience them before conceptualising in theory work.

The Schola Cantorum has its own Foundation with youth and children's choirs, and all choirs have a director and a vocal coach. The vocal coach leads warm-ups, sometimes just the vocalises, sometimes physical exercises too. They act like a section leader in the orchestra and point out vocal techniques and rhythms for certain tricky passages, along with group breathing suggestions. It was interesting to see this unfamiliar role of the vocal coach present in the Venezuelan choirs. In group teaching with the children's and youth choirs, Gustavo simply said that "I am responsible for their sound".

On the second day of workshops, Maria dealt more with conducting itself and led us in several exercises to relax our arms and upper body. We followed her example in conducting in different time signatures and also communicating expression. We again finished by going through some fabulous works by Alberto Grau for children’s choir, including some very complex eurhythmics.

Maria’s time in Barquisimeto culminated in a joint concert of the Schola Cantorum with the Camarata Larense. It was very moving to hear such beautiful sacred music and I felt transported from the dingy auditorium back to a chapel in Cambridge. They performed some of the repertoire that I had heard the Camarata rehearse, and the force of the collaborative sound of both choirs was immensely impressive. The Camarata’s performance of some Venezuelan music with tongue-twister lyrics and hilarious choreography stole the show for me and thoroughly explained their success at the World Choir Games.  

Barquisimeto #5

Carora

The town of Carora is an exquisitely beautiful, if somewhat neglected, colonial town in the state of Lara. We were headed for the Cultural Centre, which has been in existence since 1965. It has been said that this was one of the first, if not the first, nucleo established right at the beginning of El Sistema history.

Rather than seeing the weekly afternoon programming, this was a chance to see the activities of a nucleo on a Saturday. We started by seeing the Initiation (beginners) orchestra. After watching them rehearse for a while, the conductor explained a bit about the orchestra: The children had been playing their instruments for six months, and had been playing as an orchestra for three months; they started by rehearsing for one and a half hours twice a week, and then two hours on the Saturday; originally they had started by putting the strings together and then adding a wind and percussion section. The conductor complained of not having enough teachers, and how he sometimes works by himself, which must be challenging in these early stages. The majority of the children were playing violins, perhaps it is to do with the instruments they have, or the instrument’s popularity. The teaching method they use with beginners involves listening and singing to start with, then reading the score and singing using solfege, before playing the melodies on their instruments.

The Fellows broke off into groups to teach individual or ensemble lessons, and I joined Tatjana and Megan at a violin sectional of the Children’s Orchestra. It was an absolute privilege to watch Tatjana lead this rehearsal very capably in her fluent Spanish, as they rehearsed a piece the group was familiar with and needed a few adjustments, and also a tricky piece they were just starting to learn. I stayed in the back row to help one girl who looked like she was the youngest of the group, and almost managed to keep up with the instructions in Spanish!

We were able to briefly see a rehearsal of the Youth Orchestra, under the guidance of another original member of the Simon Bolivar Orchestra, who had recently returned after a successful conducting career in Argentina. It made me wonder how successful El Sistema is at retaining the large amount of students who end up in their beginner orchestras every year. We kept on seeing large orchestras of children who had only been playing since the beginning of the academic year, but considering this happens every year, what percentage go on to the children’s and youth orchestras? It seems that record-keeping and assessment is haphazard and depends on the nucleo, so it would have been difficult to get an overall answer.