Things can be rough this time of year, and singing together can help. Jacqui and Liz talk to members of the East of the Don Chorus about the songs that mean so much... or not.
Music Notes & Special Guest Stars
Ep. 1 December 12, 2019
Many thanks to these legends:
Morgan Russell
Damaris Schmucker
Mike Flint
Laurie Sanderson
Rachel Ellis
[0:01]
[Choir doing those weird vocal warm-ups. Lip trills!]]
JC: Hi, I’m Jacqui Clydesdale.
LW: And I’m Liz Walker.
JC: And this is Choral Fixation, where we ask: why do people love singing together? And how do we get the non-singers to join in?
LW: We will be exploring the answers to these questions in detail in our upcoming season, starting March 2020.
JC: But today we’re doing a special episode for the holiday season a.k.a. Super Bowl for choirs by talking to members of the East of the Don Chorus, in Toronto.
LW: Now you heard them doing some vocal warm-ups at the top of the episode. Let’s check in and see how they’re doing as they are rehearsing for their upcoming holiday concert.
[0:40]
[East of the Don Chorus practises “We Wish You a Merry Christmas,” ending on a wrong note or two.]
[1:15]
JC and LW: [laughs]
LW: OUCH. Ouch... that’s, okay. So full disclosure, Jacqui, I am a member of this choir, I am a member of this choir, and I am actually one of the sopranos in that clip. [Laughs]
JC: [Laughter]: You’re definitely going to get it. November, around this time of year, is always the hardest point, because you kind-of-sort-of-got it, but you kind-of-sort-of-don’t yet, and no, it’ll totally come together for Christmas.
LW: You know whenever I’m talking to other people in choirs, if it’s November, it’s always the same response: “How’s it going? We’re in the weeds, man. We’re in the weeds.”
JC: [laughs] That’s right.
LW: Because that concert is coming up and there are some songs where we‘re, like, I don’t know if we are ever going to get this.
JC: But what is it, like, when you’re in the weeds like that and when things are, I don’t know, dark and tough and November and tiring, what is it that keeps you going? What is it that makes you think, “All right! I definitely want to do this!”
LW: Yeah, well, I’m... OK, so I have to say that for me, when we are at this stage of rehearsals, I am looking to my conductor to tell me that I’m doing... good. That I’m doing well. Actually, one of the first people that we talked to at the rehearsal was Morgan, and she is a sectional conductor, and she’s one of those people, who her own energy is part of what she brings to motivating through these tough times. So let’s hear a little clip from Morgan; she’s going to tell us about what she loves about Christmas songs.
[2:44]
Morgan Russell: Oh, I cannot get enough of a Christmas... I would do a whole Christmas concert that’s just Christmas music. Yeah, because when you grow up you learn it, especially if you grow up musical, and you do choirs, you do bands and stuff, you have to start rehearsing Christmas music in September, especially at school. And so I actually miss Christmas music as an adult because you only ever start to hear it in, like, December. So, as an adult, I actually miss Christmas music and I am totally happy to do it and I would join a choir that just did an actual straight carol sing Christmas concert. Yeah.
[3:14]
JC: So that’s very enthusiastic Christmas devotee, Morgan, reminding us all that if you want to maintain your child like excitement for Christmas, but also have something you can be proud of as an adult to sing in front of other people, you’ve got to start practising in September.
LW: When you’ve worked so hard to come so far, and then you deliver that performance, it really feels like you have pulled off an amazing feat [laughs].
So Damaris Schmucker is our conductor at East of the Don, and she is one of those amazing conductors who can motivate by telling you how far you’ve come. She’s being so warm, and she’s being so encouraging, and she’s saying, “Guys! You didn’t know this song at all in September, and look how much you’ve done with it.” And at the same time, be able to say, “We really need to tighten up this section over here, so please pay attention.” So she’s, y’know, conducting with both hands, I like to think.
JC: So let’s see… I mean it’s all very well and good for, you know, singers to show up excited to, excited play along, excited to sing. But how does the choir director feel? I mean she’s picking music… When does she start picking music?
LW: It’s true actually. Damaris, she’s picking out the songs that we’re going to be singing in December in July. Y’know, we’re complaining about how we’re sick of hearing Christmas songs in the mall in November, but she’s been listening to them since the summertime. She’s sitting on a beach listening to Christmas carols. So when we actually talked to her about her favourite Christmas carols, [laughs] she actually gave us a funny response that we were not expecting.
[4:55]
Damaris Schmucker: I don’t love Christmas tunes. I really don’t.
JC: Really?
DS: No.
JC: Really?
DS: I’m a total Grinch that way, [laughter] but I can totally fake it.
JC: That’s amazing.
DS: Yeah.
JC: What’s your least favourite? One that makes you, like…
DS: Jingle Bells. BLECH.
JC: Really?
DS: Mmmhmm. Yeah, every time.
JC: Yeah. You know…
DS: But it’s such a, like, it’s such a hit. It’s such a, yeah, everybody loves…
JC: Everybody knows it.
DS: Yes, and children love it, so then you have to love it, right? Yeah. Yeah.
[5:17]
[Everyone’s favourite, Jingle Bells, plays. JC and LW laugh]
[5:35]
JC: One of your fellow choir members, in fact, someone you stand beside, I believe he’s a tenor? Mike?
LW: Right.
JC: He has some ideas on how to make even an annoying earworm like Jingle Bells just a bit more bearable.
[5:48]
Mike Flint: One song that I really think is very very overplayed is Jingle Bells. The funny thing is, I sang in another choir five years ago, and we had an interesting arrangement of Jingle Bells. I mean the arrangement for Jingle Bells for the tenors is sung in a different way, that is different from…
JC: Can you give me a little piece of it, so I can get a sense?
MF: [singing] Oh JINGLE JINGLE jingle all the way, ohhhhh what fun it is to ride in a one horse open sleigh! Oh JINGLE JINGLE jingle all the way, ohhhhh what fun it is to ride in a one horse open sleigh!
JC: All right. So it makes it a little bit more of a dynamic feel.
MF: Something a little more dynamic, yeah. Exactly.
JC: That’s amazing.
[6:29]
LW: So I think what Mike is really demonstrating is that when you have these old earworms if you can hear them in a new way, you can bring new feeling to them, and I actually think that that’s really helpful for people when it comes to these holidays because we’re not kids anymore. It’s really an opportunity to embrace, kind of the more complex, adult feelings, that come along with Christmas
JC: He made that feel a little new and a little more fun and a little more, you know, joyful again. This is the time of year when we need a bit of light.
LW: Mmmhmm.
JC: It’s dark.
LW: The holidays can be a rough time for everybody.
JC: It’s cold and dark.
LW: Not just people in choirs.
JC: And yeah, Laurie touched on that a bit.
LW: Yeah, Laurie was talking about that. She told us that she grew up in the Caribbean. What I really loved when you were talking to Laurie in this clip, is that when she told you her favourite song, your first response was, “Wait. Is that your favourite song? Or is that the song you like the least?” ‘Cause it’s a pretty polarizing tune.
[7:40]
JC: Tell me a little bit about...
Laurie Sanderson: In the Bleak Midwinter.
JC: Is that the one you like or don’t like?
LS: I LOVE it.
JC: Ahhh
LS: I love that... I just love it.
JC: Why? Why do you love singing it?
LS: You know what? That’s a very good question because I spent the first 10 years of my life in the Caribbean. Okay? So, that was not part of our repertoire there and... but my mother... We didn’t have a television and we… the radio certainly didn’t sing In the Bleak Midwinter. And there’s lots of calypso and soca and stuff like that. And then I don’t know, when we came up, we went to Timmons and it was the bleak midwinter, let me tell you. Holy cow. I think my mother was on Valium for years. So. But somehow, that song just said everything to me: no matter how bleak it was, then there was this wonderful light there was this wonderful light that came in the middle of this very. Dark. Time. And the thing is when you get older you realize it’s the solstice. And it was, you know, it was more than just your celebration, everybody else’s was there too, right? Hannukah and all piled up on it, and rightly so, because it’s a friggin’ bleak time. But I just love the minor tones of it, and, I don’t know, it’s a bleak song but it warms the cockles of my heart. I love it. [laughs]
[9:09]
[In the Bleak Midwinter plays, in all its minor-key glory.]
[9:17]
JC: So I think Lori really touched on some stuff that a lot of people can identify with this time of the year. You know, whether it’s because it reminds me of the Christmases with love ones who are no longer with you. Or maybe you’ve just had a rough year, or a rough couple of years. Or if you’re just not a part of this particular faith tradition, and you don’t feel a part of all this holly jolly stuff, it can feel a bit, I don’t know…
LW: Mhmmm. Yeah, really alienated.
JC: That’s right and you and I have had this conversation about how for you singing at Christmas really kind of brought you back to it
JC: I had a rough couple of years where, you know,ugh, because of illness and some personal upheaval and things, I really didn’t… I didn’t want to hate and resent Christmas. I wanted to like it. Y’know, I wanted... I don’t necessarily think I needed to love it again, but I wanted to like it again. And, I mean, the minor key... those minor key songs and those minor notes, they kind of remind you and ground you in reality and then
LW: Mhmmm
JC: ...kind of make you yearn for something a bit better for that you remember
LW: Mhmmmm
JC: … that was great.
LW: I think Rachel really sort of touched on this when she was talking about the song… now Rachel told us about a song that we’d never heard before, but she said that her brother sent it to her a couple of years ago, and he said listen to this. And this song is amazing.
[10:46]
JC: Tell me what’s your favourite or least favourite you can tell me...
Rachel Ellis: It’s my favourite.
JC: song to sing around this time of year.
RE: It’s called Noel, C’est L’Amour.
JC: Oh? I don’t know that one.
RE: You hardly ever hear it, and in fact I’d never heard heard it until a couple of years ago. My brother sent me a message and he said you have to listen to this. So he sent me this recording, and it was a choir singing, a cappella, this gorgeous song. I’m not even sure what it’s about [unintelligible] Clearly it’s about love and it’s about Noel, but it was just the chords, gorgeous, lush chords. I love it.
[11:21]
JC: So, actually let’s listen to a little bit of this one, since it’s not super well known. All the other songs we’ve talked about, people are pretty familiar with, probably. For the non-French speakers out there, “Noel C’est L’Amour” roughly translates to “Christmas, it’s about love.” I mean it’s literally, “Christmas, it is love.”
[11:42]
[Children’s choir sings Noel, C’est L’Amour]
[12:30]
LW: In the song, this grown man is talking to his sibling, and he’s sharing memories about their mother singing about Christmas. And he is encouraging his sibling to share the memories and remember the wonder of childhood and remember the wonder of their mother’s love, and it just makes me want to cry just talking about it. [laughs]
JC: Yeah. And I think one of the fascinating things about it is that, he’s not talking about... he’s not talking about his own religious devotion. He’s not talking about... he’s not talking about Christmas as it is right now, he’s reflecting on the Christmases they had and again, their mom, you know, the lights on the snow and just sort of a general overall feeling of nostalgia and looking back.
[13:42]
LW: Okay, so after, after all these other folks from choir talking about their favourite Christmas songs, what are yours?
JC: So I love... I LOVE The Holly and the Ivy [sings] “The holly and the ivy.” It always seems to be sung, by I don’t know, English boys. I really like O Come all Ye Faithful, too, if we have to go to, like, the super standard songbook. You know me, I love something that’s either a pagan throwback, or we can sing Latin versus of. I love both of them. What about you?
LW: I, okay I love Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas. There are the lines that always get me, and the lines are: “Through the years we all will be together, if the fates allow.” And even when I was a kid, I found those lines very poignant. So, in my family we have this precious VHS tape and it’s from 1985 [video tape plays in background, with a man speaking and children laughing and talking] or 19… yeah, I think it’s 1985. And my uncle, he had a camcorder, and so there’s this just wonderful video tape of all of us at Christmas. And I’m a little kid and my cousins are little kids, and our parents are there, and my grandparents are there. And the thing is, when I look at it now, I mean, it’s so poignant because as a child Christmas is very simple. You know, it’s like presents and dolls and toys, and now when I look around I can see my parents, I can see their worries. I can see where they are and how it’s complex for them.
JC: That’s right. They’ve got, I don’t know bills to pay, divorces, you know, older parents to take care of in addition to their kids. Yeah.
LW: And there are a lot of people on that tape who are not with us any longer.
JC: Yeah.
LW: I have children now, and when we are looking around a room at the generations that are there, we know that everyone’s not always going to be there and right now we’re here and we’re all together and that’s really important.
JC: Yeah, but it’s true, yeah. We are the ones who are quietly, you know, thinking about the grown-up stuff and reflecting on the innocence of childhood. It sounds so… It sounds so trite, but it’s so true.
LW: Someday, you know, my kids are going to be celebrating cyborg Christmas, and I’m hoping that they will be able to look back and see how much they were loved and part of a bigger picture.
[16:30] [Music transitions us away from musing about cyborg Christmas]
LW: Okay, we need to check in with East of the Dawn Chorus and see how they’re doing.
[16:37]
[East of the Don Chorus sings “We Wish You a Merry Christmas”]
[17:08]
[Liz and Jacqui sing snippets of “We Wish You a Merry Christmas” in silly voices and at least two different keys)]
[17:19]
JC: And that’s our show. We want to thank Morgan, Mike, Lori, Rachel and everybody in the East of the Dawn Chorus for sharing their thoughts and their songs with us. We really, really appreciate it.
LW: And special thanks, of course, to Damaris Schmucker for being the most wonderful, patient conductor even at Christmas Even if she is a bit of a Grinch!
JC: I want to say thanks to Paul McDougall for fixing the kerning problems in our logo. And we’re saying goodbye for now, but we’ll be back in March of 2020 with a full season of shows.
LW: You can write us a review. Give us a rating. Please subscribe. That is really important, and it helps us out a lot.
JC: Maybe also write us with story ideas at choralfixations (with an “s”) at gmail dot com.
[18:06]
LW: For more information about the music in this episode, please go to our show notes, where you will find full links, credits and acknowledgments. I would like to say thank you for Noel, C’est L’Amour, that came from the Choer des Enfants Chanter Noel, a children’s choir from Sherbrooke, Quebec.
[18:29]
JC: “A Continuum of Tolerance” would be a great name for a Christmas sing-along. You could just sing…[laughs] you could just sing the songs you wanted to sing and drop out on the ones that you find too annoying. [laughs] There’d be a lot of drop-outs during Jingle Bells, but the kids would carry it.