Wednesday 1 May 2013

Music in context

Only some of our mark in choir is based on singing. We have our 3rd written assignment for the year i think, not really sure so I'm going to work on that. We are currently working on 5 songs in choir and for each song there are 5 questions. 2 questions that apply directly to the song and 3 general questions for all of them.

The 3 general questions are: Name of composer/ arranger, Genre/ country of origin, Year or composition OR if it is an arrangement, year of original and year of arrangement. These 5 songs for the assignment are:
Sally Gardens, Tebje Palom, Seasons of love, Come Sweet Death & Amavolovolo.
The songs with questions are in order below.

Sally Gardens:
Traditional Irish folksong, arranged by Sean Carter
1. A member of our own choir, Sean, created the arrangement we are singing. Name 2 composers who have created arrangements of Sally Gardens, and tell me something noteworthy about their arrangement.
Tony Hogan arranged a version of Sally Gardens for guitar. In his version, there are a few spots where the melody part has a few added eight notes instead of just having the regular melody.
Peter Dyson also wrote an arrangement of Sally Gardens for a choir. In his version, the male parts start with the females singing mm and aah for a few mesures until the melody starts and then they have a slightly different part, leaving out a few words and changing rhythms. It is also different for this tune to begin with the mm and aah instead of just the traditional melody.

2. What are "Weirs"? What are "the Sally (Salley) Gardens"?
Weirs are basically dams built to stop or divert the flow of water.
Salley means a willow tree so the salley gardens are gardens of willow trees.

Tebje Pajom:
Tebje Pajom was written by Dmitri Bortnianski and is Russian church orthodox music.
1. Tell me 3 fun facts about Dmitri Bortnianski.
He was born on October 28 1751 and is well known for being one of the golden three in his era. He also composed 7 operas in his lifetime.
2. What does the text of this piece mean? A general translation is acceptable.
Tebje Pajom is about praying to god "we pray thee, bless you, thank you, god."

Seasons of Love:
1. Jonathan Larson based Rent on the plotline of a famous Opera. what was the name of the opera? Who composed it?
Rent was based on La Boheme by Giacomo Puccini.
2. Please provide a brief synopsis of the musical, Given what is happening in the musical, what is the mood and meaning of this song? Think, in particular, about the text.

Its about a group of friends living bohemian style in New York city. It deals with HIV/AIDS, drugs and love. I think the mood of the song is sad, powerful and quite hopeful. You shouldn't take life for granted, anything could happen. We assume our life will be without tragedy and grief so just live your life to the fullest and do as much as you can. Don't waste 525, 600 minutes!

come sweet death

Johann Sebastian Bach was the original composer and the style would be classical hymn.
2. In what genre/style would you classify Rhonda Sandberg's arrangement of this piece? Is this different from the original composition? Why?
I would classify this arrangement as a church hymn which isn't really different from the original. There aren't a lot of huge noticeable differences and that's why I would classify them both as hymns and also because it is clearly meant to sing in a church.

Amavolovolo:
A traditional Zulu Dowry song arranged for a choir by Rudolf de Beer.
1. The word Amavolovolo is taken from what English word? How is this word related to the songs original meaning/ use?
The word amavolovolo is taken from the english word revolver. This relates to the songs original meaning because the original meaning of the song was: we won't go to KwaMashu, we're scared of the guns. This was because there was a war going on.
2. In what situations might people sing Amavolovolo now?
Amavolovolo could be sung in many situations now but is often sung at celebrations such as weddings.

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