It’s the start of the summer holidays and I’m sitting here with my laptop – singing Christmas carols. Why, you might be thinking? December 6th is going to be something special for our school trust in Yorkshire. Seven of our 25 schools and over 100 of our children will be performing with the Gabrieli Consort & Players at York Minster, appearing as part of a 300-plus choir.
The event forms part of the Gabrieli Roar Christmas tour. For those unfamiliar with Gabrieli Roar, it is a partnership between the Consort and a network of diverse British youth choirs. Led by artistic director Paul McCreesh, the initiative combines professionals and young singers, developing skills and nurturing a love of choral music.
The Christmas tour, from November 27th to December 11th, will involve over 5,000 young people from Cumbria to Cornwall and from Durham to Kent. It includes performances at Portsmouth, Norwich, Ely, Coventry, Blackburn and Carlisle cathedrals and at Hull and York minsters, before finishing in the Southwest, at Exeter and Truro cathedrals and at St Mary Redcliffe, Bristol.
According to Roar’s director, Anna Winstone, the purpose of the tour is ‘to connect young choirs up and down the land in partnership, and to encourage more young people to engage with classical music [particularly at this time of year]. The programme offers opportunities for established choirs capable of singing in parts, but there are also simpler pieces which enable those new to singing to join in with this magnificent music.’
The programme
The ‘magnificent music’ in question is English music written for parish churches during the Georgian period, spanning a century from around 1740. This musical tradition, sometimes referred to as ‘psalmody’ or ‘gallery music’, embraces many kinds of music, from simple hymns and ‘fuguing tunes’ to more elaborate anthems. Much of the music is robust and cheerful, and connects to folk traditions, especially the Christmas repertoire.
For the tour, a dozen singers of the Gabrieli Consort will lead the choirs, accompanied by a band (the Gabrieli Players) comprising flutes, clarinets, bassoons, horns, trumpets, drums, organ and strings, with harpsichord, ophicleide and two serpents(!) providing further authenticity.
The songs, carols or anthems, by composers ranging from Handel or Haydn to lesser-known figures, include Remember, O thou man; Veni, veni, Emmanuel; The people that walked in darkness; Lo! He comes with clouds descending; As shepherds watched their fleecy care; Adeste fideles; Hush my dear, lie still and slumber; and Hark! The herald angels sing – in a version probably unknown to many.
Some pieces are suitable for upper KS2 children and include just the melody. The remaining pieces are more suited to KS3, or even 4/5; these are SATB and require fairly confident part-singing.
The pieces are grouped under four themes: Promise, Shepherds, At the Manger, and Angels. The final carol, While shepherds watched (John Foster), a Yorkshire favourite, serves as an encore.
Special offer
The event promises to be an amazing opportunity for those involved. This led me to think about the other schools in our trust, those that aren’t involved, and the possibility of wider engagement. Could the digital material and music for the tour, I asked Gabrieli, be made available to non-participating schools?
To my delight, the group agreed to allow this and, even better, has offered the material free of charge to all UK schools through a partnership with Music Teacher magazine. If you visit the relevant page of the Music Teacher website, you’ll find downloadable audio files, PDFs of the full repertoire, a Spotify playlist and YouTube links (including an introduction to ‘A Grand Georgian Christmas’).
This material is useful for schools’ own carol concerts. To quote the Gabrieli, ‘The solo parts are often quite simple, and can be sung by confident singers. Likewise, the instrumental parts are hardly virtuosic; the beauty is that there is no right or wrong, and parts can be taken by whatever players you have to hand in your school’, in effect matching the performance tradition of the day.
How to prepare your own performances
There’s a teacher-support booklet containing all the music scores for the singers, and the orchestral parts – for adapting as necessary – are also available for download. In addition, the MT website includes a playlist (Spotify) for reference; audio demos for every piece, featuring individual voice parts (SATB) as well as voices together; an accompanying video of each score, to follow along with the guide tracks; and a helpful warm-up video for use in practice sessions.
I caught up with Gabrieli Roar music directors Emily Dickens and Charles Béquignon-MacDougall to ask for their top tips for preparing to perform the material. They suggested:
- Start early. Christmas is closer than you think!
- Make sure every child has their own access to the video and MP3 resources (once downloaded) for extra practice at home.
- Have all teachers involved with the project watch the ‘Launch’ webinar, to understand the context.
- Organise regular rehearsal times, create a routine.
- Start with a warm-up. Have a look at the warm-up resource that can be used with children.
- Start with the catchiest piece, and don’t feel you must always start from the beginning of the piece. Be tactical and focus on what needs practice. Always finish the rehearsal on a high!
- Provide context. There are four themes: Promise, At the Manger, Shepherds, and Angels. You might be able to relate these to a nativity play the children performed when they were younger.
- Think about the words and diction. Help pupils understand what they’re singing about so that the meaning is conveyed, with clear articulation. You may need to explain some of the words.
- Don’t be obsessed with what you can’t do. Try to teach ‘music through music’, always putting the music first.
- Feel the joy of being involved. Perfectionism isn’t the goal here – loving wonderful music, and being part of this, is.
The benefits
The benefits of running such projects are wide-ranging. First, they’re musically inspiring, life-enhancing and elevating. There’s a sense of belonging and being part of a bigger community, which choirs do really well, and there’s cultural capital in having on open mind to things not yet experienced, especially with unknown repertoire.
For the student, you’re also improving their technical expertise – this is ‘stretching material’ – and developing their musicianship, singing, and cognitive skills while learning this repertoire. The experience could even help in future GCSE or A Level Music exams!
Beyond this, for those luckily enough to be involved with the main project, there’s an opportunity to perform in one of the UK’s amazing cathedrals – a once in a lifetime event.
Count down
Back in Yorkshire, our first meeting about the project with our team of music leads is September 5th, organised helpfully with the aid of Google Meet. It’s so exciting and special for the hundred or so children involved. Hopefully, we will be able to fill in MT readers on how the event went at York Minster, but also encourage others to get involved and enjoy the digital material now freely available. Do let me, MT or Gabrieli Roar know if you plan to put on your own performance – we’d love to hear from you!
In the meantime, here’s a final message from our friends at the Gabrieli:
‘This is an exciting national project for Gabrieli Roar, in which we will engage with thousands of young singers across the country, in great Christmas choral music. We are thrilled to be bringing together schools, music hubs, cathedrals, youth choirs and music teachers and hope that readers of Music Teacher not directly involved in the project can still benefit from our digital resources, to support their own teaching and singing activities at Christmas. And, if you are available when “A Grand Georgian Christmas” comes to a city near you in November or December, then do come and see us!’
