Last night at the BeckRidge Chorale rehearsal, I defied what I know best about myself and one of the cornerstones of my musical philosophy. In popular choral music, rhythm is 90% FEELING. Notation gives us a road map while the text/lyric provides the scenery. For some reason, I was too analytical. I stopped enjoying the scenery and kept my head buried in the map. I owe my singers an apology. After spending hours looking at every nuance of the scenery, I forgot to bring my photographs to rehearsal. So, just to make sure we are all on the same page, I have put together some rhythmic snippets of a couple of sections where I should have been more insightful. Specifically, I have included a segment from That Old Black Magic (measures 95 - 103 WITH the repeat) and a four bar phrase (measures 21 through 24) from The Color Purple. In That Old Black Magic, I have included a slower audio clip for each voice as well as an a tempo version of the same section. I hope these audio clips will make up for what I felt was a waste of your time. Please take some time with your music and these audio clips. Here is hoping you all have audio on your computers! They should accomplish what I failed to achieve last night. Sorry...

Soprano
Slow - That Old Black Magic
A Tempo - That Old Black Magic
The Color Purple

Alto
Slow - That Old Black Magic
A Tempo - That Old Black Magic
The Color Purple

Tenor
Slow - That Old Black Magic
A Tempo - That Old Black Magic
The Color Purple

Bass
Slow - That Old Black Magic
A Tempo - That Old Black Magic
The Color Purple