Choral MIDI learning files
So you have a Handel oratorio alto part to learn. Whether it’s in two days or two weeks, it never hurts to drill til there are no surprises. Here’s a site for audio files for each voice part, which can be a big help in nailing the notes, or smoothing out tricky turns or skips in a run.
You will have to take the no frills-execution of the mechanical keyboard and shape it into real music. This is where the musicianship comes in. What is the emotional context of the music? If you’re singing Handel, Bach, the Baroque, it will be apparent in whether the composer wrote in a major or minor key, the rhythmic context–a sprightly 6/8 gigue, or a 4/4 funeral dirge?
What was the social context? A church or a court post? Did you know that Beethoven was the first major composer to institute the subscription concept to concerts and performances? Poor Mozart was caught between the old patronage structure and the new indie thing of having the general public pay to attend musical events.
Here’s Mstislav Rostropovich playing the Bach Cello Suite No. 2, VI.–Gigue.
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