AMATEUR TRAINING

CIRCLE SONG

Circle Song is a simple and quasi-ancestral singing form, where a group of singers, placed in a circle ʻpass aroundʼ a basic motif, inspired by African, Latin, groove, traditional folk and jazz influences. The singers take turns improvising. Circle Song provides singers with an ideal context in which to listen, share, and carry out an individual study of vocal improvisation.

SUMMER WORKSHOPS 2011 ( dates on the schedule )

NOGARET, south of France (details of Nogaret in the ' venue ' menu)

CIRCLE SONG AND VOCAL IMPROV

Games, rules and tools for collective improvised musical creation

This workshop is a playground for 13 singers to live both a personal experience of vocal improvisation ( circle song ), and a collective one ( improvised musical creation ). Rejoicing !

The basic process involves building up a circle song from patterns created in real time by each of the singers.Beyond the excitement and sharing experienced in this process, participants will be guided through a series of precise musical games, rules and tools to:

- increase conscious listening: what exactly is happening with the music?

- sculpt and give shape to musical ideas, playing freely with variations

- create musical, and particularly rhythmic interaction with the patterns of the other singers

- be able to transform collectively the circle song in a continuous, playful and organic way.

PRECISE CONTENT

Rhythm complementarities

• learning all the possible rhythmic locations of a note in a simple 4/4 bar in gradual subdivision (first crochets, then quavers and semi-quavers).

• Playing with these possibilities of rhythmic locations through singing rhythmic patterns. Once this stage is well established, melodies will grow naturally from the rhythms.

Contrast or fusion

• Starting from the proposition of one singer, learning how to create complementary patterns through:

• Contrast (using melodic, rhythmic, textural contrast)

• Fusion (simple unison or third harmonisation to reinforce the original phrase)

Creating a motive and playing with variations

• Starting from a very simple melodic idea, exploring variations through different principles:

• Melodic variation: using a symmetric melodic process to produce a response to the original melodic idea. For instance, if the note concluding the opening phrase is ascending, the variation will conclude by descending. (This principle is frequently used in traditional music.)

• Rhythmic variation: learning to transform the original melodic idea by shifting slightly one note to a close rhythmic location.

• Subtracting variation: making a variation of the original phrase by removing notes.

Sculpting a circle song through omission

This approach is an extension of the ‘subtracting variation' principle. The idea is to break an original phrase into fragments distributed irregularly around the circle of singers. This simple process will create a kind of multi-point acoustic result, a circulating rhythm, and reveal the original united phrase as a prism reveals a white light into a rainbow range of colours.

The sense of rhythm cycle

Once we have developed a rich toolbox and the ability to handle and combine the tools, we consider how to organize the possibilities of interaction, variation, contrast and fusion within the musical time to create a playful and organic development. We will play with:

• The impact of large time variations. A simple changing detail in the fourth repetition of a pattern enlarges the cycle and gives breath and space to the whole.

• Learning to be aware of when the other parts are varying, and organising your own variation in alternated locations. (For instance if group one varies every four bars, group two will vary every eight bars). In this way circle songs can be nourished with slight variations gracefully distributed within the musical time.

GENERAL INFORMATION

Our AMATEUR TRAINING courses are intended for competent and professional singers. Although entitled ʻamateurʼ, the work carried out on these courses is quite demanding, with respect to the rhythm of work as much as to the involvement of the participants.
The AMATEUR TRAINING courses take place in a range of superb venues, carefully chosen to provide the participants with the best adapted environments to work in.
The AMATEUR TRAINING courses, are structured around two discrete approaches to singing: “Rhythm and voice” (usually in the morning) and ʻCircle songʼ (in the afternoon). Both are dealt with in synergy.

RHYTHM AND VOICE MORNINGS:
These mornings are about learning to sing phrases ʻcoupledʼ with small percussive parts, carried out simultaneously by tapping the hands on the body. The parts are slow and broken down. By participating in this activity singers discover the intense pleasure of experiencing two rhythms simultaneously.

CIRCLE SONG AFTERNOONS:
Having laid solid (analytical) foundations in the morning and deeply integrated the phrases, the afternoon consists of individual improvisations over (the group singing) this material.

THE TOPICS IN FULL:

RHYTHM AND VOICE
Rhythm and Voice focuses on two aspects, studied in-depth thanks to various exercises:
• The depths of rhythmic perception.
- working on the inner tempo and continuous listening.
This part of the course involves elementary exercises with an ultra-slow tempo. Slower tempos better reveal where the inner tempo lies. It all stems from listening. Then, thanks to this listening ability, all the skills, respecting precision, rhythmic steadiness, fluidity, etc. will follow. This method paves the ways to an infinite
realm of possibilities.
• Coordination (of rhythm and voice):
- singing vocal parts at the same time as playing a simple rhythmic accompaniment.

CIRCLE SONG
Circle Song is a simple and quasi-ancestral singing form/configuration, where a group of singers, placed in a circle ʻpass aroundʼ a basic motif, inspired by African, Latin, groove, traditional folk and jazz influences. The singers take turns improvising. Circle Song provides singers with an ideal context in which to listen, share, and carry out an individual/personal study of vocal improvisation, where it is possible to deal with the following aspects:
RHYTHM
• Onomatopoeia, rhythmic phrasing
• Group (rhythmic) steadiness: knowing how to keep pace with the rhythmic pulse of the group singing different
vocal parts.
• Polyrhythmic singing: knowing how to sing a part while listening to other parts
SOUND
• Using hierarchy: learning to sing over different dynamic levels following the soloist. Hierarchising layers of
sound, with the coachʼs help, so as to reveal the full breadth of the resulting music.
• Timbre (or colour): discerning the wealth and variety of vocal timbres. The singers are led to achieving a state
of listening in which they are conscious of all the timbres at once, without losing track of their own.
IMPROVISATION
• Confronting individual improvisation over a group accompaniment
• Working with modes of collective improvisation
• the group generates its own forms structured with the ʻrules of the gameʼ.

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