SCVA Newsletter (on-line version) – September 2004
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Message from the President – Grace Sheldon-Williams, President
Greetings to you all! I
hope you had a restful summer and are now ready to dive into a new school year
with energy and enthusiasm. In
1939, SCVA was founded with the purpose of advancing vocal music at all grade
levels in the schools of Southern California. 65 years later, this outstanding organization is still here
to serve you and your students. I
encourage you to take advantage of the many wonderful events and opportunities
SCVA has to offer. Here are a few
ways you can get involved:
- Attend the annual SCVA Fall
In-Service workshop—this is a great time to network with colleagues and get new
ideas and materials
- Host a festival! The benefits are many (see article in
this newsletter)
- Prepare your students to
audition for honor choir (note the deadlines & important details)
Other events will be featured and explained in the SCVA newsletter throughout the year. I wish to extend a special thank you to Karen Bluel, our newsletter editor, as well as all of the executive board members, who volunteer countless hours to enhance our art.
I wish you a wonderful year, and, oh yes...don’t forget to renew your membership!
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Regional Honor Choir
After more than 900 students from all over Southern California audition,
240 will be selected to sing in one of three groups: Women’s, Men’s or Mixed
Honor Choir. They will receive a
packet of music, meet for one
rehearsal (October 30th) before the Honor Choir weekend, and then (with music
memorized) come together on Friday and Saturday, November 19 & 20 for two
days of intense rehearsal and a Saturday evening concert with some of the most
distinguished conductors in our field.
All-State Honor Choir
Students interested in being considered for the California All-State Honor
Choir need only mark the appropriate box on their SCVA application. There is no additional audition
or fee. They may be asked at their auditions to reconfirm their interest in
All-State. The All-State Honor Choir will be March 17-19, 2005 in Pasadena.
Please Note:
Check your availability for all dates BEFORE auditioning. Being accepted into a choir and then
not participating will prohibit your school from participation in the Honor
Choirs for one year. Please see:
Honor Choir Guidelines and Policies.
All students auditioning for Regional and State Honor Choirs must be members in good standing of their school choral program and their conductors must be paid members of SCVA. Teachers may pay their dues by contacting Shawn Taylor at alwaysmus@aol.com or via PayPal at http://www.scvachoral.org/payments.html.
All students in Southern California should use the attached application. DO NOT use the ACDA application.
Regional Honor Choir Conductors
We are proud to announce this year’s conductors for the Regional Honor
Choirs. Dr. Jocelyn Jensen,
from UNLV, will conduct the Mixed Choir; Dr. Iris Levine, from Cal Poly
Pomona University, will conduct the Women’s Choir; and Peter Rutenberg,
conductor for the Los Angeles Chamber Singers and Cappella, will lead the Men’s
Choir.
Important Dates:
Audition Application Postmark Deadline:
Wednesday,
September 17, 2004
Audition Dates:
Saturday,
October 2, 2004 9am – Noon
Saturday,
October 9, 2004 1 – 4pm
First Rehearsal:
Saturday,
October 30, 2004 9:30am –
4pm
Santa
Ana High School, Santa Ana, CA
Honor Choir Weekend:
Friday
& Saturday, November 19 & 20
Honor Choir Performance:
Saturday,
November 20 at 7:30pm
Venice
High School, Venice, CA
California All-State Honor Choir:
March
17-19, 2005, Pasadena, CA
$$$ New Way to Pay!!! $$$
SCVA is proud to add a NEW, more convenient way to pay many SCVA fees through
PayPal. For more information, see
Mark Freedkin’s article later in this newsletter or visit http://www.scvachoral.org/payments.html.
Remember to print out a confirmation sheet and either send it in the mail or
email it with your application. REMEMBER:
All monies must be paid by either PayPal, a school check, a booster
check or money order. NO PERSONAL
CHECKS from directors, students or parents will be accepted.
For questions about SCVA Honor Choir, to volunteer, or to act as an adjudicator, contact Kathy Cobb-Woll at cobbwoll@aol.com or Dr. Rich Brunner at rbrunner@oakwoodschool.org
Audition Procedures
Solo: all audtionees will prepare and sing a solo from the
Twenty-four Italian Songs and Arias (G. Schirmer) or equivalent art song
book. The solo MUST be memorized,
sung in Italian and accompanied by tape, cd or an accompanist supplied by the
auditonee. Adjudicators will be
listening for tone quality, diction, pronunciation, musical sensitivity and
appropriate vocal range.
Range: all audtionees will demonstrate their vocal range through a short series of warm-up exercises.
Tonal Memory: all auditionees will demonstrate tonal memory skills by singing back a 4-5 note passage played by one of the adjudicators. You may sing back on any neutral syllable.
Scales/Triads: all auditionees will prepare and sing a major and minor triad, a major scale and a chromatic scale on any neutral syllable.
Sight-Reading: all auditionees will demonstrate rhythmic and melodic sight-reading skills by singing a single, unaccompanied melodic line on any neutral syllable.
NOTE: Students must provide their own accompanist or an accompanying
CD or tape IN THE PROPER KEY!
Acceptance Notice and Fees
Those accepted for the Mixed, Men’s or Women’s Honor Choir will be notified
by their directors sometime during the week of October 11th. A $50.00 fee will be collected at
the first rehearsal on October 30th.
The fee provides for music, accompanists, directors and facilities. ONLY PayPal verification, a
school check, booster check or money order will be accepted. NO PERSONAL CHECKS WILL BE ACCEPTED
from students, parents or teachers!!
Honor Choir Guidelines and Policies
A student must be enrolled in his/her school’s choral program in order to
be eligible for participation in Honor Choir. If a student drops out of the school program, he/she will be
dropped from Honor Choir as well.
No sanctions will be imposed on the school in this case.
However, when a student drops out of an SCVA Honor Choir, the student’s school may not be allowed to participate in Honor Choir the following school year. Given our time constraints, when a student drops out of Honor Choir it is impossible for us to fill their vacancy. Therefore, when a student drops out, another deserving student misses out on this wonderful opportunity.
Students who must, out of extreme necessity, drop out of Honor Choir after being accepted are required to provide a signed, written note from their parents and from their school choral director stating the reasons for the drop out. The note MUST be sent immediately to the Honor Choir coordinator by mail or hand-delivered by the student, parent or director as soon as possible.
Acceptable reasons for dropping Honor Choir:
- Death in the family just
before the concert
- Serious medical problem
- Other matters of an equally
serious nature
Unacceptable reasons for dropping Honor Choir:
- Schedule conflicts of any
kind.
- Student deciding he/she would
rather not participate, doesn’t like the music, or doesn’t want to work with a
particular conductor.
If a student drops for any reason, a panel of members from the SCVA Board will consider the reason given and decide whether it is an unacceptable or acceptable reason.
Choral directors are responsible for remaining informed about their students’ continued participation in the Honor Choir.
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PayPal Has Arrived! – Mark Freedkin, Web Communications
We are pleased to announce a new capability for making electronic
payments through the SCVA website to pay for membership renewals, festival
registrations and other SCVA event fees, as an alternative to sending school
checks, booster checks, cashier checks or money orders. A new page allows you
to electronically pay for those items using any major credit card (MasterCard,
Visa, Discover or American Express). This new capability is managed through
PayPal (which is owned and operated by e-Bay) and it will help to ensure timely
and secure payment for those items.
To use this new feature select the "e-Payments" item from the navigation menu of the SCVA website at http://www.scvachoral.org. You will then see a list of items that you can purchase. Click on the "Buy Now" button for the item you wish to purchase. You will then be taken to the PayPal website to process your payment. You should select the "Click Here" button next to the line that reads "If you do not currently have a PayPal account.”
After that, you should enter your credit card type, account number, expiration date, e-mail address and mailing address, as well as any event-specific information (such as "School Name and Singer's Name"). If you continue, your credit card will be billed and you will be returned to the SCVA website. You will also receive a separate confirmation e-mail message, which you should print out and submit with your application for the SCVA activity. When you receive your credit card bill, the charge will appear as "PayPal -- Southern California Vocal Association".
Note that a $1.00 processing fee is added to each purchase made through the SCVA website.
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FROM THE EDITOR – Karen Bluel, Editor/Co-Secretary
In order to avoid a two-year stint as the SCVA Treasurer (I do not even
balance my own checkbook!), I volunteered to take over the production of this
newsletter. Only time will tell if I made the right choice!
This newsletter is a work in progress and I will welcome any suggestions you may have. We now have the capability to include pictures, so if you have something wonderful from an SCVA event, please email it to me and I will see about including it and getting it up on the website!
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2005 Show Choir Spectacular – Erin Terreri, Show Choir V.P.
I’d like to thank Sharon Galassi for doing a great job last year on the
Show Choir Competition. Even
though she retired last year, she still was able to recruit her parent boosters
and students to help out. I was
able to bring my groups this year and we were so impressed with the Travis
Ranch students and their professionalism.
After some coercing, I agreed to take on the competition this year even after becoming a mom! Her name is Emma Lynn Terreri and she was born on October 24th weighing in at 7lbs. 11 oz. She is now almost 10 months old and is the greatest joy of our lives. I never thought I could love someone so much! I have enjoyed being a full time mom this summer and will regret having to go back to work and not being able to take care of her all day long. However, going back to work is going to seem like a vacation compared to running after a 10 month old! She definitely keeps me hopping!
I did not know I would be doing this event again until early July, therefore as of press time I have not nailed down any details for the competition. I am planning on using Long Beach Poly HS again, however I cannot make any contacts until September. I am looking at doing the competition much earlier this year. I am waiting to find out when some of the other competitions are and then scheduling the event around them. One thought I had was to make it the first Saturday in April, which is traditionally the same weekend as Fullerton Jazz Festival. I would like some feedback on this date.
Last year there were several cancellations at the last minute and even some no shows. It seems that by holding the competition in late April or in May there are too many conflicts like, proms, SAT tests, and Spring Concerts. Would putting the SCVA Competition so close to the Fullerton Jazz Competition deter you from entering either one? Please e-mail your thoughts and suggestions to erin.terreri@ggusd.net by September 10th. My goal is to make this competition accessible to SCVA members without having too many conflicts. I’ll be looking forward to hearing from you.
Have a great year!
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Exciting Times Ahead for Festival Hosts!
Jennifer Stanley, VP of High School Festivals
Laurie Hancock, VP of Junior High Festivals
Patti MacLeod, VP of Elementary Activities
It is never too early to start planning for festival season! We have been working this summer to make the festival process easier for everyone, especially festival hosts. Whether you are the director of an elementary, middle school or high school choir, there are many reasons to consider hosting a festival:
- The registration form is
easy.
- You get free festival
registration for one of your choirs at each festival you host.
- You don’t have to get a bus to
go to a festival.
- You provide schools in your area
a quality performance opportunity.
- You and your students get to see
other choirs and hear quality literature.
- Your students have the comfort
and familiarity of performing in their regular auditorium (home court
advantage!).
- Students enjoy the
responsibility of assisting in the running of the festival.
- You get excellent networking
opportunities with other directors in the festival, and with the adjudicators.
SCVA will provide for each festival host:
- A list of participating choirs
with contact information for each director
- Plaques delivered to your school
for each ensemble
- Certified adjudicators scheduled
for each festival by SCVA
When you fill out your festival host application, please indicate if you want your festival to be a clinic festival. A clinic festival has a maximum of six participating choirs and one adjudicator. After each choir performs, the adjudicator comes up to work with the ensemble. A regular festival has eight participating choirs and two adjudicators. One adjudicator tapes his/her comments, and the other writes comments on the score sheet. Both adjudicators’ scores are averaged to determine the rating (if desired by each director).
Sight-singing adjudication and sight-singing clinics will not be a part of this year’s SCVA festivals.
We’re off to a great year! Please contact us with any questions you may have.
Festival Host Application Form
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Fall In-Service – Mark Henson, Past President
Greetings and welcome back!
I hope this year brings you satisfaction and success! Mark your
calendars for Friday, October 22, 2004 - The annual SCVA Fall In-Service,
beginning at 9 a.m. As of this writing I am in the process of confirming our
guest presenter, so details regarding the location and the slate of events for
the day will be outlined in next month's newsletter as well as on our website.
Those of you who attended last year's Fall In-Service undoubtedly have fond memories of the wonderful day we spent together. I encourage you to seek out directors who have not previously attended an SCVA In-Service and invite them to join our organization and attend with you! We will be offering a variety of interest sessions on various topics and a chance for you to network with other choral professionals. Directors at all levels will find the event informative and fun.
In addition, those interested in becoming certified as an SCVA adjudicator will want to participate in the Adjudicator Certification Workshop which is offered at the In-Service every two years. A middle school and high school choral group will be selected to perform at the workshop. We will discuss the adjudication process and, following each performance, prospective adjudicators will submit a sample adjudication. Even if you don’t wish to become certified, participation in the workshop is a real insight toward understanding the adjudication process!
Reserve Friday, October 22, 2004 on your calendar now so you'll be able to attend! This is a great way to see colleagues, share new and useful ideas, and hear some great choirs. You can even register early! See the application that follows or visit our website.
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Other Important Information
SCVA Membership Application
Festival Host Application Form