Choral Festivals

The Taft Vocal Ensemble recently took part in a Music in the Parks festival at Disneyland. The experience was a very positive one in many ways. The students, understandably, were excited about winning a couple of first place trophies. I was interested in what the judges had to write and say about our performance.

I remember the first time I took the Vocal Ensemble to a festival. It was about 15 years ago, and I thought we were pretty good. When I got the judges written ratings, I was disappointed to have received just good and excellent ratings (superior being the top rating). Every negative comment I had ever heard about choral adjudicators popped into my head - they don't know what it's like in the real world, they are biased toward certain schools, they favor a particular conductor, they only like certain musical styles...

It was only when I listened to the adjudicators' tapes that I understood why we received our somewhat low rating. Under their spoken comments I could hear our group. Suddenly I heard how out of tune we really were, how bright our vowels were, and how off the balance was. Why hadn't I heard this before?

As most school music directors will tell you, one's ears become accustomed to the sound of one's groups. I think the brain must compensate and fool us into not hearing problems - probably some kind of self preservation instinct! Recordings help us to hear accurately, especially if we've had a break of several days from our group. A good adjudicator can also open our ears to reality with the added bonus of being able to suggest ways to improve.

At first it wasn't easy to accept the judges' criticisms. Then all my lectures to students about how criticism helps us grow came back to me. So, I swallowed my pride (are rather large swallow!) and began to strategize on how to improve. The going was slow, but eventually we started to move in the right direction.

Now, years later, we are a much better group. Still, as I listen to the tape and comments from our last festival, I realize that there are many areas where we can do better. I guess the only thing scarier then facing our shortcomings would be to not recognize them and not know how to improve.