SCHOLA: 7 April 2025

Playlist for Tonight – PRIORITIES

• Blow through ALL the Mozart movements (like we did with the Forrest last week)
• Serious triage on Qui Tollis and Sanctus fugue
• The extra TLC on the Forrest – as that really got short-changed last week.

Amy is out tonight

Amy is away with her family this week on their spring break, so you’re on your honor for check-in. If you are still in need of scores, please show up a bit early so I have a minute to rummage around and find what you need.

AND AGAIN… If you’re thinking, “I don’t sing very well on windy days – I think I’ll skip,” please take two aspirin and come to rehearsal anyway! We need every minute we can eek out at the point.

Run-up to the concert: Stuff you need to know

Acknowledging that you all have lives other than coming to Schola Cantorum, I appreciate your patience while we’ve been trying to work out the logistics of concert week. It would be complicated enough if we were simply doing a combined gig with Chorale. Then it gets more complicated when the UD Symphony Orchestra is involved. Now figure in the fact that Loudis Hall is offline, which means the entire rehearsal cycle for all instrumental ensembles has been thrown into a rotation so they can share a rehearsal space midday every day. And since Puglisi is the only performance space on campus right now, we don’t even have access to that space the week of the concert due to other performances.

With all this in mind, this is what concert week is looking like at the moment:

• Tuesday, April 28th @ 7:00 pm: EARLY CALL TIME for “QUASI DRESS REHEARSAL” in AED 118. Orchestra will be ready to join us at 7:30 pm, but we’ll need that extra time to find room for 150 singers and warm up. Expect rehearsal to go to 10:00 pm that evening. THIS IS THE CLOSEST THING WE GET TO A DRESS REHEARSAL – other than the Friday night during the concert itself.
• Friday, May 1 @ 6:15 pm in AED 118 for call time, riser formations and warm-up. I’m HOPING we might squeak out a soundcheck with the orchestra in Puglisi Hall, but if that happens, it (the soundcheck) will be short and sweet. (Or at least short.) CURTAIN IS AS 8:00 pm. Running time for the concert is 80 minutes of music with a likely 20-minute intermission.
• Saturday, May 2 @ 5:30 pm at St. Elizabeth Church in Wilmington. We’ll warm up downstairs then join the orchestra for a full sound-check upstairs before the doors open at 7:30 pm.

Concert Attire

The April 1 deadline to order performance attire has passed, but anyone who missed that can still place their order, but that needs to happen ASAP. If that’s YOU, please contact Amy (amyander@udel.edu) for details.

Tickets for the Concerts

I was going to include a link the UD Box Office for tickets to the concerts, but it seems the links to both concerts are inoperable at the moment. I’ll jump on that tomorrow, but suffice it to say that there will be over 200 performers on stage, and there are roughly 250 seats in Puglisi Hall where the Friday night concert is being held. Conversely, St. Elizabeth’s can hold nearly 900 people so I doubt very much that will sell out. We’ll let you know as soon as tickets go on sale, but hopefully that information will help in your planning.

Dan Forrest Score Markings

I had thought I might go through the entire Forrest score and make a clean edition with breath marks and releases, but that simply isn’t going to happen. Those of you with digital score already have the markings from the Deer Creek Chorale in Maryland, which I mostly agree with. If you’re using a hard copy, you should click through to that edition and add those markings to YOUR score. We’ll try to touch on any deviance from those markings tonight in rehearsal

DCS This Weekend

Delaware Choral Scholars have their last rehearsal marathon this weekend on Saturday and Sunday from 1:00 pm – 7:00 pm each day in AED 118. We hope to conclude the Sunday session with a mini-performance to be recorded, but we’ll have to see how that plays out. But in any event, you’re welcome to drop in to watch rehearsal should you wish to watch their final preparations for one of the most prestigious choral competitions in the world!

Next week, I’ll publish a link to the live-stream in Slovenia for those who might want to tune in to watch the action in real time. The competition will take place on Saturday, April 18 from 12:00 noon to 3:00 pm eastern time, and the winners will be announced shortly after the last choir performs. Very exciting.

See you soon.

pdh