Sarah Gaskins English 1103-016 11-10-13

Speech Characteristic Context Report My video capture is an explanatory example of basic warm-up routines choral students undergo before rehearsals and performances. My friend exhibiting the warm up in the video is a Music Performance major at Wingate University and is heavily involved in the Choral Speech Community. As she explains the warm ups throughout the video, she expresses one of the key speech characteristics all members of the Choral Speech Community exhibits: specialized vocabulary. All members within this speech community, and all those desiring to become a part of this community, must learn the meaning and importance of certain words and phrases and discipline oneself to apply this vocabulary to their choral practice. Warm-ups are activities within the speech community that an ensemble engages in not only to practice specialized vocabulary, but also to protect their vocal instruments, and blend as one voice. In the very beginning of the video, my friend, Leia, starts off with some basic trills. Trills are very common warm ups within the Choral Speech Community, however outsiders of the community most likely will not recognize the term. They may recognize the action of trilling from babies mimicking small trills, but they still would not understand the purpose. Leia explains in the video that trilling allows singers to open up their vocals chords and hit the top of their range. Range, in this context, refers to the vocal range or the highest pitch one can sing or, in this case trill. Another characteristic of membership in the speech community is body language. Notice how as she trills up the scale she uses her hands to mimic the sound. Vocalists engage their body in this way to not only warm it up, but also to visualize what their voice is doing as they sing so they can have a better understanding of the way their vocal chords function, therefore they gain better control over time. The next warm-up involves singing with vibrato. Vibrato may be a familiar term outside of the speech community, but the action of using vibrato as one sings is a very important discipline all members of the community learn. Vibrato by definition is a pulsating effect, produced in singing by the rapid reiteration of emphasis on a tone. Practicing vibrato allows the vocalist to build his or her breath support to hold a note longer as well as stretch ones vocal range. Leias third warm-up is much like the previous with vibrato, however she changes the vowel from ah to zee-ah. Choral vocalists often sing up the musical scale on many different vowel sounds because each vowel changes how the voice sounds and this is a very important key to blending. Ensembles that aim to have a very pure homogenous sound, practice blending on each vowel to eradicate the various accents and dialects of individual voices. This creates the illusion of one voice for monophonic (unison) singing or one voice for each voice part for polyphonic (harmony) singing. Also note here that a vocalists posture directly affects the quality of his or her singing. During warm-ups a vocalist must discipline his or her posture to stand up straight and relax the shoulders back to allow the diaphragm room to fully expand and compress as one sings. Leias final warm-up includes the most basic vocabulary a vocalist must learn and may be familiar to outsiders due to the wonderful and highly popular film, The Sound of Music. Im referring to Solfeggio: Do, Re, Mi, Fa, Sol, La, Ti, Do. This is a basic method to teach pitch and sight singing. An obvious indicator of membership to the Choral Speech Community is the knowledge of singing Solfeggio and also demonstrating the hand signs as Leia does in the video. Sight singing is when vocalists use Solfeggio to sing new music a cappella (only with voices). This is another difficult discipline within the Choral Speech Community and takes a lot of practice to master.