If you’ve been in rehearsal with me, you know that I’m always trying to pass along to you the cool stuff I’m learning. These might be things about vocal technique that I’m learning from my voice teacher. I might be sharing with you some things about style and...

As most of you know, I get really excited when something about choral singing becomes clearer to me and I think it's going to be useful in rehearsals. (Some of you may be happy that I finally have something new to talk about that isn't "make best friends with your...

So many of you have commented on last week’s blog that I thought I’d follow it up with some real-world examples. I’ll take you into the process we’re presently in, to pick music for the spring 2019 session. This is about as current as it gets.  Sandy said the other...

It is gratifying when singers come up to me spontaneously after rehearsal with bright eyes and say, “I love this music!” This happened many times in past Encore sessions, and it’s happening again now. This is true whether I picked the music on my own (as for the first...

It’s the beginning of October. We’ve now held five rehearsals of the Good Memories choir. As many of you know, Good Memories is our new choral program for people with early-stage memory loss and their care partners, singing together in a choir along with a remarkable...

“What we hear from people who have been diagnosed with dementia is this: ‘other people stop looking us in the eye; they stop calling us by name; they cease physical contact; and they stop expecting anything from us’.” These were the words of Mary Lenard, co-director...