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Emily Maddison
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Sep 2 · 3 min read
How many parts are there in a choir?
Parts of a Choir The singers in choirs are grouped by their voice types and choral music is usually written with distinct lines or parts for some or all of these voice types. Voice types are typically organized into four groups. From highest vocal range to lowest, these include: A soprano is a female singer with a high voice. Young boys who sing, and also girls, are usually called trebles. The word “soprano” can also refer to the top line of choir music. This would be sung by sopranos or trebles. Soprano is also used as a name for high pitched instruments, such as a soprano saxophone. In opera there are different kinds of soprano voices: A dramatic soprano will sing big, dramatic roles such as Aida in Verdi’s opera Aida. A coloratura soprano will have a light voice which can bounce up to very high notes (the Queen of the Night in Mozart’s Magic Flute goes up to top F (2 1⁄2 octaves above middle C). A soubrette is usually the maid or a young girl who flirts. A lyric soprano role needs a beautiful smooth voice, e.g. Mimi in Puccini’s La Boheme. A heavy dramatic soprano is needed in many of Wagner’s operas, e.g. Isolde in Tristan und Isolde or Brunnhilde in Der Ring des Nibelungen. In the 17th and 18th centuries many of the soprano roles were written for male sopranos. Called a castrato, they were men who had their testicles removed before puberty so that their voices would remain high pitched
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The word alto can mean: someone who sings lower than a soprano. Usually females with lower voices are called contraltos. A male alto is a man who sings in a special way called falsetto. In England male altos sing in church and cathedral choirs. In some countries like Germany it is tradition to have boy altos in cathedral choirs. These will probably be boys whose voices will soon be breaking and are starting to get lower. One of the most famous contraltos was Kathleen Ferrier. There are not so many female singers who call themselves contraltos these days. It has become more fashionable to be a mezzo-soprano. It is partly because it has become fashionable to use men for the alto parts in music by Bach and other Baroque composers, like it would have been performed in those days A tenor is a man with a high singing voice. In opera the role of the young male is usually sung by a tenor. Depending on characteristics such as: volume, color and style, the tenor voice is classified in following groups: The light tenor. This is also called tenor leggero. An example is Peter Pears, who sang the tenor solos in Benjamin Britten’s operas. The lyric tenor. The lyric tenor is a tenor with a well timbered voice, such as “The Three Tenors” (Luciano Pavarotti, Jose Carreras and Plácido Domingo). The spinto tenor. They have special abilities in the high tones, such as Franco Corelli and Enrico Caruso. The dramatic tenor. They have a high volume and a dark voice. An example is Mario Del Monaco. A “Heldentenor” (German for “hero tenor”) is someone with a big tenor voice. This is suitable for heroic parts like the heroes in most of Wagner’s operas. Lauritz Melchior, Max Lorenz and Jonas Kaufmann are famous heroic tenors. A bass is a type of male singing voice and possesses the lowest vocal range of all voice types. According to The New Grove Dictionary of Opera, a bass is typically classified as having a range extending from around the second E below middle C to the E above middle C (i.e., E2–E4).[1] Its tessitura, or comfortable range, is normally defined by the outermost lines of the bass clef. ChorSymphonica is a project-based ensemble. We don’t meet on a regular basis for rehearsals, but come together for brief, intense work periods (“projects”), which culminate in performances. Musicians self-select for projects, depending on their own availability. In this way we can draw upon the range of qualified musicians throughout the region for our concerts. To know more Visit: https://chorsymphonica.org/who-we-are/ --
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