Fortunately I rarely have to pull out of performances because of illness, but a number of times in the last few years I’ve gone to rehearsals for a concert I wasn’t singing in. Twice the work concerned was the German Requiem and part of the reason for rehearsing was to build up familiarity with a piece I’d eventually get to perform again. (And I now have: post to follow).
Apart from this, another reason to go to such rehearsals is to get the benefit of the conductor’s expertise. And to get to know a new piece that you haven’t encountered before. This was the case this autumn as I went to rehearsals for Bristol Choral Society’s next concert, which consisted largely of pieces that we will record in the New Year. Two that we aren’t recording were a pair by Eric Whitacre: Cloudburst and Water Night, settings of overlapping texts by Octavio Paz. His early work Cloudburst was especially intriguing as it was more experimental and I haven’t really been stretched much in this way since I was in the Chandos Singers. It would spoil the surprise for those who don’t know it, if I tried to describe the ways in which the sonic range of this piece is extended beyond standard choral singing. At any rate, I felt a bit sorry that the later Whitacre pieces I’ve sung have been rather more conventional.