CHORAL MUSIC SAMPLE COURSE DESCRIPTION

GS- East

The purpose of the NC Governor's School East choral music curriculum may be summarized via the following objectives:

• To facilitate for the students choral music-making on a high level to strive for a thorough understanding of each piece, a well-rehearsed presentation, and an inspired performance
• To expose students to music written within the past 100 years, with emphasis on compositions employing expanded tonality, non-traditional techniques, and those having a particular element or elements of 20th-century (or contemporary) style
• To encourage students to work on refinement of their own individual instrument, even as they continue to discover it
• To challenge the students to articulate what they like and/or dislike about any of the literature. In other words, if they were the composer, what might they have done differently, and why? (Do they wish they had written it? Has it been worth our time?)

The chorus presents at least two concerts. One recent concert focused on music by American composers, and included works such as Rene Clausen’s A Jubilant Song, three movements from Randall Thompson’s Americana, Halsey Stevens’s Magnificat, Richard Felciano’s Pentecost Sunday, Rosephanye Powell’s Ascribe to the Lord, and “Stomp Your Foot” from Aaron Copland’s The Tenderland. Another concert featured a multi-cultural emphasis, including music indigenous to American ethnic groups. The repertoire included the traditional African folk processional Nginani na, Benjamin Britten’s Rejoice in the Lamb, Ernst Toch’s Valse (for speech choir), Veljo Tormis’s Parismaalase lauluke, an arrangement of the Korean folk song Arirang, the Kyrie from Glenn McClure’s A Caribbean Mass and an arrangement of The Battle of Jericho.