Well, we've just come back from the Gold Coast Eisteddfod, and the choir didn't get anything this year! I'm severely annoyed because they sang VERY WELL, even to my never-quite-satisfied ears, and though that should be reward in itself, it is always galling to come home without a trophy, especially as we have won (sometimes deservedly, sometimes not) in the past.
And it's not as though they didn't deserve to get a place! The adjudicator gave the place trophies to choirs who pushed their voices, shouted, or just simply sang out of tune! Now to endorse this sort of singing is just asking for vocal problems (probably nodules), and to advocate a 'white noise' type of sound (clear straight tone) over a full, rich sound is just plain wrong to my ears. But.........every adjudicator has different criteria. Some like to see movement, even at the expense of the singing. Others will sacrifice tone for the sake of word enunciation. This one wanted light and shade of sound, even at the expense of vocal quality and tonality. Me, you start by singing the right notes, and then build the rest on from there. No wonder there are so many burnt-out singers out there if this is what the 'Australian Choral Sound' is!
Oh well, eisteddfods are the opinions are one person. Not much you can do about that. The kids felt very good about themselves after they sang, and that's what counts! And they had a number of people (even conductors of other choirs) go out of their way to tell us that we were 'robbed'. So there!
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