choral-evolution

Director Notes - Okt 28th 2026

Fri, 30 Oct 2026 18:47:39 GMT

Hello Choral Evolution!

One of the most important skills a chorister brings to rehearsal and performance is listening. Listening is not easy, it's hard to hear the other parts when your section is singing away. Sitting in a circle like we did on Wednesday makes it much easier to hear the other sections and achieve some balance. We'll set up the same way this week and continue to listen, tune and balance our parts to achieve an exciting and effective sound.

Maybe it's time to start singing with the balanced track, listen to how your parts interact with the whole arrangement?

Try some drills: how much of a song can you sing without checking your parts?

Learn the endings to your piece so you can look up.

Learn/memorize lines with page turns to help you look up when you sing.

Memorize bits where we'll be slowing or pausing so you can watch the conductor.

Here's what we'll work on this week:

Child of Wonder - Warm up

Like It's Christmas - Clapping, Dynamics

Christmas (Baby Please Come Home)

All I want for Christmas is You

I'll release some of you at 8:45 and keep the small group:

Christmas Time is Here

Grown up Christmas list

And any of these pieces :)

Festive Christmas Trilogy

Christmas Morning

Underneath the Three

Christmas Canon

White Christmas

River

Happy New Year

Carol of the Bells

See you Wednesday evening in Sooke,

André ♪

The choir's sound is only as good as the singers making it. Start exercising your voices regularly. Find a nice big space where you won't be disturbed and sing some of the parts you are working on at full voice. Imagine you are in a big hall, really sing out and enjoy the feeling of making a free and open sound. The halls we perform in are large and require a lot of sound to fill. We need each voice to contribute to our exciting live sound

Breathing is the rhythm of music – singing is tone on breath – practice the complete breath – be conscious of each breath

– then put breath on pitch – let the breath make the tone - release vocal tension, stiffness - trust the breath

Start your practice every day:

✓ Complete breath – Low – Med – High, then all together.

✓ This will Coordinate – innervate – strengthen your breathing

✓ Keep chest high – sigh to start tone – start relaxing right away

✓ Sing 5 notes down on oo, then oo – ah. Like a sigh

✓ Now you are ready to start singing

✓ Practice – know your parts – use the practice tracks. If you have trouble accessing them, please ask.

Reminders:

✓ We have Excellent New music, mark lightly with pencils only.

✓ Please bring a pencil to rehearsal

✓ Mark your parts – score is a road map to beautiful music

✓ In long passages, decide where you will breathe, mark it down and practice it.

✓ Practice – know your parts – use the practice tracks. You will get an email explaining how to do

this.

CE News 25 Oct 2026

Mon, 26 Oct 2026 03:14:09 GMT

You might notice the picture when you click into the blog area. This is a reminder that we won't have an audience if we don't share that we are having a show! Now is the time to speak to friends, family, coworkers, person in line at the grocery store, coffee shop, etc. and tell them about the fabulous show we have coming up. It will be fun for all ages and let them know that they are songs that they should all know! It might even have the audience singing along with us! Physical tickets will soon be available to sell and the board will let you know when that will happen at one of the upcoming rehearsals.

Our music is coming together, but keep rehearsing at home and in your sectionals to make it great. Pay close attention to the tricky bits that are pointed out at rehearsal. Our hard work will only made us sound better. If you do miss a rehearsal, you can find the rehearsal tracks in the Practice Tracks. Fraser has done some fantastic editing to make it easier to hear. Thank you for your skills!

We are still looking for someone to take on the advertising role: Joscelyn (previous member who wasn't able to join this session) would like to mentor someone in this task; she would work with someone as she knows all that it intails. It involves getting our shows advertised on air, on electronic billboards, getting word out in newspapers as well as free community calendars, etc. The job is not too labour intensive, but needs to happen soon. If this is something you might do, please let a board member know.

Thank you to everyone who has found a task to do to keep this choral machine running. If it wasn't for your assistance, so many things would not be able to be done as it would fall to the board and their task load is already very heavy. The board will be able to assist anyone with understanding what the job is, so just ask. I will be sending out a list in email so everyone will know what they chose to help with. A big thank you to the board for all the behind the scenes hard work that you do. Your board has grown with Victoria becoming a new director to help share the load: we appreciate you joining the board and already taking on duties.

We will be meeting in Sooke for the next rehearsal. Andre has already sent out the list of what we will work on, so I'll see you in Sooke!

Director Notes - Okt 22nd 2026

Fri, 23 Oct 2026 17:18:50 GMT

Hello Choral Evolution!

We are having a run of really productive rehearsals this month. It's encouraging to hear that we have learned our notes this early in the process. We'll continue to root out wrong notes and add important details along the way. As we get settled on each arrangement we'll spend more and more time fixing ever smaller problems. Ultimately, we will have time to polish each piece so that we present a truly beautiful and memorable sound.

Here's what we'll work on this week:

Child of Wonder

Christmas Morning

White Christmas

River

All I want for Christmas is You

And any of these pieces:)

Festive Christmas Trilogy

Underneath the Three

Christmas Time is Here

Christmas Canon

White Christmas

Break

Christmas (Baby Please Come Home)

Like It's Christmas

Grown up Christmas list

Happy New Year

Carol of the Bells

See you Wednesday evening in Sooke,

André ♪

Breathing is the rhythm of music – singing is tone on breath – practice the complete breath – be conscious of each breath

– then put breath on pitch – let the breath make the tone - release vocal tension, stiffness - trust the breath

Start your practice every day:

✓ Complete breath – Low – Med – High, then all together.

✓ This will Coordinate – innervate – strengthen your breathing

✓ Keep chest high – sigh to start tone – start relaxing right away

✓ Sing 5 notes down on oo, then oo – ah. Like a sigh

✓ Now you are ready to start singing

✓ Practice – know your parts – use the practice tracks. If you have trouble accessing them, please ask.

Reminders:

✓ We have Excellent New music, mark lightly with pencils only.

✓ Please bring a pencil to rehearsal

✓ Mark your parts – score is a road map to beautiful music

✓ In long passages, decide where you will breathe, mark it down and practice it.

✓ Practice – know your parts – use the practice tracks. You will get an email explaining how to do

this.

CE News 18 October 26

Mon, 19 Oct 2026 03:43:48 GMT

"It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas"......okay, well not so much, but our music definitely gets you thinking of Christmas. I haven't even started my shopping yet! Lots of time, I guess as Hallowe'en isn't even here yet. This concert is going to rock with the way the songs are shaping up. I really appreciated Andre's encouraging feedback today about how he feels that we are doing well. Keep up the good work at home, it really shows during rehearsal.

Thanks to the people who brought snacks for the long rehearsal today; I had to nip out to church so I missed the goodies and coffee/tea. It is appreciated how much we pull together with these simple things. Thanks again for the goodies that I'm sure everyone enjoyed. After our rehearsal, a large group of us went to Lawrence and Hilary's to have chili and vegies...even ice cream for dessert. Thank you to Choral Evolution for putting on this event for the choir; it was nice to just hang out together and have some good food. Thank you Lawrence and Hilary for opening your home to the large group.

Not to scare anyone, but did you know we have 6 rehearsals and then the dress rehearsal and shows? Kind of puts things into perspective. If you have tricky spots in your music, now is the time to review them and seek help from your section lead or Andre. Andre also encourages singing out into a large room as we will have to do that when it comes time for the show. Keep working the breathing exercise as it will build your lung capacity as the muscles are strengthened.

We are in Langford this Wednesday, so see you there.

Director Notes - Okt 15th 2026

Fri, 16 Oct 2026 02:44:35 GMT

Hello Choral Evolutionaries!

I was so pleased with rehearsal Wednesday. We have made lots of progress learning our parts and we're ready for our half day rehearsal this week. I think our new seating arrangement will help us hear one another and improve our tuning and ensemble. We'll keep working at refining our setup to maximize our sound.

Please put your music in this order:

Festive Christmas Trilogy

Christmas Morning

Child of Wonder

Underneath the Three

Christmas Time is Here

Christmas Canon

White Christmas

Break

Christmas (Baby Please Come Home)

River

Like It's Christmas

Grown up Christmas list

All I want for Christmas is You

Happy New Year

Carol of the Bells

I need hand clappers for "Like It's Christmas" See if you can memorize the part so your hands are free for clapping. We'll do some simple hand clapping choreography (clapography?) to add visual interest. Oh, and there are finger snaps too!

See you Sunday at 1pm in Langford,

André

Breathing is the rhythm of music – singing is tone on breath – practice the complete breath – be conscious of each breath

– then put breath on pitch – let the breath make the tone - release vocal tension, stiffness - trust the breath

Start your practice every day:

✓ Complete breath – Low – Med – High, then all together.

✓ This will Coordinate – innervate – strengthen your breathing

✓ Keep chest high – sigh to start tone – start relaxing right away

✓ Sing 5 notes down on oo, then oo – ah. Like a sigh

✓ Now you are ready to start singing

✓ Practice – know your parts – use the practice tracks. If you have trouble accessing them, please ask.

Reminders:

✓ We have Excellent New music, mark lightly with pencils only.

✓ Please bring a pencil to rehearsal

✓ Mark your parts – score is a road map to beautiful music

✓ In long passages, decide where you will breathe, mark it down and practice it.

✓ Practice – know your parts – use the practice tracks. You will get an email explaining how to do

this.

CE News 11 Oct 2026

Sun, 11 Oct 2026 15:21:15 GMT

Hey, everyone. Happy Thanksgiving/Friendsgiving! I hope you have the opportunity for Food, Family, Friends and Fun this weekend. I have a houseful coming tomorrow so it's turkey time!

We are making great progress on our music, so thank you to everyone who is working so hard to accomplish this. Thank to Andre and Gabe for keeping us on track and teaching us the way of the music so it turns out just right. They are the stars of the photo you see above.

Our very own Fraser has mad computer skills and has created all parts of "Child of Wonder". Andre posted a choir singing so use the two to learn. Thank you to both! Click the link below to access the parts one:

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1xjTRRlS1Vxq8G-tLWiTq64NcC4cojD1K?usp=sharing

Andre's Blog spoke of ticket sales: yes please! Get out there and spread interest. You know the dates of the shows from the calendar (Dec 4, 5) so get people to save the date in their calendars. Let's make us the event of the season that everyone wants to attend. Start talking us up to friends, acquaintances, co-workers, people in line at the grocery store, etc. Sally has worked on an awesome poster and we should get some printed soon so you can post in your car: it is a passive way to share our event.

Thank you to everyone who signed up for a task on the "job board". I'll take some time to review it and then share the jobs we still need done. Because we are fewer this session, it might mean that there will have to be more than one job. But I know you are up to it!

We are in Langford for the next two rehearsals as well as the SUNDAY "retreat" rehearsal on 18 October from 1-5. Afterwards, those that can make it (and significant others are welcome) will head to Lawrence and Hilary's home for some food and fun times. If you have a portable musical instrument, bring it with you. Please make every effort to be at the long rehearsal as we accomplish so much it is not to be missed!

Have a great weekend and we'll see each other on Wednesday in Langford.

Director Notes - Okt 8th 2026

Fri, 09 Oct 2026 18:40:13 GMT

Hello Choral Evolutionaries!

Oktober is the month where our singing takes the shape we need for performance. Now that we've spent time with the practice tracks and been through the arrangements together, we will begin to drill down and clear up any problem spots. Expect me to start at the end of the piece and work forward. That will help to break dependance on the practice tracks. We need to come as close as possible to memorizing this music if we are to truly give and enjoy our performances.

Please start thinking about ticket sales. I was out with friends last night and told them all about our Christmas Spectacular. I did a bit of a sales pitch saying they should come to our show as a group, go out before the show, see us in action. I'll follow up as the show gets closer and hopefully make some actual sales. We each need to take every opportunity to grow our audience. If they don't come to the shows, they'll never know how rewarding the shows are. Stay tuned for updates on when and how to sell tickets from the Board.

Next week, Oktober 14th we will work on the following tunes:

White Christmas- Finish work through

River - clean and polish

Child of Wonder - CTRL + click to hear a performance of this piece

Carol of the Bells - this must be memorized for performance

Christmas (Baby Please Come Home)

Tunes we have worked through:

All I Want For Christmas Is You

Happy New Year

Christmas Morning

Festive Christmas Trilogy

Christmas Canon

Like It's Christmas

Underneath the Three

See you Wednesday in Langford,

André

Breathing is the rhythm of music – singing is tone on breath – practice the complete breath – be conscious of each breath

– then put breath on pitch – let the breath make the tone - release vocal tension, stiffness - trust the breath

Start your practice every day:

✓ Complete breath – Low – Med – High, then all together.

✓ This will Coordinate – innervate – strengthen your breathing

✓ Keep chest high – sigh to start tone – start relaxing right away

✓ Sing 5 notes down on oo, then oo – ah. Like a sigh

✓ Now you are ready to start singing

✓ Practice – know your parts – use the practice tracks. If you have trouble accessing them, please ask.

Reminders:

✓ We have Excellent New music, mark lightly with pencils only.

✓ Please bring a pencil to rehearsal

✓ Mark your parts – score is a road map to beautiful music

✓ In long passages, decide where you will breathe, mark it down and practice it.

✓ Practice – know your parts – use the practice tracks. You will get an email explaining how to do

this.

CE News 4 Oct 2026b

Mon, 05 Oct 2026 03:26:28 GMT

First up, thank you to everyone who was able to sing the anthem at todays hockey game. It was a blast...and we learned it was Marty the Marmot's birthday too, so we got to sing Happy Birthday to him as well. I didn't stay for the game, so those that did will have to advise if they put that up on the big screen as well. There are some pictures floating about (thanks Vanessa!) which I'll try to get to the website.

We have rehearsal in Sooke again this week, same place, same time. Andre will post the songs we need to work on so remember to check his blog. Some songs are coming along great, so be encouraged that we will sound great for the shows. Keep up all your hard work.

As spoken of before, we are a volunteer organization, so there are jobs to be had by everyone. Some have already taken some on, and thank you, but there are many more. At rehearsal will be sign up boards for volunteer jobs: the idea is that if you sign up early, you probably will get something in your wheelhouse; if not, you get what is left over. The volunteer lists will be ready for Wednesday, so please take a look for them at the break.

It looks like the get together event will happen after the long rehearsal as Lawrence and Hilary will share their home for the event. More details will come soon as the long rehearsal is on 18 October (which is in 2 weeks). Please join us for some fun, great food, singing and getting to know one another better.

See you on Wednesday in Sooke!

Director Notes - Okt 1st 2026

Thu, 01 Oct 2026 18:45:26 GMT

Hello Choral Evolutioneers!

We are right on schedule working through our Christmas repertoire. We ran the pieces we've learned so far, and things are in good shape to begin shaping and polishing. Don't stop singing and improving your knowledge of those songs we've worked on. Keep them fresh by visiting the regularly.

Sue thought that tracks for Child of Wonder, our acapella piece, could be up today. Please check for the recordings and get to know the piece before next rehearsal. Think of it as this season's "Locus Iste", and we'll use it to develop our choral sound. White Christmas is also on the docket for next week. It will challenge us with lots of lush choral sounds to enjoy.

Choir is much more uplifting when we listen and participate fully. The more of the concert you memorize, the more involved you can be in the performance.. Read a line, then look up and sing it. Do this enough times and your memory will take over and you'll be able to get your eyes off the music and on to the conductor. Thank you again for your concentration and keeping the chatter to a minimum during rehearsals. It saves so much time and energy for all of us.

Next week, Oktober 7th we will work on the following tunes:

White Christmas- Work through

Child of Wonder - CTRL + click to hear a performance of this piece

Carol of the Bells

All I want for Christmas is You

Tunes we have worked through:

River

Happy New Year

Christmas Morning

Festive Christmas Trilogy

Christmas Canon

Christmas (Baby Please Come Home)

Like It's Christmas

Underneath the Three

See you Wednesday in Sooke,

André

Breathing is the rhythm of music – singing is tone on breath – practice the complete breath – be conscious of each breath

– then put breath on pitch – let the breath make the tone - release vocal tension, stiffness - trust the breath

Start your practice every day:

✓ Complete breath – Low – Med – High, then all together.

✓ This will Coordinate – innervate – strengthen your breathing

✓ Keep chest high – sigh to start tone – start relaxing right away

✓ Sing 5 notes down on oo, then oo – ah. Like a sigh

✓ Now you are ready to start singing

✓ Practice – know your parts – use the practice tracks. If you have trouble accessing them, please ask.

Reminders:

✓ We have Excellent New music, mark lightly with pencils only.

✓ Please bring a pencil to rehearsal

✓ Mark your parts – score is a road map to beautiful music

✓ In long passages, decide where you will breathe, mark it down and practice it.

✓ Practice – know your parts – use the practice tracks. You will get an email explaining how to do

this.

CE News 27 Sept 2026

Sun, 27 Sep 2026 18:47:31 GMT

Hi everyone. Some housekeeping items right off the top:

Please make sure you refer to the Wellness Policy in the members area. It is the time of sickness and anyone around little kids has probably experienced some virus since they started school.
Please make sure you let us know if you will be absent using attendance.ce2023@gmail.com or use the link in the members area
absence of more than 2 weeks should have follow-up done to make sure you have kept up with the music (that will be a check-in with Andre)

Reminders:

Singing "O Canada" on 4 October (NEXT Sunday!!) at 4pm. More details will be sent in email as to the meet time. The ice is cold so wear a coat and I have a maple leaf scarf or bandana that we will put on. The link for the tickets is: Choral Evolution | Select Your Tickets
Choir get together: Hilary and Lawrence have offered their home (Thank You) for 3 October . The time to meet will be 1-3:30ish pm as they have a commitment later that day. I'm hoping most can make that time. Partners are welcome! Final details will be shared in email.
See the email about supporting Fraser's daughter Aria
If you have bottles/cans/milk jugs/etc and want to donate them to the choir, please let us know. You can in turn donate the money from them to help support your choir in the "I love my choir" box.

I will be sharing with our web design partner the updated members list which will be posted in the members area. Please do not share information in the members area with anyone outside the choir.

Please put some thoughts into who might be your section lead(s). Amanda and Hilary have volunteered for the Sopranos so thank you!.

Thank you for showing up at rehearsal and learning your music on your own time! You are all awesome.

Sherry

\Director Notes - Sept 24th 2026

Thu, 24 Sep 2026 18:58:46 GMT

Hello Choral Evolutioneers!

We are still waiting for delivery of some of our new Christmas tunes. We have on the way a lush choral arrangement of White Christmas that features audience participation (a first for CE!) and Gabe with a virtuoso piano part. We're also waiting for Mariah Carey's All I Want for Christmas is You. Those are the 2 most played songs in history. Probably why the sheet music is so hard to get :)

We are still waiting on rehearsal tracts for Child of Wonder, our acapella piece. I'd like to read through it, so I've included a link to a YouTube performance below. Listen, read along, do your best and we'll start it this week.

Choir is much more uplifting when we listen and participate fully. Thank you again for your concentration and keeping the chatter to a minimum during rehearsals. It saves so much time and energy for all of us.

Next week, Sept 30th we will work on the following tunes:

Happy New Year - work on harmonies and entrances

Christmas Canon - Work through

Christmas Morning - 2nd pass

Child of Wonder - CTRL + click to hear a performance of this piece

River - Sing through, clean up

See you Wednesday in Sooke,

André

Breathing is the rhythm of music – singing is tone on breath – practice the complete breath – be conscious of each breath

– then put breath on pitch – let the breath make the tone - release vocal tension, stiffness - trust the breath

Start your practice every day:

✓ Complete breath – Low – Med – High, then all together.

✓ This will Coordinate – innervate – strengthen your breathing

✓ Keep chest high – sigh to start tone – start relaxing right away

✓ Sing 5 notes down on oo, then oo – ah. Like a sigh

✓ Now you are ready to start singing

✓ Practice – know your parts – use the practice tracks. If you have trouble accessing them, please ask.

Reminders:

✓ We have Excellent New music, mark lightly with pencils only.

✓ Please bring a pencil to rehearsal

✓ Mark your parts – score is a road map to beautiful music

✓ In long passages, decide where you will breathe, mark it down and practice it.

✓ Practice – know your parts – use the practice tracks. You will get an email explaining how to do

this.

CE News 20 Sept 2026

Mon, 21 Sep 2026 03:46:23 GMT

So, three rehearsals in and you can see how much people are working at home. Thank you for doing your "homework" and being prepared to sing when we get together. If you are struggling with a section of the songs, make sure you put your hand up and ask for some help....if you are struggling, someone probably is too. Once we get our section leads arranged and get our sectionals happening, problems can be brough there as well. Speaking of which, we are looking for section leads. The lead should have some musical background and some organizational skills; it can be two people if that works for the section. If this sounds like you, please share your name with one of the board members. It is not a hard task, but it would be great to get set up so we can get the sectionals started.

I've sent the information about the Royals tickets by email. I will duplicate it here to ensure there is a viable link for a while: link to purchase $17 tickets to the Royals game on Oct 4th.

Choral Evolution | Select Your Tickets

We had a lot of fun singing the national anthem at the game and from what I heard, we sounded good. More information about meeting times will be coming in email once the planning is complete.

Please remember to keep silent unless singing. I have to admit that I'm guilty of this as well. This is your reminder as it makes rehearsal move along better when we are listening.

We are in Langford this week for rehearsal. Thank you to Fraser and carpool crew for setting up chairs for us. A reminder that if you want to try out for the small group, refer to Andre's blog for the information. The portion of the song he chose is to hear range and how singers work together; it is not the song that the small group will do.

There are starting to be colds going around as we move into fall and indoors. Please refer to the wellness policy in the members area to help you decide if you should join us for rehearsal. I will also do my plug for the hospital chant: wash your hands, wash your hands, wash your hands. I really does make a difference.

See you on Wednesday.

Director Notes - Sept 18th 2026

Fri, 18 Sep 2026 19:19:55 GMT

Hello Choral Evolutioneers!

We are making steady progress reading through our Christmas tunes. Thank you all for keeping the chatter to a minimum during rehearsals. It saves so much time and energy for all of us.

The choir's sound is only as good as the singers making it. Please start exercising your voices regularly. Find a nice big space where you won't be disturbed and sing some of the parts you are working on at full voice. Imagine you are in a big hall, really sing out and enjoy the feeling of making a free and open sound. The halls we perform in are large and require a lot of sound to fill. We need each voice to contribute to our exciting live sound.

If you would like to try out for a spot in our little group, please prepare your part in "Rivah" , 9 bars starting at letter D.

Next week, Sept 23rd we will work on the following tunes:

Underneath the Three - let's dig into this one

Child of Wonder - We will read this acapella piece and start learning it

River - Sing through and clean up

Christmas Morning - Read through

Christmas Canon - If we have time

See you Wednesday in Langford,

André

Breathing is the rhythm of music – singing is tone on breath – practice the complete breath – be conscious of each breath

– then put breath on pitch – let the breath make the tone - release vocal tension, stiffness - trust the breath

Start your practice every day:

✓ Complete breath – Low – Med – High, then all together.

✓ This will Coordinate – innervate – strengthen your breathing

✓ Keep chest high – sigh to start tone – start relaxing right away

✓ Sing 5 notes down on oo, then oo – ah. Like a sigh

✓ Now you are ready to start singing

✓ Practice – know your parts – use the practice tracks. If you have trouble accessing them, please ask.

Reminders:

✓ We have Excellent New music, mark lightly with pencils only.

✓ Please bring a pencil to rehearsal

✓ Mark your parts – score is a road map to beautiful music

✓ In long passages, decide where you will breathe, mark it down and practice it.

✓ Practice – know your parts – use the practice tracks. You will get an email explaining how to do

this.

CE News 13 Sept 2026

Sun, 13 Sep 2026 18:49:29 GMT

Hey everyone! We seem to be settling in well and it is evident that there has been some work at home on the music; thank you for that as it only makes us a better choir and makes rehearsal easier. When we work on the music at home, the rehearsal will be less overwhelming as you will know exactly where you are and what you should be singing. If you are able, please practice a bit every day with the tracks and music. I have a 45 minute commute so I downloaded to my phone and I can rehearse in my car. Yes, I probably get strange looks, but maybe that will encourage people to seek us out! Please see Andre's blog for what we will be focusing on Wednesday: those should be your need to work on pieces.

We will be in Langford for our next rehearsal. For those new to the venue, please see the Langford Map in the members area: 2838 Bryn Maur Rd . There is another group using the space so we cannot enter until 7pm. Reminder: there is underground parking that we can use (directly to the left of the building). The rehearsal space is on the second floor and there is an elevator for those that need it; stairs are to the left in the foyer. If you arrive before 7, please stay outside and take the opportunity to visit; we will get started as soon as we get upstairs. Please lend a hand setting up chairs so we can get started.

Now, I feel that I cannot let Andre's comments slide about my "boring blog"....the gauntlet has been thrown down! (ahaha) This area is meant for information for Choral Evolution members....so, what would you like to see in it? I can tailor it to the members needs, so any suggestion is welcome. Please share your thoughts to my personal email: labtech1963@gmail.com.

As advised earlier, this is a completely volunteer organisation, with the exception of our talent: AD and accompanist. As such, there will be many jobs that are required to be done, and if no one volunteers, the board staff have to take them on, weighing their workload down. In the upcoming weeks, a volunteer list will be at rehearsal and I encourage everyone to choose at least 1 task. Thank you for your willingness to help us succeed.

Make sure you start talking to people about our shows in December: Sooke, Dec 4 and Colwood, Dec 5. We also plan for the Sing-Along to happen, but need to arrange some details before dates are shared.

You may have noticed the "I Love My Choir" box on the table at rehearsal. This was an initiative from a few years back to allow members to toss in a couple of dollars to help the choir along. I save bottles and contribute the money to the box. If you have something to contribute, please do. We are also looking for someone to organize and initiate a Bottle Drive. If that is something you would like to do, please let us know.

Have a great week, remember to practice, and I'll see you on Wednesday in Langford.

Director Notes - Sept 10th 2026

Thu, 10 Sep 2026 17:38:32 GMT

Hello Choral Evolutioneers!

Our season is off to a fine start. Learning our parts and putting them together at rehearsal is always challenging at the beginning. As things progress, the fog clears and the true sound of Choral Evolution will come ringing through. We heard a few moments of clarity last night and the sound was exciting to those of us at the front. We are a fine group and I predict an excellent show will come of it.

Altos: We have a surplus of Altos and we need another couple of Sopranos. If you are comfortable singing to a D or E at the top of the staff...Consider joining the sopranos! We all went at least that high during the warm up last night for instance. If you are interested or tempted, please let me or someone on the board know. The Sopranos have lots of fun too and they often get the tune.

Next week, Sept 16th we will work on the following tunes:

Underneath the Three - let's read through it and get started.

Christmas (Baby Please Come Home) We should be able to finish reading this one

River - Letter D to the end

Happy New Year - Beginning to Bar 26

Like it’s Christmas - We should be able to finish reading this one

A Festive Christmas Trilogy (We will sing this to end most rehearsals, send us out the door happy)

See you Wednesday in Langford,

André

Breathing is the rhythm of music – singing is tone on breath – practice the complete breath – be conscious of each breath

– then put breath on pitch – let the breath help you release vocal tension, stiffness - learn to trust the breath

Start your practice every day:

✓ Complete breath – Low – Med – High, then all together.

✓ This will Coordinate – innervate – strengthen your breathing

✓ Keep chest high – sigh to start tone – start relaxing right away

✓ Sing 5 notes down on oo, then oo – ah. Like a sigh

✓ Now you are ready to start singing

✓ Practice – know your parts – use the practice tracks. If you have trouble accessing them, please ask.

Reminders:

✓ We have Excellent New music, mark lightly with pencils only.

✓ Please bring a pencil to rehearsal

✓ Mark your parts – score is a road map to beautiful music

✓ In long passages, decide where you will breathe, mark it down and practice it.

✓ Practice – know your parts – use the practice tracks. You will get an email explaining how to do

this.

CE News 6 Sept 26

Sun, 06 Sep 2026 18:27:48 GMT

Welcome back to our returning members, and a huge welcome to our new singers! We had 10 new recruits on Wednesday which is an awesome turn out. Thank you to everyone for supporting new singers and sharing a wonderfully warm CE welcome.

Thank you to Andre for auditioning and getting us right back into the music. Thank you to Gabe for your awesomeness and skill at the keyboard!

CE strives to be a "family of singers" so please embrace that philosophy and enjoy singing with a group of like-minded people. We all have different versions of skills, so learn from each other; this is where the sectionals come in. If you hadn't realized yet, Choral Evolution is FUN!

If you have accessed the blog, you have gained access to the members area and have seen the calendar, Andre's blog and other pertinent information including the tracks. Sue has included instructions on how to download (Thanks, Sue). If you have issues with it, please contact her at suemcleodmail@gmail.com.

The members area password will be changed this week (after Wednesday) and everyone will be advised.

Your participation at rehearsals is integral to us singing as a unit, and in order to track that and ensure we are all able to keep up with the work, an attendance is taken each rehearsal. If you cannot attend due to sickness (please see the sickness policy) or for some other reason, please send an email to attendance.ca2023@gmail.com. There is also a link in the members area, but once you send an email to the address, your phone/computer will remember it.

Also to be updated in the members area is a list of current singers. It will share your name, email and phone number. If for some reason you do not want this shared, please advise. We use the list so that sections can contact their members for sectionals. You might ask "what is a sectional"? Sectionals are where a section gets together to review parts of the music, rehearse together and learn to know others in their section. We will be requesting a Section Lead of each section; that person organizes the group and sets up times/location to meet. It is one of the many volunteer jobs that this organization has. The Section Lead should have a good understanding of music and some organizational tools (although, the section lead can share that aspect with another member). Because we have lots to do and learn, starting sectionals early is very helpful. You can use the tracks if a piano is not available.

This is becoming too long, so I'm quitting while ahead. Information about other volunteer opportunities will be shared just after the break at rehearsals.

Be sure to download your music and start learning! It will only make us a better choir.

Sherry

Director Notes Template - Sept 2nd 2026

Wed, 02 Sep 2026 21:22:02 GMT

Hello Choral Evolutioneers!

Thank you for joining us Wednesday for our 1st rehearsal. So many new happy singers looking to add to our already amazing sound. We're going to have a wonderful time together getting our music learned and rehearsed and this show on the road.

Next week, Sept 9th we will work on the following tunes:

Christmas (Baby Please Come Home) Choral Sheet Music | J.W. Pepper

River

Happy New Year

Like it’s Christmas

A Festive Christmas Trilogy (We will sing this to end most rehearsals, send us out the door happy)

Start your practice every day:

✓ Complete breath – Low – Med – High, then all together.

✓ This will Coordinate – innervate – strengthen your breathing

✓ Keep chest high – sigh to start tone – start relaxing right away

✓ Sing 5 notes down on oo, then oo – ah. Like a sigh

✓ Now you are ready to start singing

✓ Practice – know your parts – use the practice tracks. If you have trouble accessing them, please ask.

Breathing is the rhythm of music – singing is tone on breath – practice the complete breath – be conscious of each breath

– then put breath on pitch – let the breath help you release vocal tension, stiffness - learn to trust the breath

See you Wednesday in Sooke!

André

Reminders:

✓ We have Excellent New music, mark lightly with pencils only.

✓ Please bring a pencil to rehearsal

✓ Mark your parts – score is a road map to beautiful music

✓ In long passages, decide where you will breathe, mark it down and practice it.

✓ Practice – know your parts – use the practice tracks. You will get an email explaining how to do

this.

Welcome to the fall season, 2026

Sat, 29 Aug 2026 00:33:40 GMT

Hello CE singers,

We’re excited to welcome you back! Registration for our new session begins Wednesday, September 2 at 6:30 pm in the Sooke Community Hall dining room . Due to rising costs, we’ve had to increase the season fee slightly - the new fee for the season is $200 . If you pre-pay by e‑transfer to choralevolution@ gmail .com , you can pick up your music now. Many rehearsal tracks are ready so you can get a jump on learning the pieces.

This session is a playful departure from our usual fall fare … imagine pop‑forward Christmas favourites with a few contemporary choral gems tucked in. Expect a few familiar names to pop up (think a cheeky nod to ABBA, a bright Kelly Clarkson moment, a classic Mariah highlight, a wistful Amy Grant tune, and a festive Jonas Brothers vibe) plus a couple of surprises and contemporary choral pieces to keep things sparkling.

If you have a friend who might like to see what our choir is like, please invite them to the first rehearsal — they would be very welcome! Please consider pre-paying now to help the first night run smoothly; if you prefer not to pre-pay, a quick reply to this email to let us know you’ll attend would be greatly appreciated.

We would also like to welcome and thank our new board members, Emily Craddock and Michelle Wellwood! Thank you for joining us Michelle and Emily!

We look forward to singing with you on September 2 ^nd ,

Your Choral Evolution Board of Directors

Sherry Walters, president

Jackie Hansen, treasurer

Emily Craddock, secretary

Diane Edwards, past co-president

Michelle Wellwood, director

Sally Titchkosky, director