Yesterday, Billy C, Do, and I were to accompany Princess Canary at a concert put on by her High School's vocal music program. We had a sound check at 11 AM. On my way there, I had to take a busy street congested by due to ongoing construction. I was stopped behind a line of cars for a red light, when this Ford Expedition rear-ended me. I was pissed, but mostly calm when I took down the information from this stupid lady who hit me, but I missed the sound check. My point is, what a crappy way to begin the day. I wanted to kill the woman.
So, performance time. Princess Canary sang beautifully. It is on film somewhere. She sang the Beatles' "I Will," which is the first difficult song I ever attempted. Never really learned it until now because it didn't really fit my voice. It's a cool song with chord changes about every two beats.
Princess has a sweet voice. She's not yet comfortable with it, but once she develops it, will be a fine singer.
Many other students sang solos, duets, and other conglomerations. One thing I felt (and this isn't a commentary on the quality of performances) was that song writing can't be as hard as I seem to think. So many of the songs sung were utter crap. And hits for someone.
Even some of the choral music wasn't that good. Zoe's group, the chambers singers, did some really great stuff, but the other groups did mostly pop tunes. And there was a whole lot of churchy music. Not GOOD churchy music. But current pop, sappy churchy music. Jesus, "Take the Wheel," about a woman in turmoil driving back home and deciding to let Jesus take over. She decides to let go of the steering wheel and I'm thinking, given my morning accident, that's a pretty dangerous thing to do.
This school is located in the middle of a highly conservative Christian community, so I guess many people feel it's ok to have that much religion at a public school. But I just wonder whether a student who wants to do a song about another religious or political view would be allowed to do so.
1 comment:
I wondered about that too. I'd love to see someone do that and see what kind of reaction they get. But since we're talking about high school students it would probably end up being a disaster with long-lasting repercussions. Those songs WERE utter crap. karaoke crap. How nice it would have been if someone had sung a sweet old hymn accompanied by piano or guitar.
Princess C did a beautiful job with a song that was skillfully written by a couple of guys who really knew their shit.
I hope you're feeling better about the car incident. Maybe that woman had handed the brake pedal over to Jesus.
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