Hello!

I am all excited because I am conducting at a wedding tomorrow and the music is gorgeous! We will have the Byrd Four Part Mass, Sicut Cervus by Palestrina and If Ye Love Me by Tallis.

Usually I conduct accompanied choral music (because my choir have issues with tuning and because of the layout of our gallery, hearing each other!) so I am really excited to get back to my roots and the stuff I really love.

Unaccompanied polyphony is such a pleasure to conduct because it is so cleverly written and so beautiful. With good singers it just sounds amazing. I think Sicut Cervus is my favourite piece of all to conduct...it is just so stunning and written so well to the text. Although as I go through the music for tomorrow the Agnus from the Byrd 4 is running a very close second!

What does anyone else like conducting?

Haydn Symphony No. 94 in G Major (surprise)

I have always had a sneaking suspicion that to be a good conductor you should be made of copper, or at the very least some non-human and mostly metallic substance. As evidence I put to you the following 3 well known conductors: Karajan, Rattle, Previn - no human male would EVER have hair like those 3, so by extension they must be non-human, probably robotic, therefore mostly metal and largely copper. QED??

Anything that stays in 1 time signature with no changes of speed!

I had real problems the 1st time I attempted to conduct as I was nervous that everyone was watching me Then I remembered what band was in front of me and realised that no-one would be looking at me - they don't for the regular conductor so why me

Allegro con Brio from Beethoven's 7th symphony (try and keep your hairstyle tidy during that!)

My favourite conducting occasion was my 60th birthday celebration, when my wife organised a string orchestra of many friends and acquaintances plus two offspring to rehearse and play the Elgar Introduction and Allegro and the Tippett Concerto for Double String Orchestra. We also played the Elgar Serenade without rehearsal. Within the last two years, two smaller scale occasions came close: the Ravel "Mother Goose" suite and Debussy's "L'après-midi d'un faune". These are all favourite works of mine.

Apart from directing the church choir once every 6 weeks or so, my only serious conducting was of a large choir performing Stainer's Crucifixion where I was the tenor soloist as well. Quite hard work!

I like conducting from the piano - it's amazing what one can do with a bit of eye contact

Make everyone fall over?

More like turn them to stone


*runs*

I am trying to make a sensible post here!!

I have MDed several shows from the piano.
Conducting on it's own is boring (for me).

I suppose to be able to conduct from the piano, you need to be good at giving a nod and a wink!

Yep

I'd like to try to conduct 'In the Hall of the Mountain King' some day!

Actually, I just like to conduct *anything*.

Grieg's Peer Gynt is awesome I have it all on my iPod

I think a lot if Shostakovich's orchestral stuff would be great to conduct too. It's certainly amazing to play!

Keep it up though CJB! It is sooooooo scary the first few times to stand up in front of a group and conduct. But it is so much fun! Take every opportunity you can to have another go.



That sounds amazing!



Yes! I tried to conduct polyphonic mass while conducting them...it's a tough one!




MDing like that is impressive stuff. I'd love to have a go. But I don't think anything could top directing good unaccompanied singing...especially something like Palestrina.



Go for it! It is so much fun and so rewarding! Would you do a course?

I'd quite like to conduct Tchaik's Romeo and Juliet do for some reason. I'd love to conduct and sometimes find myself doing so when listening to music alone. What a responsibility it must be!

Oh, I'd absolutely love to! It's one of my dreams... I don't know if it'll ever happen though. But I've been conducted by some amazing conductors in my time (Clark Rundell, anyone? *swoon*)... I wish I could be remotely like them!

I always conduct when im listening to music
I must look so strange, haha.

Yes, that would be amazing! I haven't done any orchestral conducting...but I'd say Romeo and Juliet would be a serious rush! Also, Finlandia...that would be really fun. It is a responsibility alright, but I find despite becoming extremely (painfully!) nervous when asked to play the piano, standing up and waving my arms at people is not so nerve-wracking. I think it is probably because you're not there for you, but to keep everyone else going and working together.



If you get a chance go for it! I think the RSCM do choral conducting course about the place...go for one!Maybe you and Matthew could go together for support.

I can't recommend it enough I'm doing a course the week after next and just got all my music...lots of study ahead for the next little while!

The moderato from Rachmaninov's Piano concerto no 2 always gets my arms moving (and I'm not a conductor).