At 8:45 PM -0500 9/9/06, Richard Smith wrote:
This is interesting. I have never considered putting choir anyplace except at the bottom, like an orchestra without strings. I'm interested to hear your reasons for other positions.
Well, I can give you the logic that makes sense to me, but I can't give you an appeal to authority. (Gee, this may be a case where we actually get to make up our own minds!!)
Since orchestral scores have been around for a lot longer than concert band scores, and since I've spent more time with them, they are going to be my model. And typically, in orchestral scores if there is a featured line or lines, such as a vocal soloist, a violin soloist, a piano soloist, or a chorus, it is centered or just below center on the page, where you can follow it and still have the rest of the score in your peripheral vision. And conventionally that is between the percussion (if any) and the strings, a bit below center.
Now, there are two ways to think about this convention, and I think that's why there are different ideas on this. You can think of it as (more or less) centering the featured line, or you can think of it as placing that line above the strings. The problem arises when you then try to transfer the logic to a concert band score. Since there are no strings, one kind of logic suggests that "above the strings" equals "below the winds and percussion," and that puts the chorus/soloist at the bottom of the score. But then you lose the centered placement that makes for better score reading. So the other kind of logic suggests "keep the featured lines centered on the page," which is what I almost automatically do. In this I agree completely with David Bailey.
I can think of no orchestral score in which the featured lines are placed at the bottom of the page. And similarly, I can think of no orchestral score where the featured lines are placed at the top of the page. (I'm sure someone can quote exceptions, but in my experience they would be exceptions and not the rule.)
Putting the chorus at the top of the score reasons not from orchestral convention but from octavo convention where the piano accompaniment is placed below the vocal lines, and reasons that since the piano part is often a reduction of the orchestration, the vocal lines should be at the top, but I'm not convinced because the full orchestral layout IS an existing convention.
Of more interest is the score order when obbligato instruments are added to the vocal lines and piano accompaniment in a choral octavo. I automatically put them above the vocal lines, and if there were added rhythm section lines I would place them below the piano, and again, I think my instinct is informed by orchestral practice.
Bottom line: Do what makes sense to you, and hope that it also makes sense to the conductors who will use your score. Beyond that it's like the question of making transposed or concert pitch scores: there is no single right answer for every one and every situation.
John -- John & Susie Howell Virginia Tech Department of Music Blacksburg, Virginia, U.S.A 24061-0240 Vox (540) 231-8411 Fax (540) 231-5034 (mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]) http://www.music.vt.edu/faculty/howell/howell.html _______________________________________________ Finale mailing list [email protected] http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
