Chicago a cappella presents "Roll, Jordan, Roll" on Feb. 6, 7, 13, and 14. 
 
How did the African-American spiritual come about?  Here are some thoughts about the social background and history of the spiritual, from my program notes for these upcoming performances.   
 
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This is the first in a series of blogs to provide historical context for Chicago a cappella's upcoming February performances of spirituals, Roll, Jordan, Roll.  Some of this material didn't make it into the program notes and so is unique to this blog and this website.  Enjoy, and don't be shy about commenting if you have something to say.

Special Guest, Courtney Perkins and Angela Golden in a dialogue about Million Dollar Quartet.

CP:  One of the benefits of running a blog, or having a co-worker/friend that does, is that you get invited to events with the comical name "blogger night" offering free tickets to an otherwise pricey show that I've wanted to see for some time.  Advertised on cabs and local buses everywhere, Million Dollar Quartet.

AG: I may have ignored those cabby signs, but I paid attention when I got an opportunity to get free tickets. 

CP: Blogger Night became our mantra leading up to the performance --it had a certain ring to it.

AG: But we bloggers didn't get any special recognition which was sort of disappointing.

The Los Angeles Times recently published a great article by Chloe Veitman about female conductors.  This seems especially relevant to me because the Chicago Sinfonietta has recently begun search to find a successor to our Founder and Music Director, Paul Freeman.  While I won’t go into any details about our search process, we have definitely become aware of some extremely talented female candidates, two of whom – Mei-Ann Chen and Alondra de la Parra - will be guest conducting our orchestra next season.

We just finished the first weekend of "Chansons d'Amour:  April in Paris," the newest Chicago a cappella program.  I must say I'm very happy with the program and how it all turned out.  If you haven't ever heard the Poulenc Huit chansons françaises (Eight French songs), mostly based on 16th-century and other traditional tunes, they're worth the whole admission price on their own.  What a fabulous cycle!  Poulenc is amazing.
 
But I don't want to dwell on Poulenc -- rather, on what it takes to deliver the 16th-century chanson in a convincing manner.  This is harder than it looks.  Replicating the notes on the page is necessary but not sufficient for a great performance. 
 
So I've been thinking about this a little and have a few thoughts to offer.