Application: Intervals, Sight-Reading, and Audiation

     Alright, let's apply what we talked about in my last post. As a refresher, last time I covered how to recognize various intervals using classic songs that we all know. What we're going to do now is look at some of the music that I've sung in the past and use this method to understand how to sight read specific intervals without playing them on a piano first.

Shown below is a 4-part choral arrangement for Francis Scott Key's "The Star Spangled Banner"

Let's quickly identify the intervals that are sung by each voice part.


"Oh -" : m3 (Frosty the Snowman)

"say-can" : M3 (Kum Bah Yah)

"can-you" : m3

"you-see," : P4 (Here comes t. Bride)

     By recognizing the intervals I'm going to sing, I can figure out in my head where the line is supposed to go.

Let's look at another example where we can see the intervals existing across voice-parts.

Look at the Bass and Tenor line (bottom two lines). Notice that neither one is that complicated, but remember that in a choir, the notes are being sung at the same time. So while the tenors are singing a "F" in "bursting", the basses are singing "F" an octave lower, forming a P8 interval.

But when the tenor's sing the "Eb" in "gave", the basses stay on their "F" on the same beat in the measure. Think about the notes "F" and "Eb". While in this instance they are in different octaves, the affect they create when played together is the same: M2 (Major Second)

What this does is create Dissonance in the music (we'll discuss this concept in a later post), and give the music a sense of motion as it moves to resolve to the M3 that is created in the beginning of the next measure (consonance). Like I said, don't worry about these terms because we'll cover them in a different post. Right now, just understand that intervals can exist in both individual melodies and across voice parts or chords.

        For some fun choral terms, let's talk about what sight-reading actually is, and how our newfound skill of identifying intervals can help us do this without the need of accompaniment. If you're in a high school choir right now, you might be familiar with what I'm talking about. Sight-reading is the ability to be sing a line of music after only being given the starting pitch/key signature. When I was in high school and learning a new piece,  teacher would usually have us listen to various recordings of the song before we even started figuring out the notes. After that we would go over the rhythm specific parts of the song, and only then, after days of looking at the music and discussing it's tempo/rhythm, would we actually start singing.
 
         For those of you that want to sing in college, let me give you some helpful advice. Most college choral directors will expect you to know how to sight-read. This doesn't mean get the music and practice it for a couple days with a piano to help you. This means they give you the music, tell you what key it's in (if you can't figure that our already), give you the starting pitch, and you start singing.

          So how do you do this? Well, it's a tricky little skill called audiation. This is the ability to hear music or pitches in your head without music being physically played. It's kinda like daydreaming, but with music. In this way talented singers can hear their pitch without disturbing others by trying to find their note out loud. Try practicing this skill at home or in choir next time your teacher wants you to sing a certain pitch. As long as you know the starting note and understand how intervals sound (remember our examples from the previous post), you'll be able to sing the pitch perfectly the first time without having to find it by humming or "sliding".

        Now these directors aren't going to expect perfection the first time you sing a song, but that's the difference between high school and college. Here, they expect you to have a basic understanding of intervals and chord progressions so you can accurately "guess" where your melody/harmony line is going to go. Don't get overwhelmed as a freshmen though, because usually you're going to be in at least one large ensemble at first, and you're going to get a lot of help from the older/more experienced member's of your section (this will help you really hone in your skills for when you get into smaller choirs).

          I hope this way helpful in explaining how to apply your newfound knowledge of intervals in choir or solo singing. Note that this can also be used in other instruments, but it requires more practice to understand which notes/hand positions will produce specific pitches. Nevertheless the concept is the same. With a basic understanding of intervals and how harmony lines interact with each other, you can sing on pitch with brand new music and quickly find how your voice-part works with the rest of the choir.
         
          Thanks for reading, leave any comments or questions below if you have them! Also if you have a piece of music that you want analyzed, take a picture of it and we can include it in a future post.

Sincerely, ZS