Gospel CD, DVD Being Released by Calvin

September 24, 2007 == MEDIA ADVISORY

Summary: The Gospel Choir at Calvin is releasing a new CD, celebrating 10 years of live performances, and director Charsie Sawyer is releasing an instructional DVD intended to train choir directors and singers in proper technical skills, posture, breathing and breath support, tone quality, vowel and style uniformity and resonance.

For the full stories on both the CD and the DVD, including JPGs, see
http://www.calvin.edu/news/releases/2007-08/charsie-sawyer.htm

The Gospel Choir at Calvin College is releasing Then Sings My Soul!, a CD celebrating 10 years of live performances. The collection, funded by the Calvin music department, will be available through the Calvin Campus Store.

Then Sings My Soul!, is a compilation of 23 songs from concerts the choir has performed in a decade of tours to everywhere from Oshkosh to Philadelphia and California to Ghana.

"Usually a choir goes on tour and then records the tour. I didn't want to do that," said Calvin music professor Charsie Randolph Sawyer, the director of the Gospel Choir. "I wanted to make it a celebration of 10 years of all of these different singers."

Sawyer also recently has released an instructional DVD for keeping gospel choirs in spanking vocal health. The DVD, which retails for $39.99, also is available through the Calvin campus store, and was created to train choir directors and singers in proper technical skills, posture, breathing and breath support, tone quality, vowel and style uniformity and resonance.

"There are a lot of DVDs for choral singers -- classically trained singers who sing in the European style," said Sawyer, herself a classically trained opera singer. "Singing gospel is harder, and it requires that you maintain proper breath control and proper breath support and technique."

Sawyer has used the techniques she teaches in the DVD to rehearse the Calvin Gospel Choir, whose music on its new CD is as wide-ranging as the choir is, combining spirituals, African music and anthems with both contemporary and traditional gospel songs. The collection even includes a rendition of the Battle Hymn of the Republic, accompanied by an orchestra.

"I like the choir to be versatile," said Sawyer.

At 120 voices, the Gospel Choir is the largest student choral ensemble at Calvin. The choir is also inclusive, welcoming the handful of faculty and staff members who want to join.

Pictures of various tour locations and of many of the sopranos, altos, tenors and basses who sang in the Gospel Choir since 1996 decorate the booklet accompanying Then Sings My Soul.

And listed inside the booklet are all 800 names of the choir members from those years -- an editorial decision on which Sawyer insisted.

"They are just a wonderful group of students who love to sing and worship," she said. "I am so grateful that I'm the director of the gospel choir."

Contact Sawyer at 616-526-6823 or csawyer@calvin.edu

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Received on Mon Sep 24 14:37:11 2007