This article contains affiliate links.
President Harry Truman said, "Not all readers are leaders, but all leaders are readers." You should be reading books to enhance your effectiveness as a choir conductor to become a better leader for your choirs. The following books will enhance your ability to lead your choirs to greatness.
1. Conducting Technique
This book is full of practical conducting exercises, clear visual renderings of conducting patterns, and useful tips on conducting technique. This is book is great for all levels of conductors from those just starting out to the professional. This is a book you will want to reference for most of your conducting career.
2. The Robert Shaw Reader
This book compiles the notes, letters, rehearsal plans, and master work guides written by the great Robert Shaw. This is a must have for the conductor who performs large works with orchestra and choir. It provides a personal look into the genius of a master conductor and teacher. It shows his sense of wit, his leadership skills, and his commitment to the music.
3. Chorus Confidential
This book is very entertaining while at the same time very educational. Dehning has a very approachable style of writing that is similar to a conversation, as apposed to the academic language found in many choral conducting books. He offers great tips on score study, voice mapping, rehearsal pacing, conducting technique, and so much more. This is a very enjoyable book that will provide you with some excellent new ways of looking at the choir conductor profession.
4. The 4-Hour Work Week
While this book has very little to do with actual choral conducting, it will provide some very useful tips and techniques for managing your overall work-life balance. I am not suggesting that you only work four hours a week, however I am suggesting that you use this book to cut down on some of the monotonous tasks that get in the way of music making. This book will help you to improve your daily work flow, eliminate unnecessary interruptions, and can get you to work smarter not harder.
5. Evoking Sound
This book takes a more "new age" approach to choral conducting. It provides great resources for examining your overall conducting technique. It can help you eliminate some of your bad conducting habits and to gain a better sense of how your body actual moves. The included DVD is one of the best parts of this book. The DVD shows you how your muscles and skeleton are designed to move in the most efficient way possible. This is great as both a text book for an undergraduate choral conducting class and for someone wanting to better understand their conducting technique.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorZach Thompson |