A great presentation on choral arts and communication

Conductor Philip Copeland





When I attended the ACDA southern conference in Memphis this past spring I heard a lot of great musicmaking, but certainly one of the most memorable moments was hearing Philip Copeland's University of Alabama/Birmingham choir sing AND watching Philip conduct. While Philip and I have developed a friendship mostly through ChoralNet and e-mail I had never actually seen him conduct until Memphis. I was totally blown away by his style, conducting the gesture and the line, rarely simple beat patterns. I asked him about this later and he told me it was due to the great influence of his teacher Jerry Jordan. You can see what I said about the UAB choir at ACDA by clicking here:

http://tinyurl.com/23fbh54

Some background on Mr. Jordan via Ole Miss on the internet:

Jerry Jordan is Professor Emeritus at the University of Mississippi where for twenty-one years he led one of the most active and accomplished collegiate choral programs in the United States. Choirs under his direction or supervision performed to standing ovations at National and Southern Division Conventions of the American Choral Directors Association each of his last five years at Ole Miss. His Concert Singers have won seven major international choral competitions in Europe – more than any other American choir.

Recently I noticed a post of Facebook in which Philip mentions a presentation he gave recently about Jerry Jordan's ideas about choral musicmaking. I took a look at this slide presentation and really wished I could have heard the live verbal presentation that went along with it. I hope that Philip can share it with more people. In the meantime, I highly recommend you view the slideshow by going here

http://www.immigrantconductor.org/2010/09/good-to-great.html


I got a kick out of slide number 15 and then was surprised and pleased he mentioned a piece of mine at slide number 66 .

So, see what you think- there is much to ponder and learn from here, without a doubt!

P.S. Philip is now the new director of choral studies at Samford University. We should all look forward to hearing his new choirs from Samford.