2019 Class Titles and Descriptions
(listed alphabetical, by session)
Click HERE to download a pdf of the following class descriptions. (updated 3/19/19)
SESSION 1 - Friday, 3:15pm
20-Minute Voice Lesson: This is your opportunity to have a scheduled 20-minute singing lesson. You'll meet one-on-one with a fantastic vocal coach who will help you personally become a better singer.
FACULTY: Sheryl Brook TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
40-minute Voice Lesson: This is your opportunity to have a scheduled 40-minute singing lesson. You'll meet one-on-one with a fantastic vocal coach who will help you personally become a better singer.
FACULTY: Beth Bruce TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
40-Minute Voice Lesson: This is your opportunity to have a scheduled 40-minute singing lesson. You'll meet one-on-one with a fantastic vocal coach who will help you personally become a better singer.
FACULTY: Kathleen Hansen TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Achieving Vocal Match: What the heck IS vocal match? The age old question that is continually explored by barbershoppers across time. This class will delve into what vocal match means and use practical examples to help achieve a better unit within our sections, choruses and quartets.
FACULTY: Nikki Blackmer and Judy Pozsgay TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Beyond the Ictus : Conducting techniques for directors and musical leaders to promote clarity and ease of communication.
FACULTY: Lori Lyford TARGET AUDIENCE: Directors, Section Leaders
DCP Testing: Region 13 offers testing at this time for their Directors Certification Program. Judy Beckman
Do Less and Sing More: Is your chapter spending more time on non-singing “jobs” than on singing? Is it getting harder to find volunteers for those jobs? We’ll review ways in which you can increase member and audience satisfaction by doing less and singing more, and how to get off the “financial hamster wheel” so that decisions are not driven by chapter financial needs. We’ll look at free and low-cost resources available to aid with chapter operations, performance, marketing, and other needs, and we’ll review tools, services, and other solutions that you can begin using immediately. (Offered in Sessions 1 and 8)
FACULTY: Chris Rimple TARGET AUDIENCE: Chapter/Chorus Leadership
Forward Motion: What It Is, What It Isn’t, and How To Get More of It : Forward motion is that ineffable quality that keeps audiences on the edge of their seats, eager to know what is coming next. Performances lacking forward motion are experienced as “boring,” “mechanical,” or “slow.” In this class you will learn powerful rehearsal techniques to imbue your performance with drama and urgency. This is a high-participation class; come ready to sing!
FACULTY: Elizabeth Davies TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone, Quartets
Keep Your Hands To Yourself: Many of us have received well-intentioned advice about selling the song through use of faces and bodies. Too often, this results in too much hand movement to the point of distracting the audience. This class will explore what we as barbershop performers are trying to do on stage, and then see if it is possible to succeed in our purpose without the use of our hands. Class will include interaction, discussion and experimentation. Class offered in sessions 1 and 5.
FACULTY: Roger Mills TARGET AUDIENCE: Quartets, Everyone
Motivation for Chorus Directors: Most directors have had a night where they come home from rehearsal and ask themselves "Why do I want to be a Chorus Director? How do others make it look so easy? How do I motivate my singers when I have trouble staying motivated myself?" This class will address those issues and more as we delve into the minds and hearts of successful Chorus Directors.
FACULTY: Raymond Schwarzkopf TARGET AUDIENCE: Directors, Teachers, Assistant Directors, Section Leaders
Musical Leaders Workshop: Developing and strengthening leadership skills of section specialists and assistant directors.
FACULTY: Jana Gutenson TARGET AUDIENCE: Section Leaders, Music Leadership
Reading Music: If you’ve never gotten around to learning how to read music as well as you’d like, join us as we learn the basic building blocks of music: note names, scales, notation, key signatures, time signatures, and more. Recognize melodic movement, intervals, rhythms, and scales to help you ‘hear’ the music before you sing it. By applying a practical application of music reading you can enhance your singing experience and musicianship. Offered in sessions 1 and 3.
FACULTY: Lisa Schwarzkopf TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
The Emoting Body: One of the unique challenges of singing in the barbershop style is the dual focus on sound and presentation. As stage performers, the body is perhaps the most vital way to connect with the audience, enhancing an interp's impact. This class focuses on unifying the body with the emotional content of the lyrics being sung and will be useful to front-row singers, those aspiring to the front row, and everyone else in the chorus. Please wear comfortable shoes, as we will be walking around the room. Offered in sessions 1 and 8.
FACULTY: Ellie Osterman TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Unleashing the Artist in You: Using professional examples of great performers, we will explore how to bring the best performance inside each of us to the stage.
FACULTY: Ryan Heller TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Vocal Production : Breathing, alignment, support – the triumvirate of singing! Clear, concise explanations, and hands on participation.
FACULTY: Anne Downton TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Why Are We Getting Coaching But Not Improving?: This class is for coaches, directors and students alike. You and your coach/director may be trying to get to the same place, but discover why you may not be improving because of perspective and how you can begin to use a shared language that will help move everyone forward faster and with a greater level of skills.
FACULTY: Paul Ellinger TARGET AUDIENCE: Quartets, Directors, Everyone
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SESSION 2 - Friday, 8:00pm
40-minute Voice Lesson: This is your opportunity to have a scheduled 40-minute singing lesson. You'll meet one-on-one with a fantastic vocal coach who will help you personally become a better singer.
FACULTY: Beth Bruce TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
40-Minute Voice Lesson: This is your opportunity to have a scheduled 40-minute singing lesson. You'll meet one-on-one with a fantastic vocal coach who will help you personally become a better singer.
FACULTY: Kathleen Hansen TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
40-Minute Voice Lesson: This is your opportunity to have a scheduled 40-minute singing lesson. You'll meet one-on-one with a fantastic vocal coach who will help you personally become a better singer.
FACULTY: Ellie Osterman TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Barbershop Language: Tools for Singing: Barbershop is a unique style of music in that we can enjoy a beautiful melody, and yet tell a compelling and exciting story along the way! Some have called this "Singlish"! In this class, we will review the most important singing language rules and apply them to a song example. We will also discuss the new Vocal Expression element in the Singing Category, and how it is affected by proper use of the barbershop language rules.
FACULTY: Brian Barford TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Can The Emcee Help Us Put on a Better Performance? Whether you are the emcee, or the one hiring an emcee, you’ll want to be sure the emcee is the perfect host or hostess for your audience. This class explores the attributes of an effective master of ceremonies and the various roles they fulfill to make your show the best it can be.
FACULTY: Judy Beckman TARGET AUDIENCE: Show Coordinators, Quartets, Everyone
Chorus Outreach: This class by the highly entertaining Jim Clark will focus on how to work with your local community, your local schools, and the local choruses to make a stronger community that supports each other. Of course, if you get the word out that you are friendly, they just might come to your chorus to see what you do. Yup, this class is about sneaking your way into people's hearts and psyches so you can take over the world with barbershop chords.
FACULTY: Jim Clark TARGET AUDIENCE: Chapter/Chorus Leadership, Everyone
Developing Great Vocal Production for your Quartet or Chorus! : Singers never stop learning how to become better singers! Revisiting the basics and doing so in a highly productive and calculated way helps us integrate better habits and root out the bad habits that hold back our best singing.
FACULTY: Will Fox TARGET AUDIENCE: Section Leaders, Everyone, Quartets
Empowering Leadership: The long-term success of any chapter is based on leadership. We’ll show you how to become a leader who empowers your volunteers. You’ll learn three ways to motivate volunteer members, six contracts of delegation that will allow them to support the chapter’s purpose, and you’ll even have the chance to practice an empowering conversation.
FACULTY: Rob MacDonald TARGET AUDIENCE: Directors, Team Leaders, Section Leaders
Everyone in Harmony : Here's your opportunity to ask all those pesky questions about the Everyone in Harmony plan. What's the future of BHS now that women are included?
FACULTY: Amy and Donny Rose TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Inside an Arranger's Mind: Ever wonder how an arranger comes up with a new arrangement? What comes first? Do you arrange start to finish? Do you start with the tag? Is there a process or do you just start arranging? How did you think of doing “that” in your arrangement? How do you make your arrangements “interesting”? We will talk about strategies of coming up with arrangements and how to find inspiration for interesting and unique arrangements.
FACULTY: Kevin Keller TARGET AUDIENCE: Quartets, arrangers, everyone
Learn Music FAST!!!!: So, you've been singing the same songs for the past years... and you still don't know them? Maybe you need to apply some whole-brain, power-learning methods??? Whether your goal is to learn 3 or 30 songs this year, come join us as we explore how to learn music quickly and effectively.
FACULTY: Raymond Schwarzkopf TARGET AUDIENCE: Quartets, Everyone
Magic Lies in the Sound of Communication: Analyze musical lines, lyrics, word art, and physical expression to heighten expressive, authentic communication. Consonant use and speech-like delivery within the musical lines will be thoroughly explored.
FACULTY: Lori Lyford TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Personalizing Music: Class explores music selection and how to rework an arrangement to customize to your ensemble’s personality or level.
FACULTY: Nikki Blackmer, Anne Downton, Melissa Pope TARGET AUDIENCE: Directors, Quartets
Relationship of Judging Categories with Signature and Ryan Heller: Learn the integration of the categories and how it applies to all aspects of our performing.
FACULTY: Ryan Heller TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Rhythm Basics: Feel the groove! This class will help you expand your rhythmic vocabulary - including note values, rests, and different meters - and introduce practical tips for reading and ‘hearing’ rhythms before you sing them. We will discuss tempo driven songs– fast and slow - and identify ways to sing them without speeding up or slowing down. Come ready to clap, tap and stomp your way through quarter notes, eighth notes, and triplets… and learn the importance of subdivisions and feeling the pulse. Basic music reading skill will enhance your experience in this class. Offered in sessions 2 and 7.
FACULTY: Lisa Schwarzkopf TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Shockingly Good Sectionals : One of the fastest ways to improve a chorus is to raise the quality of sectional rehearsals. In this class we will explore an exciting and engaging model of sectional work that pursues three goals simultaneously: Accuracy, Unity, and Drama. This is a high-participation class; come ready to sing!
FACULTY: Elizabeth Davies TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone, Section Leaders
Space And Place: In this class, We will feel and hear the differences between these placements, finding where we feel vibrations for different styles of singing, particularly for Barbershop. We will also be doing demonstrations of correct and incorrect placements which have always shown to as entertaining as they are educational!
FACULTY: Jean Barford TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Stand Well, Breathe Well, Sing Well: Good basic vocal production is something we singers need every time we open our mouths, but do we understand why we need to do all the things we're taught to do by our directors? This class will be a hands-on exploration of our most basic barbershop skills, and you will come away knowing more about your own voice and where you need to focus to achieve even better sound. We'll cover body alignment, breath usage, and tone production, and give you some new tools to work on these skills. This is a class for every singer.
FACULTY: Sheryl Brook TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Story-based Performing: Bring your audience on a journey as you perform by having a story behind your song. You’d sing “I Love You Truly” to your newborn child very differently than you’d sing it to your dream car! Learn why the story has to come first and then any embellishments or choreo. You'll learn about vocal character and how the vocal inflections, texture changes, and nuances impact the story-telling.
FACULTY: Lea Beverley TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Tag Singing A: Darwin Scheel is so passionate about tags that he hosts an annual tag party and Brandon can't stop teaching tags everywhere he goes so expect a fun-filled 90 minutes of tag singing! Learn new tags, sing old ones, and learn how to teach tags. Offered in sessions 2, 4, and 6 with NO repeat tags!
FACULTY: Brandon Hall and Darwin Scheel TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
The Successful PVI: Creating a learning opportunity for the individual singer to improve their vocal skills.
FACULTY: Jana Gutenson TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
What exactly IS Marketing?: So, you’ve been told you’re in charge of “marketing” for your chorus or quartet. Yay. Now comes the hard part: What does it even mean to be in charge of marketing? And how does this newfangled “internet” thing change how you market the chorus?
In this class, we will cover the role of marketing. What exactly IS the job of marketing director (hint: it’s not about making pretty posters) and we’ll discuss how the modern digital landscape poses both challenges and opportunities for marketing your chorus in new and interesting ways.
FACULTY: Larry Osterman TARGET AUDIENCE: Quartets, Chorus, Everyone
What’s Your Vision?: Has your chapter lost its way? Is it difficult to explain why your chapter exists, what it does, and why someone would want to join? It may be time to revisit your Vision and Mission. We’ll review the purpose of a Vision and Mission, how to brainstorm and define them, and how they impact chapter culture. We’ll examine your chapter “persona” (the public face that you present to the world) and how that helps or hurts. Back home, you’ll have the skills needed to take your chapter leadership through a Vision/Mission brainstorming exercise. (Offered in Sessions 2 and 7)
FACULTY: Chris Rimple TARGET AUDIENCE: Chapter/Chorus Leadership
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SESSION 3 - Saturday, 8:45am
20-Minute Voice Lesson: This is your opportunity to have a scheduled 20-minute singing lesson. You'll meet one-on-one with a fantastic vocal coach who will help you personally become a better singer.
FACULTY: Sheryl Brook TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
5 Leadership Practices: The difference between an organization that simply survives and one that thrives is leadership. Leaders must not only have a vision, but they must possess the ability to translate that vision into reality. In this course, you will discover the five best practices of leadership: possessing a driving passion to realize a vision, cultivating relationships built on trust, unleashing the motivation of members, acting as a social architect, and relating to all people from a foundation of positive intentions.
FACULTY: Rob MacDonald TARGET AUDIENCE: Directors, Team Leaders, Section Leaders
Barbershop in our Changing World: Is your chapter aging and struggling to grow? Is your audience shrinking? Generational and societal changes over the last 50 years have had dramatic impacts on non-profit and fraternal organizations, and barbershop is no exception. We'll examine these changes and their effects on your chapter, then learn specific strategies to use them for your advantage.
FACULTY: Chris Rimple TARGET AUDIENCE: Chapter/Chorus Leadership
Basic Music Theory: If you have ever wondered what the heck the Director is talking about when he/she starts to use words like “interval, key signature, inverted chord, or seventh chords,” this may be the class for you. This class will attempt to explore Music Theory from its most fundamental elements up though basic harmonic analysis and help you get with the lingo! Burt Szabo’s “Theory of BBS Harmony” book is encouraged, but not required. Advanced Music Theory is in session 4.
FACULTY: Chuck Roegiers TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Chorus Culture: Primarily for chorus leaders, but open to all, this session will focus on the challenges of creating and maintaining a positive culture during rehearsals, performances, and meetings. Specific strategies will be given to keep chorus members engaged in an uplifting environment.
FACULTY: Rachel Pack TARGET AUDIENCE: Directors, Section Leaders, Quartets
Community Awareness Brainstorm: Choruses and quartets wanting to try new things to broaden your reach and awareness in the local community, this session is for you. Singing telegrams? Barbershop Quartet Day? Flash mobs? Bring 2-3 “outside the box” performance ideas that you’ve tried or even thought about trying, and we’ll share these together in a big marketing brainstorm session. You’ll leave this class with new concrete ideas to put into action.
FACULTY: Duncan Gilman TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Creating a Visual Plan: Whether you are in a chorus or a quartet, or even just singing a solo, your body moves to emphasize the story you are telling. Choreography, or adding movement to the music, helps to bring the story behind your song to life. This basic choreography class will cover simple vocabulary and types of movement that enhance the story. We'll talk about face/body involvement, the benefits and pitfalls of planned choreography, and how to keep it singer-friendly and musically driven.
FACULTY: Amy Rose TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Harmony Accuracy: We’ve all seen this on score sheets, so what IS harmony accuracy? This class discusses and explains the factors that affect tuning and harmony accuracy. This interactive class will include listening to a number of examples, to determine what is impacting harmony accuracy.
FACULTY: Melissa Pope TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone, Quartets, Directors
How to Sing a Good Line: There are lots of ways to sing a line of music. We'll explore different approaches to convey different emotions or stories as well as tips and tricks to sing beautifully. Why stay ordinary when you can be amazing!
FACULTY: Will Fox TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone, Quartets
Inner Mastery Foundations - Building a Success Mindset: This foundational class by Inner Coach of Barbershop Jan Carley provides the proven critical elements to building a success mindset. In this class you will be introduced Jan’s signature personal mastery “Overtone System” as outlined in her new book, THE OVERTONE EFFECT where she uses the phenomenon of overtones as a metaphor for creating results that go well beyond what you ever thought possible. You will learn the foundational generative mindset approach to keep you growing exponentially instead of getting stuck in “fixing”. We’ll talk about the brain, and how 2 simple words can shift your mindset from tunnel thinking to growth, creativity and insight. You will leave with practical concepts and tools to immediately implement for positive change. Jan’s unique mindset mastery work has transformed the singing and chorus experiences of thousands of barbershoppers worldwide. Come and find out why!
FACULTY: Jan Carley TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Original Polecats: Learn - or improve - the Original Polecats, (Vol 1) If you know your part on the Polecats, you get to join in on lots of fun at HCNW: late night singing, and even some in-class singing. If you need to brush up on a few Polecat songs, or even learn some, come to this class and get up to speed. It will be a great foundation for you to join in the singing, and have even more fun this weekend. Bring your Polecat book. If you can’t find yours, a few copies will be available for purchase at HCNW.
FACULTY: Gerry Borden TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Reading Music: If you’ve never gotten around to learning how to read music as well as you’d like, join us as we learn the basic building blocks of music: note names, scales, notation, key signatures, time signatures, and more. Recognize melodic movement, intervals, rhythms, and scales to help you ‘hear’ the music before you sing it. By applying a practical application of music reading you can enhance your singing experience and musicianship. Offered in sessions 1 and 3.
FACULTY: Lisa Schwarzkopf TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Sing in Barbershop Style: There are a thousand things you can do with a song; come learn the critical things you have to do in order for the song to be barbershop. If you don’t use these five, you cannot succeed in singing barbershop. We will also explore a second Ah Hah and trap -- just because a chart is written in the barbershop style, it doesn’t mean that you are singing it in the barbershop style. This class will help you understand what barbershop is, and how to use your new understanding of the barbershop style to move from being a "notes and words" singer to a singer who gives the barbershop song its due. This class is for everyone from novices to experts.
FACULTY: Raymond Schwarzkopf TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Sing It and Mean It: This class will look at techniques for more expressive performance from three different aspects as the attendees analyze lyrics, emotional content and physical expression.
FACULTY: Lori Lyford TARGET AUDIENCE: Directors, Everyone
So You Want to Be in a Quartet: WANTED: singers with little or no experience singing in a quartet, but who would like to try quartetting, in a safe environment. People will be available to help you with your part, but the goal is for you to handle your part on your own. Don’t worry about “It won’t be pretty.” It never was, for any of us. But this is a great way to experience the thrill of making chords happen, just because of you. (The thrill is not unlike the thrill you had your first time pedaling your bike without the training wheels.) There will be lots of do-overs, and lots of support. Come try it; it might just be your next step on your barbershop journey.
FACULTY: Brandon Hall and Darwin Scheel TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Storytelling and the Barbershop Style: Barbershoppers tell you they are telling you a story when they really aren’t. How do we use the construct of story-telling in the music that we sing and stay emotionally engaged.
FACULTY: Kevin Keller TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone, Quartets
Tagging Vowels - Better Singing With Unified Vowels: Using selected favorite TAGS from the beloved collection, we will use a set of vowel targets to focus on a like approach to word pronunciation. Singing TAGS is always fun but using these carefully matched sounds produces a ringing that you will love! Everyone writes on the provided handouts and everyone sings.
FACULTY: Beth Bruce TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Understanding Artistry and Musicality with Signature and Ryan Heller: The goal of every singer is to produce a response in the listener, but how do we get there? Together with Signature, we will examine the common tools and techniques applied to create musicality and artistry (breath plan, dynamics, and embellishments, to name a few) . No matter the level of your chorus or quartet, there is something for you to do!
FACULTY: Ryan Heller with Signature Quartet TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone, Quartets
Warm-Up Your Sound: Creating a vocal launch pad for successful rehearsals and performances through sequential building of the ensemble sound during vocal warm-ups.
FACULTY: Jana Gutenson TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
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SESSION 4 - Saturday 10:30am
40-minute Voice Lesson: This is your opportunity to have a scheduled 40-minute singing lesson. You'll meet one-on-one with a fantastic vocal coach who will help you personally become a better singer.
FACULTY: Gerry Borden TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone CANCEL OR MOVE
40-minute Voice Lesson: This is your opportunity to have a scheduled 40-minute singing lesson. You'll meet one-on-one with a fantastic vocal coach who will help you personally become a better singer.
FACULTY: Beth Bruce TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
40-minute Voice Lesson: This is your opportunity to have a scheduled 40-minute singing lesson. You'll meet one-on-one with a fantastic vocal coach who will help you personally become a better singer.
FACULTY: Will Fox TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
40-Minute Voice Lesson: This is your opportunity to have a scheduled 40-minute singing lesson. You'll meet one-on-one with a fantastic vocal coach who will help you personally become a better singer.
FACULTY: Kathleen Hansen TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
40-Minute Voice Lesson: This is your opportunity to have a scheduled 40-minute singing lesson. You'll meet one-on-one with a fantastic vocal coach who will help you personally become a better singer.
FACULTY: Ellie Osterman TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Advanced Music Theory: We all love barbershop harmony; now let’s find out WHY! How are the chords constructed? How are they different from the rest of Western music? What makes that “barbershop sound?” This class is designed for those who comfortably read music and understand the basics of keys, chords, overtones, and music terminology. We will also take a look at figured bass analysis and harmonic progressions – what works and what doesn’t. There will be some crossover from the Advanced Arranging Class. Burt Szabo’s “Theory of BBS Harmony” book is an excellent resource, but not required. Basic Music Theory is in session 3.
FACULTY: Chuck Roegiers TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone, Arrangers
Bodacious Barbershop Basics : This class is focused on the singer who has a feel for the music but might not read music very well or understand the structure of the chords. We will explore the basics of how barbershop music works and demystify the circle of fifths, tri-tone movement, and other terms that make your eyes glaze over! Come feel the fun of barbershop chords and melody lines while seeing and hearing how these barbershop basics work.
FACULTY: Lisa and Raymond Schwarzkopf TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Building a Culture of Success: Create a more joyful ensemble experience (and avoid leadership burnout) by building a framework of core values and well-defined, collaboratively created goals.
FACULTY: Jana Gutenson and Lori Lyford TARGET AUDIENCE: Directors, Everyone
Coaching Under Glass: Signature Quartet and the Barfords: No matter where you are on your barbershop journey, coaching can help you hone your specific skills to enable the group to be more successful. Regardless of your level, you work on the same skills but higher skilled groups work in finer detail. Come with questions and watch Signature get coached by Brian and Jean Barford.
FACULTY: Brian and Jean Barford with Signature Quartet TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Engage on Stage: “Performance from the inside out” When your audience comes to see you perform, they expect nothing other than to be entertained. Within each one of us there is a wonderful psychophysical power that can be sourced to hold our audiences in captivated attention. In this workshop, we’ll take the technical journey to the emotional side of performing. Come learn the techniques actors and stage performers use to discover their role on the stage.
FACULTY: Theresa Weatherbee TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone, Quartets
Facebook Ads Workshop: Facebook advertising is one of the most economical ways to spread your marketing message. Think you're ready to try your first Facebook ads campaign? This class will walk you through the steps from start to finish and will cover everything, including creating target audiences and effective ad content. Participants will leave this session with: a guided tour of Facebook Ads manager and a plan of action for starting an ad campaign.
FACULTY: Duncan Gilman TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Feedback: The Breakfast of Champions: As performers and volunteers, we thrive on feedback that is well-delivered. How do others know when your expectations have been met — or not? Understand the power of feedback. Use motivational and corrective feedback to build confidence and competence in others. Learn the “fit, focus and timing” of good feedback, and how to recognize the achievers in your group. Plan your next feedback.
FACULTY: Rob MacDonald TARGET AUDIENCE: Directors, Team Leaders, Section Leaders
Finale - Basic: This class will introduce you to using Finale. This program is quite powerful but can be intimidating. We'll walk through some of the things it can do and show how to use the most important parts. You'll need to bring your computer, your copy of Finale, and a basic understanding of music notation (See "Music Reading Basics" in session 1 if you need a tune-up!)
FACULTY: Mike Rosen TARGET AUDIENCE: Arrangers, Quartets, Everyone
Finding Your First (or Any) Note: How many times have you heard "What's MY note?!?" This class will teach you how to find your note relative to the pitch blown. You'll get a chance to practice your sight-reading skills in a supportive environment.
FACULTY: Harry Buerer TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone, Newbies
Inner Mastery Fundamentals - Eliminating Mental Interference (On and Off Stage): The biggest thing standing in the way of your peak performance (in life and onstage)…is YOU! Learn how to easily adopt a generative growth mindset to support your journey as a singer and performer instead of holding you back. This session with Inner Coach of Barbershop, Jan Carley, will tackle the challenging mental stuff that interferes with your success, confidence and joy. Get tools to reframe your “self-judgment”, get rid of limiting beliefs and learn how to turn your Inner Critic into an Inner Coach. These Mindset Mastery tools will help you move forward with confidence and will positively impact both your chorus and non-chorus life.
FACULTY: Jan Carley TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone, Quartets
Polecats - Volume 2: Learn - or improve - the Polecats Vol 2. If you know your part on the Polecats, you get to join in on lots of fun at HCNW: late night singing, and even some in-class singing. If you need to brush up on a few Polecat songs, or even learn some, come to this class and get up to speed. It will be a great foundation for you to join in the singing, and have even more fun this weekend. Bring your Polecat book. If you can’t find yours, a few copies will be available for purchase at HCNW.
FACULTY: Ken Potter TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Purposeful Inclusion: Most barbershop chapters do not reflect the diversity of the communities in which they rehearse and perform. We’ll review the history of minority involvement in barbershop, intentional and unintentional exclusionary practices, and the state of diversity in barbershop today. We’ll examine the differences between Tolerance, Acceptance, and Inclusion, and outline the facets of an inclusive chapter. We’ll examine your chapter “persona” (the public face that you present to the world) and how that helps or hurts your efforts at inclusion. We’ll review outreach and partnering solutions that can help your chapter increase diversity, both in audience and membership.
FACULTY: Chris Rimple TARGET AUDIENCE: Chapter/Chorus Leadership, Everyone
Steps to Writing a Barbershop Tag: You want to write a tag for a Chorus celebration or maybe just for fun. Follow this step by step process for how to write a Barbershop Tag using established principles of music theory and barbershop harmony. General understanding of scales and chords will be helpful. Bring your portable keyboard with earphones to play along.
FACULTY: Janice Wheeler TARGET AUDIENCE: Arrangers, Everyone
Storytelling - the Vocal Art Form: Once upon a time…Songs were made up of words and the words told a story…. We can develop great vocal skills, but if we don’t use those skills and others to move our audience, it’s a lost opportunity. Story telling is an art and you are the artist. Vocal inflection, word sounds, dynamics, vocal tone even silence are some of the tools you can use to paint your picture and leave a lasting impression. Come…storytellers and storyteller- wanna-bes. Come meet your people.
FACULTY: LouAnn Hommel TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Tag Singing B: Darwin Scheel is so passionate about tags that he hosts an annual tag party and Brandon can't stop teaching tags everywhere he goes so expect a fun-filled 90 minutes of tag singing! Learn new tags, sing old ones, and learn how to teach tags. Offered in sessions 2, 4, and 6 with NO repeat tags!
FACULTY: Brandon Hall and Darwin Scheel TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Take Me to Your (Section) Leader: Attendees will assess skills/challenges, explore ways to take your section to the next level, and see how to effectively work the learning styles of your singers.
FACULTY: Kathy Scheel TARGET AUDIENCE: Section Leaders, Directors, Assistant Directors, Wanna-bes
Understanding Artistry and Musicality with Frenzy and Ryan Heller: The goal of every singer is to produce a response in the listener, but how do we get there? Together with our demo quartet we will examine the common tools and techniques applied to create musicality and artistry (breath plan, dynamics, and embellishments, to name a few) . No matter the level of your chorus or quartet, there is something for you to do!
FACULTY: Ryan Heller with Frenzy Quartet TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone, Quartets
Wavebox Singing Part 1/2: The holistic approach to music that has people singing and performing at higher levels more quickly and with greater ease. See what music can look and feel like and even how to share what you learn and know more effectively with others.
FACULTY: Paul Ellinger TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
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SESSION 5 - Saturday 1:30pm
Changing the Tag: It’s an uptune with a descending tag. How to go about analyzing and changing the tag to have an ascending ending using established principles of music theory and barbershop harmony.
FACULTY: Janice Wheeler TARGET AUDIENCE: Directors, Quartets, Arrangers
Coaching Under Glass: Renegade and The Barfords: No matter where you are on your barbershop journey, coaching can help you hone your specific skills to enable the group to be more successful. Regardless of your level, you work on the same skills but higher skilled groups work in finer detail. Come with questions and watch Renegade get coached by Brian and Jean Barford.
FACULTY: Brian and Jean Barford with Renegade Quartet TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Demystifying Resonance: Unlocking the ways to best amplify your sound for Quartet or Chorus singers. We will debunk old myths and learn how to maximize our instrument.
FACULTY: Ryan Heller TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Dispelling Judging Myths: Opportunity for students to ask questions about the judging process. We will talk about myths associated with Judging. This will be a class where students bring their questions and I will answer them as transparently as possible.
FACULTY: Kevin Keller TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Finale - Advanced: Learn to use some of the more powerful parts of Finale and get your questions answered. You'll need your computer, your copy of Finale, and a passing familiarity with Finale.
FACULTY: Mike Rosen TARGET AUDIENCE: Arrangers, Quartets, Everyone
Fostering Diversity and Inclusion through Repertoire, Rehearsals, and Culture: Attendees will discover how language, music choice, web presence and chorus culture either attract or dissuade members of diverse ages, cultures, ethnicities, abilities, and more. We will discuss best practices to create a welcoming, inclusive and diverse chorus culture.
FACULTY: Kathleen Hansen TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Grow Your Chapter: A cappella music is experiencing a resurgence, but is your chapter benefiting from it? Are you struggling to find and retain members? Most participants are attracted to singing for the fun and camaraderie it provides, not for performance or competition. We’ll review member needs and how to align chapter goals with them, as well as partnerships and other relationships that can help you grow your membership. We’ll examine your chapter “persona” (the public face that you present to potential members) and how that helps or hurts your recruiting efforts. We’ll also review marketing techniques and their effectiveness, including social media, email marketing, SEO/SEM, and more traditional forms.
FACULTY: Chris Rimple TARGET AUDIENCE: Chapter/Chorus Leadership
Introduction to Nonprofit Accounting : This class will walk you through some of the common questions US choruses and quartets have with their finances, accounting, and taxes and help you find and file the appropriate forms for BHS and SAI. Nonprofit accounting isn’t the same as for-profit accounting, and each chorus is responsible for maintaining their nonprofit eligibility. Come with questions to ask as the class explores US taxes, nonprofit status, and other topics of financial interest.
FACULTY: Don Thorn TARGET AUDIENCE: Treasurers, Quartets, Team Leaders
Is It a Script or an Exciting Musical Journey?: Take any selection of songs and weave them into a fun and entertaining story with music. A Musical! People want to be entertained. Find the passion. Find the humor. Find the joy. Leave them wanting and coming back for more. Tips and Tricks. Let’s collaborate!
FACULTY: LouAnn Hommel TARGET AUDIENCE: Chapter/Chorus Leadership, Everyone
Keep Your Hands To Yourself: Many of us have received well-intentioned advice about selling the song through use of faces and bodies. Too often, this results in too much hand movement to the point of distracting the audience. This class will explore what we as barbershop performers are trying to do on stage, and then see if it is possible to succeed in our purpose without the use of our hands. Class will include interaction, discussion and experimentation. Class offered in sessions 1 and 5.
FACULTY: Roger Mills TARGET AUDIENCE: Quartets, Everyone
Leading From Strengths for Positive Results: As a chorus leader in any capacity, you are a critical influencer to both the joy and the success of your ensemble. Not only are you responsible for modeling the behaviors that the chorus will follow, you must also ensure that the best possible atmosphere exists for the director and the musical product to go forward unimpeded. In this class with Inner Coach of Barbershop Jan Carley, we will simplify your role as leader, and find out what you need to be able to lead effectively. Discover your signature strengths, how to lead creatively instead of reactively and get the tools you need to inspire your chorus from the inside out. Practice the critical tools of giving and receiving feedback, giving deep acknowledgment, and learn how to build trust and resiliency. You will leave empowered and encouraged about your important leadership contribution.
FACULTY: Jan Carley TARGET AUDIENCE: Music Leaders, Section Leaders, Future leaders
Make More Changes, Faster: We often cease to improve because we "do things like we've done." The crucial element here is make changes to what you're doing, then evaluate the result. And do more of this, more often! This class is about making choices in rehearsal that maximize the rate of change for the better.
FACULTY: Ron Black TARGET AUDIENCE: chorus directors, musical leaders, quartets
Photos and Videos for Marketing Your Chorus: Our members are performers, so naturally the marketing that is most effective shows off our performing. In this class, we’ll cover what makes great photo and video content, how to distribute it on Instagram and other visual networks, and some easy tools to take your print and web marketing to the next level.
FACULTY: Duncan Gilman TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Selecting Music for your Mixed Ensemble: BHS Director of Education Donny Rose will explain the ins and outs, pitfalls, and pathways to success when selecting music for mixed ensembles. Great for choruses, quartets, and anyone interested in mixed harmony singing.
FACULTY: Donny Rose TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Sing Your Part Smart - 8 Parts: 8 separate classes where each member of Frenzy and Signature explores ways to better sing tenor, lead, baritone and bass. Class will use an 8-part arrangement of "Anything You Can Do" by Josh Ehrlich as the teaching tool for Sing Your Part Smart classes. Students who also attend part 2 in session 6 will be performing on the Saturday night show.
FACULTY: Frenzy and Signature TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Three PVIs to Improve Your Chorus: These lessons are created for the musical leaders of your chorus to share with the members one on one. They are intended to be used in a systematic PVI program wherein each lesson builds upon the skills taught on the previous set of skills. We’ll work together and carefully go through the materials.
FACULTY: Beth Bruce TARGET AUDIENCE: Section Leaders, Directors, Quartets
Warmups for the Voice, Brain, Body, Breathing, and More: In this class we explore more than just vocal exercises and what each type of warmup can do for the performer. It’s the what, why, who, what and when of the beginning of each rehearsal.
FACULTY: Judy Beckman AUDIENCE: Section Leaders, Everyone
Wavebox Singing Part 2/2: The continuation of Wavebox Singing.
FACULTY: Paul Ellinger TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
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SESSION 6 - Saturday, 3:15pm
House of Delegates Meeting: Representatives from each EVG chapter will meet with the EVG Board and OPS Team.
40-Minute Voice Lesson: This is your opportunity to have a scheduled 40-minute singing lesson. You'll meet one-on-one with a fantastic vocal coach who will help you personally become a better singer.
FACULTY: Ellie Osterman TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
A Character Driven Performance: Join us and explore the ins and outs of a good, character- driven performance. This is no joke! Give them a performance that touches their souls. Learn how. This is a physically interactive class.
FACULTY: LouAnn Hommel TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone, Quartets
Arranging for Beginners: This class is for those who are curious about arranging but don't feel like they know enough about harmony. In this class we will work our way through arranging a simple song with only 2 chords in it, so you don't have to be intimidated. Basic sight reading is the only pre-requisite.
FACULTY: Harry Buerer TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Being a Masterful Director (From the Inside Out): As director you have an enormous responsibility as the primary person inspiring your chorus’ success. It is a pressure-filled, highly-demanding role and one that is critically important for the chorus’ joy, happiness and growth toward excellence. Though we naturally expect our directors to be technically skilled and knowledgeable, your most powerful impact actually comes from who you “be”, not what you “do”. How you show up, how you model presence, vulnerability and resiliency and even how you speak is critical to creating a vibrant chorus culture of growth and success.
This session will help inspire your journey to personal mastery, and remove the barriers and interferences that get in the way of sustaining a personal position of strength, balance and positive leadership. Inner Coach of Barbershop Jan Carley has changed positively impacted dozens of barbershop directors through her innovative “Coach on Call” program. Come to this session with an open mind and heart. This could well be the class that positively shifts you and your chorus culture forever.
FACULTY: Jan Carley TARGET AUDIENCE: Chorus directors and Assistant Directors
Getting Beyond Scoresheets: Instead of using your score to judge how well you are succeeding, use two alternate yardsticks: The Comfort of the Audience and The Believability of Your Song. The target audience for this class is singers who care about getting better and who have worked at it but are frustrated that the effort-to-reward ratio has been so meager. Linear thinkers and logical rational sequential doers are prized students.
FACULTY: Raymond Schwarzkopf TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Getting Gigs, Getting Paid: Quartets are often a labor of love, but what about getting paid for some of that work? This class will guide you through the key elements that establish you as a professional, well packaged ensemble that is attractive to audiences AND paying clients.
FACULTY: Amy Rose TARGET AUDIENCE: Choruses, Quartets
Goodbye Stage Fright!: This session will allow us to rid ourselves of the fears of singing in any situation and only leaving just enough excitement to make it fun! It is so freeing to discover that our fears are based on flawed logic and inaccurate assumptions about what audiences are actually thinking. Join this interactive class and free yourself to sing and perform at higher levels like never before!
FACULTY: Paul Ellinger TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Grow Your Audience: A cappella music is experiencing a resurgence, but is your chapter benefitting from it? Are you struggling to find and retain an audience? Creating awareness of your chapter or chorus requires more than an advertisement in the local paper. Changing communication habits require that a chapter utilize a wide variety of marketing methods and tools. We’ll review audience needs and how to align chapter desires with them, as well as partnerships and other relationships that can help you grow your audience. We’ll examine your chapter “persona” (the public face that you present in your marketing) and how that helps or hurts your efforts. We’ll also review marketing techniques and their effectiveness, including social media, email marketing, SEO/SEM, and more traditional forms.
FACULTY: Chris Rimple TARGET AUDIENCE: Chapter/Chorus Leadership
How is THAT Barbershop: People think something is not contestable and then look at the score sheet to see nothing happened in the MUS category. Why? We watch some of the most controversial performances and discuss them.
FACULTY: Kevin Keller TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone, Quartets
Mining the Chart: There's so much music out there, and we're passionate about singing as much of it as possible in this lifetime! But how do we know which version of our favorite song is going to work for us? This class will look at what the chart (music) itself tells you, and help you identify the skills necessary to sing the arrangement you have. We'll do some marking of the music (octaves, P-theory, etc) and we'll look at the chords, embellishments, and traps in the charts, and discuss ways to use what the arranger has written. This class will work best for you if you read music, but will be of use even if you don't.
FACULTY: Sheryl Brook TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Put the best YOU in the UNIT with Renegade and Ryan Heller: Explore the elements of unity in this interactive class. From the aspects of vocal skills that need to be aligned, to the frequent causes of synchronization errors, we want to be sure that as many parts of our quartet/chorus unit are as together as possible...our goal is for all singers to bring their best selves to every rehearsal/performance!
FACULTY: Ryan Heller and Renegade Quartet TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone, Quartets
Ring Chords Like Never Before: You’ll walk through the crucial elements of barbershop singing that will leave you amazed. We approach the three elements of voice timbre, vowels, and tuning in some new ways. You’ll be ringing chords like a pro.
FACULTY: Ron Black TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Sing Your Part Smart - Putting It All Together: 8 separate classes where each member of Frenzy and Signature explores ways to better sing tenor, lead, baritone and bass. Class will use an 8-part arrangement of "Anything You Can Do" by Josh Ehrlich as the teaching tool for Sing Your Part Smart classes. Students who also attend part 2 in session 6 will be performing on the Saturday night show.
FACULTY: Frenzy and Signature TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
SmartScore for Learning Tracks: Would you like to generate learning tracks for your chorus? Or transpose it up or down? Of course, you would! Mike (and Judy!) will show you how to scan printed sheet music, and take it into SmartScore X2 Piano Edition. Then, you will learn to correct the few (but inevitable!) errors, mix the piece into part-predominant sound files, and convert them to MP3 format, for burning to CD or listening on a computer or mobile device.
For software, you will need SmartScore X2 Piano Edition, from www.musitek.com. The software costs $80 to purchase, but a non-saving, demo version is free. That’s all you will need for the course for hands-on learning. Please have it loaded onto your laptop computer when you get here to save a lot of time. If you just want to sit and watch, that’s fine, too.
FACULTY: Mike Rosen TARGET AUDIENCE: Arrangers, Quartets, Everyone
Smoke and Mirrors - Being your own Vocal Coach: Not everyone lives close to superstar voice instructors, but you can make tremendous progress with a recorder and a mirror. Learn how to evaluate your own singing as well as a few tips and tricks to make better and faster progress. Fantastic skills for when your coach is just too far away.
FACULTY: Will Fox TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone, Quartets
Tag Singing C: Darwin Scheel is so passionate about tags that he hosts an annual tag party and Brandon can't stop teaching tags everywhere he goes so expect a fun-filled 90 minutes of tag singing! Learn new tags, sing old ones, and learn how to teach tags. Offered in sessions 2, 4, and 6 with NO repeat tags!
FACULTY: Brandon Hall and Darwin Scheel TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
The Power of Five: The five most important questions is a practical methodology, designed and used by the pros to get an ensemble cast on the same page. It was developed to give performers the skills required to transmit the true message of the song to their audience. In this interactive class, we will take a song, analyze it together by using these specific questions, and develop a plan of action that will ensure an engaging, high level performance.
FACULTY: Theresa Weatherbee TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone, Quartets, Directors
Vocal Color and Blend: Listen to recordings of singers. Explore and describe diverse vocal timbre. Practice vocal techniques that will achieve beautiful ensemble blend. Everybody sings!
FACULTY: Beth Bruce TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone, Quartets
Why Is That So Hard to Sing?: You've purchased a published arrangement from Sweet Adelines Incorporated, but the chorus or quartet members are unable to sing the Intro successfully. Why is it so hard to sing? How to go about analyzing and fixing the problem/s using established principles of music theory and barbershop harmony.
FACULTY: Janice Wheeler TARGET AUDIENCE: Quartets, Directors, Arrangers
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SESSION 7 - Sunday, 8:45am
20-Minute Voice Lesson: This is your opportunity to have a scheduled 20-minute singing lesson. You'll meet one-on-one with a fantastic vocal coach who will help you personally become a better singer.
FACULTY: Sheryl Brook TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
40-minute Voice Lesson: This is your opportunity to have a scheduled 40-minute singing lesson. You'll meet one-on-one with a fantastic vocal coach who will help you personally become a better singer.
FACULTY: Gerry Borden TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone CANCEL OR MOVE
DCP Testing: Region 13 offers testing at this time for their Directors Certification Program. Judy Beckman
Filling Your Vocal Toolbox: Finding the right tool (vocal technique) for the job (diagnosis of vocal issues). Most vocal issues fall within four areas. In this class, you will learn to hear indicators of which area(s) to work on and what exercises (tools) are helpful remedies.
FACULTY: Lori Lyford TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Rhythm Basics: Feel the groove! This class will help you expand your rhythmic vocabulary - including note values, rests, and different meters - and introduce practical tips for reading and ‘hearing’ rhythms before you sing them. We will discuss tempo driven songs– fast and slow - and identify ways to sing them without speeding up or slowing down. Come ready to clap, tap and stomp your way through quarter notes, eighth notes, and triplets… and learn the importance of subdivisions and feeling the pulse. Basic music reading skill will enhance your experience in this class. Offered in sessions 2 and 7.
FACULTY: Lisa Schwarzkopf TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Setting and Achieving Goals: There are many areas a chapter could choose to use as a strategy for change. Using a Gap Analysis, identify which options and priorities have the most impact for short- and long-term goals. Then, use the goal process to create the details of implementation. Why do goals fail? Learn the principles of goal setting. Learn the SMART goal-setting process that supports your strategy and objectives. Understand the benefits, obstacles, and actions; measure your success using the right metric. This process works for individuals, quartets, teams, committees and chapters. Write a goal for your chapter.
FACULTY: Rob MacDonald TARGET AUDIENCE: Directors, Team Leaders, Section Leaders
SOP - Standing Ovation Program: BHS has a wonderful program to help you improve your future shows. They'll send someone to attend your show and send you a report about what went well and what could be improved covering everything from advertising to venue to emceeing! This is also an opportunity for you to become a reviewer.
FACULTY: Bobby Huber TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
The Independent Singer: Methods and techniques for taking charge of your own vocal development.
FACULTY: Jana Gutenson TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
The Language of Masterful Coaching: How to Inspire Change In Singers: Grateful singers have used the phrase “master communicator” to describe Robert Shaw, Jim Henry, Mo Field, Kevin Keller, Greg Lyne, and other inspiring musical leaders. This class will explore the language of masterful coaching and will provide practice in a range of coaching techniques to give you “power steering” over the hearts and minds of singers.
FACULTY: Elizabeth Davies TARGET AUDIENCE: Directors, Everyone
The Quartet Quandry: An open discussion on things we can do as directors, section leaders, and individual chorus members to get our chorus involved in quartetting (not just competitively).
FACULTY: Brandon Hall TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Vocal Exercises for Your Sectionals using the Clues in the Music: This class will cover some techniques to use during vocal warm ups that then specifically relate to music being learned or performed that evening. We'll discuss the advantages of using transferrable skills and techniques to actual performance for better section unity and accuracy.
FACULTY: Nancy Kurth TARGET AUDIENCE: Section Leaders, Assistant Directors, Quartets, Wanna-bes
What’s Your Vision?: Has your chapter lost its way? Is it difficult to explain why your chapter exists, what it does, and why someone would want to join? It may be time to revisit your Vision and Mission. We’ll review the purpose of a Vision and Mission, how to brainstorm and define them, and how they impact chapter culture. We’ll examine your chapter “persona” (the public face that you present to the world) and how that helps or hurts. Back home, you’ll have the skills needed to take your chapter leadership through a Vision/Mission brainstorming exercise. (Offered in Sessions 2 and 7)
FACULTY: Chris Rimple TARGET AUDIENCE: Chapter/Chorus Leadership
Woodshedding for Beginners: Are you curious about woodshedding, but don't have a clue how to do it? This class will start with the simplest-possible materials, and show you why some alternatives work better than others. It would be helpful if you knew a little bit about chord structure, but we'll try to cover everything so you won't be left behind. After this class, you'll have a good start at understanding woodshedding.
FACULTY: Harry Buerer TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
You're Such a Character!: Attendees will gain an understanding of how characterization is more than just choreography or showmanship and how it can enhance a performance and bring an audience into the moment.
FACULTY: Kathy Scheel TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
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SESSION 8 - Sunday, 10:30am
Champion-Level Performance: Will Fox has been directing groups that for years have claimed choir state championships, jazz festival championships, concert band state championships and barbershop chorus District championships and International appearances. Come and learn the keys to his success in all of these musical genres and start applying these keys to your own quartet, chorus or ensemble.
FACULTY: Will Fox TARGET AUDIENCE: Music Educators, Everyone, Quartets
Choosing Music: Selecting repertoire is the most challenging decision a quartet or chorus faces. This class offers practical advice on finding the perfect fit for competition or performance.
FACULTY: Jana Gutenson TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone, Quartets
Do Less and Sing More: Is your chapter spending more time on non-singing “jobs” than on singing? Is it getting harder to find volunteers for those jobs? We’ll review ways in which you can increase member and audience satisfaction by doing less and singing more, and how to get off the “financial hamster wheel” so that decisions are not driven by chapter financial needs. We’ll look at free and low-cost resources available to aid with chapter operations, performance, marketing, and other needs, and we’ll review tools, services, and other solutions that you can begin using immediately. (Offered in Sessions 1 and 8)
FACULTY: Chris Rimple TARGET AUDIENCE: Chapter/Chorus Leadership
Emceeing a Show: The emcees are the glue that pull the show together. We’ll cover emceeing basics (using a mic, finding material, pacing) necessary to emcee a division show which will help you emcee other shows as well. It is strongly recommended that each division in EVG send at least one member to take this class.
FACULTY: Bobby Huber TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Entertaining is Providing Nourishment to Your Guests: This class will help you see your role of performer as one who is a host for guests, and who provides musical and emotional nourishment for your guests. This class will include a discussion of how and why you should change your performance when the audience or the situation is different and show you myriad ways to become comfortable regardless of the occasion – for example, singing in a nursing home or at the fair is far different from singing on your annual show.
FACULTY: Raymond Schwarzkopf TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Getting the Upper Hand on Breathing : Hands on techniques for learning how to improve all phases of the breathing-to-sing process, including: inhalation, maximizing capacity, breath control, length of line, and sufficient movement of air while singing
FACULTY: Lori Lyford TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
How to get THERE from here: We know that we want to create an experience for our audiences, but how do we get there? Meet with the creator of The Performance Sphere (a conceptual tool presented during the General Session) and discover new levels of sharing music and experiences for both the audience and performer alike. This class will use a balanced approach to having both video observation, conversation and may even have opportunities for real time feedback for groups in the room. This could be the “don’t miss” class of the your weekend!
FACULTY: Paul Ellinger TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
How to Teach Tags: Ahhh, tags...those exceedingly excellent, enjoyable, and entertaining ear-candy endings of embellishments and echoes, eliciting extensive elation and ecstasy! But what to do when there are no Tagmasters in tow to teach tunes? This course will teach you methods and strategies for teaching tags, and teach you how and why world domination through barbershop harmony can be achieved with this humble musical device. Come, Harmony-walker, and begin your journey to becoming a Tag Jedi!!
FACULTY: Brandon Hall TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Mixed BBS Chorus: Spend an enjoyable Sunday morning singing in a mixed chorus. You'll get learning tracks and music before HCNW begins so you will be ready to explore the joys of singing together!
FACULTY: Gerry Borden TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Rhythm in Your Music: This class will help you work through the rhythms in printed music. Learn about ballads, blues, swing tunes, toe tappers, and syncopations in the music and how to deliver them. What’s the difference between a triplet in a jazz song, a triplet in a swing song, and a triplet in a downbeat song? Basic music reading skills will be a huge help in this class.
FACULTY: Donny Rose TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
The Emoting Body: One of the unique challenges of singing in the barbershop style is the dual focus on sound and presentation. As stage performers, the body is perhaps the most vital way to connect with the audience, enhancing an interp's impact. This class focuses on unifying the body with the emotional content of the lyrics being sung and will be useful to front-row singers, those aspiring to the front row, and everyone else in the chorus. Please wear comfortable shoes, as we will be walking around the room. Offered in Sessions 1 and 8.
FACULTY: Ellie Osterman TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
What Social Media Can (and Can't!) Do For You: The most frequent question about using social media for groups is "Is all that effort worth it?" This class will show you how using various social platforms can impact your success and will help you align your expectations about the results to expect. Not sure if it's worth investing the time and money? Join us to learn how to maximize your reach and minimize the workload.
FACULTY: Amy Rose TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
20-Minute Voice Lesson: This is your opportunity to have a scheduled 20-minute singing lesson. You'll meet one-on-one with a fantastic vocal coach who will help you personally become a better singer.
FACULTY: Sheryl Brook TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
40-minute Voice Lesson: This is your opportunity to have a scheduled 40-minute singing lesson. You'll meet one-on-one with a fantastic vocal coach who will help you personally become a better singer.
FACULTY: Beth Bruce TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
40-Minute Voice Lesson: This is your opportunity to have a scheduled 40-minute singing lesson. You'll meet one-on-one with a fantastic vocal coach who will help you personally become a better singer.
FACULTY: Kathleen Hansen TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Achieving Vocal Match: What the heck IS vocal match? The age old question that is continually explored by barbershoppers across time. This class will delve into what vocal match means and use practical examples to help achieve a better unit within our sections, choruses and quartets.
FACULTY: Nikki Blackmer and Judy Pozsgay TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Beyond the Ictus : Conducting techniques for directors and musical leaders to promote clarity and ease of communication.
FACULTY: Lori Lyford TARGET AUDIENCE: Directors, Section Leaders
DCP Testing: Region 13 offers testing at this time for their Directors Certification Program. Judy Beckman
Do Less and Sing More: Is your chapter spending more time on non-singing “jobs” than on singing? Is it getting harder to find volunteers for those jobs? We’ll review ways in which you can increase member and audience satisfaction by doing less and singing more, and how to get off the “financial hamster wheel” so that decisions are not driven by chapter financial needs. We’ll look at free and low-cost resources available to aid with chapter operations, performance, marketing, and other needs, and we’ll review tools, services, and other solutions that you can begin using immediately. (Offered in Sessions 1 and 8)
FACULTY: Chris Rimple TARGET AUDIENCE: Chapter/Chorus Leadership
Forward Motion: What It Is, What It Isn’t, and How To Get More of It : Forward motion is that ineffable quality that keeps audiences on the edge of their seats, eager to know what is coming next. Performances lacking forward motion are experienced as “boring,” “mechanical,” or “slow.” In this class you will learn powerful rehearsal techniques to imbue your performance with drama and urgency. This is a high-participation class; come ready to sing!
FACULTY: Elizabeth Davies TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone, Quartets
Keep Your Hands To Yourself: Many of us have received well-intentioned advice about selling the song through use of faces and bodies. Too often, this results in too much hand movement to the point of distracting the audience. This class will explore what we as barbershop performers are trying to do on stage, and then see if it is possible to succeed in our purpose without the use of our hands. Class will include interaction, discussion and experimentation. Class offered in sessions 1 and 5.
FACULTY: Roger Mills TARGET AUDIENCE: Quartets, Everyone
Motivation for Chorus Directors: Most directors have had a night where they come home from rehearsal and ask themselves "Why do I want to be a Chorus Director? How do others make it look so easy? How do I motivate my singers when I have trouble staying motivated myself?" This class will address those issues and more as we delve into the minds and hearts of successful Chorus Directors.
FACULTY: Raymond Schwarzkopf TARGET AUDIENCE: Directors, Teachers, Assistant Directors, Section Leaders
Musical Leaders Workshop: Developing and strengthening leadership skills of section specialists and assistant directors.
FACULTY: Jana Gutenson TARGET AUDIENCE: Section Leaders, Music Leadership
Reading Music: If you’ve never gotten around to learning how to read music as well as you’d like, join us as we learn the basic building blocks of music: note names, scales, notation, key signatures, time signatures, and more. Recognize melodic movement, intervals, rhythms, and scales to help you ‘hear’ the music before you sing it. By applying a practical application of music reading you can enhance your singing experience and musicianship. Offered in sessions 1 and 3.
FACULTY: Lisa Schwarzkopf TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
The Emoting Body: One of the unique challenges of singing in the barbershop style is the dual focus on sound and presentation. As stage performers, the body is perhaps the most vital way to connect with the audience, enhancing an interp's impact. This class focuses on unifying the body with the emotional content of the lyrics being sung and will be useful to front-row singers, those aspiring to the front row, and everyone else in the chorus. Please wear comfortable shoes, as we will be walking around the room. Offered in sessions 1 and 8.
FACULTY: Ellie Osterman TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Unleashing the Artist in You: Using professional examples of great performers, we will explore how to bring the best performance inside each of us to the stage.
FACULTY: Ryan Heller TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Vocal Production : Breathing, alignment, support – the triumvirate of singing! Clear, concise explanations, and hands on participation.
FACULTY: Anne Downton TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Why Are We Getting Coaching But Not Improving?: This class is for coaches, directors and students alike. You and your coach/director may be trying to get to the same place, but discover why you may not be improving because of perspective and how you can begin to use a shared language that will help move everyone forward faster and with a greater level of skills.
FACULTY: Paul Ellinger TARGET AUDIENCE: Quartets, Directors, Everyone
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SESSION 2 - Friday, 8:00pm
40-minute Voice Lesson: This is your opportunity to have a scheduled 40-minute singing lesson. You'll meet one-on-one with a fantastic vocal coach who will help you personally become a better singer.
FACULTY: Beth Bruce TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
40-Minute Voice Lesson: This is your opportunity to have a scheduled 40-minute singing lesson. You'll meet one-on-one with a fantastic vocal coach who will help you personally become a better singer.
FACULTY: Kathleen Hansen TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
40-Minute Voice Lesson: This is your opportunity to have a scheduled 40-minute singing lesson. You'll meet one-on-one with a fantastic vocal coach who will help you personally become a better singer.
FACULTY: Ellie Osterman TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Barbershop Language: Tools for Singing: Barbershop is a unique style of music in that we can enjoy a beautiful melody, and yet tell a compelling and exciting story along the way! Some have called this "Singlish"! In this class, we will review the most important singing language rules and apply them to a song example. We will also discuss the new Vocal Expression element in the Singing Category, and how it is affected by proper use of the barbershop language rules.
FACULTY: Brian Barford TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Can The Emcee Help Us Put on a Better Performance? Whether you are the emcee, or the one hiring an emcee, you’ll want to be sure the emcee is the perfect host or hostess for your audience. This class explores the attributes of an effective master of ceremonies and the various roles they fulfill to make your show the best it can be.
FACULTY: Judy Beckman TARGET AUDIENCE: Show Coordinators, Quartets, Everyone
Chorus Outreach: This class by the highly entertaining Jim Clark will focus on how to work with your local community, your local schools, and the local choruses to make a stronger community that supports each other. Of course, if you get the word out that you are friendly, they just might come to your chorus to see what you do. Yup, this class is about sneaking your way into people's hearts and psyches so you can take over the world with barbershop chords.
FACULTY: Jim Clark TARGET AUDIENCE: Chapter/Chorus Leadership, Everyone
Developing Great Vocal Production for your Quartet or Chorus! : Singers never stop learning how to become better singers! Revisiting the basics and doing so in a highly productive and calculated way helps us integrate better habits and root out the bad habits that hold back our best singing.
FACULTY: Will Fox TARGET AUDIENCE: Section Leaders, Everyone, Quartets
Empowering Leadership: The long-term success of any chapter is based on leadership. We’ll show you how to become a leader who empowers your volunteers. You’ll learn three ways to motivate volunteer members, six contracts of delegation that will allow them to support the chapter’s purpose, and you’ll even have the chance to practice an empowering conversation.
FACULTY: Rob MacDonald TARGET AUDIENCE: Directors, Team Leaders, Section Leaders
Everyone in Harmony : Here's your opportunity to ask all those pesky questions about the Everyone in Harmony plan. What's the future of BHS now that women are included?
FACULTY: Amy and Donny Rose TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Inside an Arranger's Mind: Ever wonder how an arranger comes up with a new arrangement? What comes first? Do you arrange start to finish? Do you start with the tag? Is there a process or do you just start arranging? How did you think of doing “that” in your arrangement? How do you make your arrangements “interesting”? We will talk about strategies of coming up with arrangements and how to find inspiration for interesting and unique arrangements.
FACULTY: Kevin Keller TARGET AUDIENCE: Quartets, arrangers, everyone
Learn Music FAST!!!!: So, you've been singing the same songs for the past years... and you still don't know them? Maybe you need to apply some whole-brain, power-learning methods??? Whether your goal is to learn 3 or 30 songs this year, come join us as we explore how to learn music quickly and effectively.
FACULTY: Raymond Schwarzkopf TARGET AUDIENCE: Quartets, Everyone
Magic Lies in the Sound of Communication: Analyze musical lines, lyrics, word art, and physical expression to heighten expressive, authentic communication. Consonant use and speech-like delivery within the musical lines will be thoroughly explored.
FACULTY: Lori Lyford TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Personalizing Music: Class explores music selection and how to rework an arrangement to customize to your ensemble’s personality or level.
FACULTY: Nikki Blackmer, Anne Downton, Melissa Pope TARGET AUDIENCE: Directors, Quartets
Relationship of Judging Categories with Signature and Ryan Heller: Learn the integration of the categories and how it applies to all aspects of our performing.
FACULTY: Ryan Heller TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Rhythm Basics: Feel the groove! This class will help you expand your rhythmic vocabulary - including note values, rests, and different meters - and introduce practical tips for reading and ‘hearing’ rhythms before you sing them. We will discuss tempo driven songs– fast and slow - and identify ways to sing them without speeding up or slowing down. Come ready to clap, tap and stomp your way through quarter notes, eighth notes, and triplets… and learn the importance of subdivisions and feeling the pulse. Basic music reading skill will enhance your experience in this class. Offered in sessions 2 and 7.
FACULTY: Lisa Schwarzkopf TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Shockingly Good Sectionals : One of the fastest ways to improve a chorus is to raise the quality of sectional rehearsals. In this class we will explore an exciting and engaging model of sectional work that pursues three goals simultaneously: Accuracy, Unity, and Drama. This is a high-participation class; come ready to sing!
FACULTY: Elizabeth Davies TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone, Section Leaders
Space And Place: In this class, We will feel and hear the differences between these placements, finding where we feel vibrations for different styles of singing, particularly for Barbershop. We will also be doing demonstrations of correct and incorrect placements which have always shown to as entertaining as they are educational!
FACULTY: Jean Barford TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Stand Well, Breathe Well, Sing Well: Good basic vocal production is something we singers need every time we open our mouths, but do we understand why we need to do all the things we're taught to do by our directors? This class will be a hands-on exploration of our most basic barbershop skills, and you will come away knowing more about your own voice and where you need to focus to achieve even better sound. We'll cover body alignment, breath usage, and tone production, and give you some new tools to work on these skills. This is a class for every singer.
FACULTY: Sheryl Brook TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Story-based Performing: Bring your audience on a journey as you perform by having a story behind your song. You’d sing “I Love You Truly” to your newborn child very differently than you’d sing it to your dream car! Learn why the story has to come first and then any embellishments or choreo. You'll learn about vocal character and how the vocal inflections, texture changes, and nuances impact the story-telling.
FACULTY: Lea Beverley TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Tag Singing A: Darwin Scheel is so passionate about tags that he hosts an annual tag party and Brandon can't stop teaching tags everywhere he goes so expect a fun-filled 90 minutes of tag singing! Learn new tags, sing old ones, and learn how to teach tags. Offered in sessions 2, 4, and 6 with NO repeat tags!
FACULTY: Brandon Hall and Darwin Scheel TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
The Successful PVI: Creating a learning opportunity for the individual singer to improve their vocal skills.
FACULTY: Jana Gutenson TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
What exactly IS Marketing?: So, you’ve been told you’re in charge of “marketing” for your chorus or quartet. Yay. Now comes the hard part: What does it even mean to be in charge of marketing? And how does this newfangled “internet” thing change how you market the chorus?
In this class, we will cover the role of marketing. What exactly IS the job of marketing director (hint: it’s not about making pretty posters) and we’ll discuss how the modern digital landscape poses both challenges and opportunities for marketing your chorus in new and interesting ways.
FACULTY: Larry Osterman TARGET AUDIENCE: Quartets, Chorus, Everyone
What’s Your Vision?: Has your chapter lost its way? Is it difficult to explain why your chapter exists, what it does, and why someone would want to join? It may be time to revisit your Vision and Mission. We’ll review the purpose of a Vision and Mission, how to brainstorm and define them, and how they impact chapter culture. We’ll examine your chapter “persona” (the public face that you present to the world) and how that helps or hurts. Back home, you’ll have the skills needed to take your chapter leadership through a Vision/Mission brainstorming exercise. (Offered in Sessions 2 and 7)
FACULTY: Chris Rimple TARGET AUDIENCE: Chapter/Chorus Leadership
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SESSION 3 - Saturday, 8:45am
20-Minute Voice Lesson: This is your opportunity to have a scheduled 20-minute singing lesson. You'll meet one-on-one with a fantastic vocal coach who will help you personally become a better singer.
FACULTY: Sheryl Brook TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
5 Leadership Practices: The difference between an organization that simply survives and one that thrives is leadership. Leaders must not only have a vision, but they must possess the ability to translate that vision into reality. In this course, you will discover the five best practices of leadership: possessing a driving passion to realize a vision, cultivating relationships built on trust, unleashing the motivation of members, acting as a social architect, and relating to all people from a foundation of positive intentions.
FACULTY: Rob MacDonald TARGET AUDIENCE: Directors, Team Leaders, Section Leaders
Barbershop in our Changing World: Is your chapter aging and struggling to grow? Is your audience shrinking? Generational and societal changes over the last 50 years have had dramatic impacts on non-profit and fraternal organizations, and barbershop is no exception. We'll examine these changes and their effects on your chapter, then learn specific strategies to use them for your advantage.
FACULTY: Chris Rimple TARGET AUDIENCE: Chapter/Chorus Leadership
Basic Music Theory: If you have ever wondered what the heck the Director is talking about when he/she starts to use words like “interval, key signature, inverted chord, or seventh chords,” this may be the class for you. This class will attempt to explore Music Theory from its most fundamental elements up though basic harmonic analysis and help you get with the lingo! Burt Szabo’s “Theory of BBS Harmony” book is encouraged, but not required. Advanced Music Theory is in session 4.
FACULTY: Chuck Roegiers TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Chorus Culture: Primarily for chorus leaders, but open to all, this session will focus on the challenges of creating and maintaining a positive culture during rehearsals, performances, and meetings. Specific strategies will be given to keep chorus members engaged in an uplifting environment.
FACULTY: Rachel Pack TARGET AUDIENCE: Directors, Section Leaders, Quartets
Community Awareness Brainstorm: Choruses and quartets wanting to try new things to broaden your reach and awareness in the local community, this session is for you. Singing telegrams? Barbershop Quartet Day? Flash mobs? Bring 2-3 “outside the box” performance ideas that you’ve tried or even thought about trying, and we’ll share these together in a big marketing brainstorm session. You’ll leave this class with new concrete ideas to put into action.
FACULTY: Duncan Gilman TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Creating a Visual Plan: Whether you are in a chorus or a quartet, or even just singing a solo, your body moves to emphasize the story you are telling. Choreography, or adding movement to the music, helps to bring the story behind your song to life. This basic choreography class will cover simple vocabulary and types of movement that enhance the story. We'll talk about face/body involvement, the benefits and pitfalls of planned choreography, and how to keep it singer-friendly and musically driven.
FACULTY: Amy Rose TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Harmony Accuracy: We’ve all seen this on score sheets, so what IS harmony accuracy? This class discusses and explains the factors that affect tuning and harmony accuracy. This interactive class will include listening to a number of examples, to determine what is impacting harmony accuracy.
FACULTY: Melissa Pope TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone, Quartets, Directors
How to Sing a Good Line: There are lots of ways to sing a line of music. We'll explore different approaches to convey different emotions or stories as well as tips and tricks to sing beautifully. Why stay ordinary when you can be amazing!
FACULTY: Will Fox TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone, Quartets
Inner Mastery Foundations - Building a Success Mindset: This foundational class by Inner Coach of Barbershop Jan Carley provides the proven critical elements to building a success mindset. In this class you will be introduced Jan’s signature personal mastery “Overtone System” as outlined in her new book, THE OVERTONE EFFECT where she uses the phenomenon of overtones as a metaphor for creating results that go well beyond what you ever thought possible. You will learn the foundational generative mindset approach to keep you growing exponentially instead of getting stuck in “fixing”. We’ll talk about the brain, and how 2 simple words can shift your mindset from tunnel thinking to growth, creativity and insight. You will leave with practical concepts and tools to immediately implement for positive change. Jan’s unique mindset mastery work has transformed the singing and chorus experiences of thousands of barbershoppers worldwide. Come and find out why!
FACULTY: Jan Carley TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Original Polecats: Learn - or improve - the Original Polecats, (Vol 1) If you know your part on the Polecats, you get to join in on lots of fun at HCNW: late night singing, and even some in-class singing. If you need to brush up on a few Polecat songs, or even learn some, come to this class and get up to speed. It will be a great foundation for you to join in the singing, and have even more fun this weekend. Bring your Polecat book. If you can’t find yours, a few copies will be available for purchase at HCNW.
FACULTY: Gerry Borden TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Reading Music: If you’ve never gotten around to learning how to read music as well as you’d like, join us as we learn the basic building blocks of music: note names, scales, notation, key signatures, time signatures, and more. Recognize melodic movement, intervals, rhythms, and scales to help you ‘hear’ the music before you sing it. By applying a practical application of music reading you can enhance your singing experience and musicianship. Offered in sessions 1 and 3.
FACULTY: Lisa Schwarzkopf TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Sing in Barbershop Style: There are a thousand things you can do with a song; come learn the critical things you have to do in order for the song to be barbershop. If you don’t use these five, you cannot succeed in singing barbershop. We will also explore a second Ah Hah and trap -- just because a chart is written in the barbershop style, it doesn’t mean that you are singing it in the barbershop style. This class will help you understand what barbershop is, and how to use your new understanding of the barbershop style to move from being a "notes and words" singer to a singer who gives the barbershop song its due. This class is for everyone from novices to experts.
FACULTY: Raymond Schwarzkopf TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Sing It and Mean It: This class will look at techniques for more expressive performance from three different aspects as the attendees analyze lyrics, emotional content and physical expression.
FACULTY: Lori Lyford TARGET AUDIENCE: Directors, Everyone
So You Want to Be in a Quartet: WANTED: singers with little or no experience singing in a quartet, but who would like to try quartetting, in a safe environment. People will be available to help you with your part, but the goal is for you to handle your part on your own. Don’t worry about “It won’t be pretty.” It never was, for any of us. But this is a great way to experience the thrill of making chords happen, just because of you. (The thrill is not unlike the thrill you had your first time pedaling your bike without the training wheels.) There will be lots of do-overs, and lots of support. Come try it; it might just be your next step on your barbershop journey.
FACULTY: Brandon Hall and Darwin Scheel TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Storytelling and the Barbershop Style: Barbershoppers tell you they are telling you a story when they really aren’t. How do we use the construct of story-telling in the music that we sing and stay emotionally engaged.
FACULTY: Kevin Keller TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone, Quartets
Tagging Vowels - Better Singing With Unified Vowels: Using selected favorite TAGS from the beloved collection, we will use a set of vowel targets to focus on a like approach to word pronunciation. Singing TAGS is always fun but using these carefully matched sounds produces a ringing that you will love! Everyone writes on the provided handouts and everyone sings.
FACULTY: Beth Bruce TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Understanding Artistry and Musicality with Signature and Ryan Heller: The goal of every singer is to produce a response in the listener, but how do we get there? Together with Signature, we will examine the common tools and techniques applied to create musicality and artistry (breath plan, dynamics, and embellishments, to name a few) . No matter the level of your chorus or quartet, there is something for you to do!
FACULTY: Ryan Heller with Signature Quartet TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone, Quartets
Warm-Up Your Sound: Creating a vocal launch pad for successful rehearsals and performances through sequential building of the ensemble sound during vocal warm-ups.
FACULTY: Jana Gutenson TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
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SESSION 4 - Saturday 10:30am
40-minute Voice Lesson: This is your opportunity to have a scheduled 40-minute singing lesson. You'll meet one-on-one with a fantastic vocal coach who will help you personally become a better singer.
FACULTY: Gerry Borden TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone CANCEL OR MOVE
40-minute Voice Lesson: This is your opportunity to have a scheduled 40-minute singing lesson. You'll meet one-on-one with a fantastic vocal coach who will help you personally become a better singer.
FACULTY: Beth Bruce TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
40-minute Voice Lesson: This is your opportunity to have a scheduled 40-minute singing lesson. You'll meet one-on-one with a fantastic vocal coach who will help you personally become a better singer.
FACULTY: Will Fox TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
40-Minute Voice Lesson: This is your opportunity to have a scheduled 40-minute singing lesson. You'll meet one-on-one with a fantastic vocal coach who will help you personally become a better singer.
FACULTY: Kathleen Hansen TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
40-Minute Voice Lesson: This is your opportunity to have a scheduled 40-minute singing lesson. You'll meet one-on-one with a fantastic vocal coach who will help you personally become a better singer.
FACULTY: Ellie Osterman TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Advanced Music Theory: We all love barbershop harmony; now let’s find out WHY! How are the chords constructed? How are they different from the rest of Western music? What makes that “barbershop sound?” This class is designed for those who comfortably read music and understand the basics of keys, chords, overtones, and music terminology. We will also take a look at figured bass analysis and harmonic progressions – what works and what doesn’t. There will be some crossover from the Advanced Arranging Class. Burt Szabo’s “Theory of BBS Harmony” book is an excellent resource, but not required. Basic Music Theory is in session 3.
FACULTY: Chuck Roegiers TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone, Arrangers
Bodacious Barbershop Basics : This class is focused on the singer who has a feel for the music but might not read music very well or understand the structure of the chords. We will explore the basics of how barbershop music works and demystify the circle of fifths, tri-tone movement, and other terms that make your eyes glaze over! Come feel the fun of barbershop chords and melody lines while seeing and hearing how these barbershop basics work.
FACULTY: Lisa and Raymond Schwarzkopf TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Building a Culture of Success: Create a more joyful ensemble experience (and avoid leadership burnout) by building a framework of core values and well-defined, collaboratively created goals.
FACULTY: Jana Gutenson and Lori Lyford TARGET AUDIENCE: Directors, Everyone
Coaching Under Glass: Signature Quartet and the Barfords: No matter where you are on your barbershop journey, coaching can help you hone your specific skills to enable the group to be more successful. Regardless of your level, you work on the same skills but higher skilled groups work in finer detail. Come with questions and watch Signature get coached by Brian and Jean Barford.
FACULTY: Brian and Jean Barford with Signature Quartet TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Engage on Stage: “Performance from the inside out” When your audience comes to see you perform, they expect nothing other than to be entertained. Within each one of us there is a wonderful psychophysical power that can be sourced to hold our audiences in captivated attention. In this workshop, we’ll take the technical journey to the emotional side of performing. Come learn the techniques actors and stage performers use to discover their role on the stage.
FACULTY: Theresa Weatherbee TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone, Quartets
Facebook Ads Workshop: Facebook advertising is one of the most economical ways to spread your marketing message. Think you're ready to try your first Facebook ads campaign? This class will walk you through the steps from start to finish and will cover everything, including creating target audiences and effective ad content. Participants will leave this session with: a guided tour of Facebook Ads manager and a plan of action for starting an ad campaign.
FACULTY: Duncan Gilman TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Feedback: The Breakfast of Champions: As performers and volunteers, we thrive on feedback that is well-delivered. How do others know when your expectations have been met — or not? Understand the power of feedback. Use motivational and corrective feedback to build confidence and competence in others. Learn the “fit, focus and timing” of good feedback, and how to recognize the achievers in your group. Plan your next feedback.
FACULTY: Rob MacDonald TARGET AUDIENCE: Directors, Team Leaders, Section Leaders
Finale - Basic: This class will introduce you to using Finale. This program is quite powerful but can be intimidating. We'll walk through some of the things it can do and show how to use the most important parts. You'll need to bring your computer, your copy of Finale, and a basic understanding of music notation (See "Music Reading Basics" in session 1 if you need a tune-up!)
FACULTY: Mike Rosen TARGET AUDIENCE: Arrangers, Quartets, Everyone
Finding Your First (or Any) Note: How many times have you heard "What's MY note?!?" This class will teach you how to find your note relative to the pitch blown. You'll get a chance to practice your sight-reading skills in a supportive environment.
FACULTY: Harry Buerer TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone, Newbies
Inner Mastery Fundamentals - Eliminating Mental Interference (On and Off Stage): The biggest thing standing in the way of your peak performance (in life and onstage)…is YOU! Learn how to easily adopt a generative growth mindset to support your journey as a singer and performer instead of holding you back. This session with Inner Coach of Barbershop, Jan Carley, will tackle the challenging mental stuff that interferes with your success, confidence and joy. Get tools to reframe your “self-judgment”, get rid of limiting beliefs and learn how to turn your Inner Critic into an Inner Coach. These Mindset Mastery tools will help you move forward with confidence and will positively impact both your chorus and non-chorus life.
FACULTY: Jan Carley TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone, Quartets
Polecats - Volume 2: Learn - or improve - the Polecats Vol 2. If you know your part on the Polecats, you get to join in on lots of fun at HCNW: late night singing, and even some in-class singing. If you need to brush up on a few Polecat songs, or even learn some, come to this class and get up to speed. It will be a great foundation for you to join in the singing, and have even more fun this weekend. Bring your Polecat book. If you can’t find yours, a few copies will be available for purchase at HCNW.
FACULTY: Ken Potter TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Purposeful Inclusion: Most barbershop chapters do not reflect the diversity of the communities in which they rehearse and perform. We’ll review the history of minority involvement in barbershop, intentional and unintentional exclusionary practices, and the state of diversity in barbershop today. We’ll examine the differences between Tolerance, Acceptance, and Inclusion, and outline the facets of an inclusive chapter. We’ll examine your chapter “persona” (the public face that you present to the world) and how that helps or hurts your efforts at inclusion. We’ll review outreach and partnering solutions that can help your chapter increase diversity, both in audience and membership.
FACULTY: Chris Rimple TARGET AUDIENCE: Chapter/Chorus Leadership, Everyone
Steps to Writing a Barbershop Tag: You want to write a tag for a Chorus celebration or maybe just for fun. Follow this step by step process for how to write a Barbershop Tag using established principles of music theory and barbershop harmony. General understanding of scales and chords will be helpful. Bring your portable keyboard with earphones to play along.
FACULTY: Janice Wheeler TARGET AUDIENCE: Arrangers, Everyone
Storytelling - the Vocal Art Form: Once upon a time…Songs were made up of words and the words told a story…. We can develop great vocal skills, but if we don’t use those skills and others to move our audience, it’s a lost opportunity. Story telling is an art and you are the artist. Vocal inflection, word sounds, dynamics, vocal tone even silence are some of the tools you can use to paint your picture and leave a lasting impression. Come…storytellers and storyteller- wanna-bes. Come meet your people.
FACULTY: LouAnn Hommel TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Tag Singing B: Darwin Scheel is so passionate about tags that he hosts an annual tag party and Brandon can't stop teaching tags everywhere he goes so expect a fun-filled 90 minutes of tag singing! Learn new tags, sing old ones, and learn how to teach tags. Offered in sessions 2, 4, and 6 with NO repeat tags!
FACULTY: Brandon Hall and Darwin Scheel TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Take Me to Your (Section) Leader: Attendees will assess skills/challenges, explore ways to take your section to the next level, and see how to effectively work the learning styles of your singers.
FACULTY: Kathy Scheel TARGET AUDIENCE: Section Leaders, Directors, Assistant Directors, Wanna-bes
Understanding Artistry and Musicality with Frenzy and Ryan Heller: The goal of every singer is to produce a response in the listener, but how do we get there? Together with our demo quartet we will examine the common tools and techniques applied to create musicality and artistry (breath plan, dynamics, and embellishments, to name a few) . No matter the level of your chorus or quartet, there is something for you to do!
FACULTY: Ryan Heller with Frenzy Quartet TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone, Quartets
Wavebox Singing Part 1/2: The holistic approach to music that has people singing and performing at higher levels more quickly and with greater ease. See what music can look and feel like and even how to share what you learn and know more effectively with others.
FACULTY: Paul Ellinger TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
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SESSION 5 - Saturday 1:30pm
Changing the Tag: It’s an uptune with a descending tag. How to go about analyzing and changing the tag to have an ascending ending using established principles of music theory and barbershop harmony.
FACULTY: Janice Wheeler TARGET AUDIENCE: Directors, Quartets, Arrangers
Coaching Under Glass: Renegade and The Barfords: No matter where you are on your barbershop journey, coaching can help you hone your specific skills to enable the group to be more successful. Regardless of your level, you work on the same skills but higher skilled groups work in finer detail. Come with questions and watch Renegade get coached by Brian and Jean Barford.
FACULTY: Brian and Jean Barford with Renegade Quartet TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Demystifying Resonance: Unlocking the ways to best amplify your sound for Quartet or Chorus singers. We will debunk old myths and learn how to maximize our instrument.
FACULTY: Ryan Heller TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Dispelling Judging Myths: Opportunity for students to ask questions about the judging process. We will talk about myths associated with Judging. This will be a class where students bring their questions and I will answer them as transparently as possible.
FACULTY: Kevin Keller TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Finale - Advanced: Learn to use some of the more powerful parts of Finale and get your questions answered. You'll need your computer, your copy of Finale, and a passing familiarity with Finale.
FACULTY: Mike Rosen TARGET AUDIENCE: Arrangers, Quartets, Everyone
Fostering Diversity and Inclusion through Repertoire, Rehearsals, and Culture: Attendees will discover how language, music choice, web presence and chorus culture either attract or dissuade members of diverse ages, cultures, ethnicities, abilities, and more. We will discuss best practices to create a welcoming, inclusive and diverse chorus culture.
FACULTY: Kathleen Hansen TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Grow Your Chapter: A cappella music is experiencing a resurgence, but is your chapter benefiting from it? Are you struggling to find and retain members? Most participants are attracted to singing for the fun and camaraderie it provides, not for performance or competition. We’ll review member needs and how to align chapter goals with them, as well as partnerships and other relationships that can help you grow your membership. We’ll examine your chapter “persona” (the public face that you present to potential members) and how that helps or hurts your recruiting efforts. We’ll also review marketing techniques and their effectiveness, including social media, email marketing, SEO/SEM, and more traditional forms.
FACULTY: Chris Rimple TARGET AUDIENCE: Chapter/Chorus Leadership
Introduction to Nonprofit Accounting : This class will walk you through some of the common questions US choruses and quartets have with their finances, accounting, and taxes and help you find and file the appropriate forms for BHS and SAI. Nonprofit accounting isn’t the same as for-profit accounting, and each chorus is responsible for maintaining their nonprofit eligibility. Come with questions to ask as the class explores US taxes, nonprofit status, and other topics of financial interest.
FACULTY: Don Thorn TARGET AUDIENCE: Treasurers, Quartets, Team Leaders
Is It a Script or an Exciting Musical Journey?: Take any selection of songs and weave them into a fun and entertaining story with music. A Musical! People want to be entertained. Find the passion. Find the humor. Find the joy. Leave them wanting and coming back for more. Tips and Tricks. Let’s collaborate!
FACULTY: LouAnn Hommel TARGET AUDIENCE: Chapter/Chorus Leadership, Everyone
Keep Your Hands To Yourself: Many of us have received well-intentioned advice about selling the song through use of faces and bodies. Too often, this results in too much hand movement to the point of distracting the audience. This class will explore what we as barbershop performers are trying to do on stage, and then see if it is possible to succeed in our purpose without the use of our hands. Class will include interaction, discussion and experimentation. Class offered in sessions 1 and 5.
FACULTY: Roger Mills TARGET AUDIENCE: Quartets, Everyone
Leading From Strengths for Positive Results: As a chorus leader in any capacity, you are a critical influencer to both the joy and the success of your ensemble. Not only are you responsible for modeling the behaviors that the chorus will follow, you must also ensure that the best possible atmosphere exists for the director and the musical product to go forward unimpeded. In this class with Inner Coach of Barbershop Jan Carley, we will simplify your role as leader, and find out what you need to be able to lead effectively. Discover your signature strengths, how to lead creatively instead of reactively and get the tools you need to inspire your chorus from the inside out. Practice the critical tools of giving and receiving feedback, giving deep acknowledgment, and learn how to build trust and resiliency. You will leave empowered and encouraged about your important leadership contribution.
FACULTY: Jan Carley TARGET AUDIENCE: Music Leaders, Section Leaders, Future leaders
Make More Changes, Faster: We often cease to improve because we "do things like we've done." The crucial element here is make changes to what you're doing, then evaluate the result. And do more of this, more often! This class is about making choices in rehearsal that maximize the rate of change for the better.
FACULTY: Ron Black TARGET AUDIENCE: chorus directors, musical leaders, quartets
Photos and Videos for Marketing Your Chorus: Our members are performers, so naturally the marketing that is most effective shows off our performing. In this class, we’ll cover what makes great photo and video content, how to distribute it on Instagram and other visual networks, and some easy tools to take your print and web marketing to the next level.
FACULTY: Duncan Gilman TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Selecting Music for your Mixed Ensemble: BHS Director of Education Donny Rose will explain the ins and outs, pitfalls, and pathways to success when selecting music for mixed ensembles. Great for choruses, quartets, and anyone interested in mixed harmony singing.
FACULTY: Donny Rose TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Sing Your Part Smart - 8 Parts: 8 separate classes where each member of Frenzy and Signature explores ways to better sing tenor, lead, baritone and bass. Class will use an 8-part arrangement of "Anything You Can Do" by Josh Ehrlich as the teaching tool for Sing Your Part Smart classes. Students who also attend part 2 in session 6 will be performing on the Saturday night show.
FACULTY: Frenzy and Signature TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Three PVIs to Improve Your Chorus: These lessons are created for the musical leaders of your chorus to share with the members one on one. They are intended to be used in a systematic PVI program wherein each lesson builds upon the skills taught on the previous set of skills. We’ll work together and carefully go through the materials.
FACULTY: Beth Bruce TARGET AUDIENCE: Section Leaders, Directors, Quartets
Warmups for the Voice, Brain, Body, Breathing, and More: In this class we explore more than just vocal exercises and what each type of warmup can do for the performer. It’s the what, why, who, what and when of the beginning of each rehearsal.
FACULTY: Judy Beckman AUDIENCE: Section Leaders, Everyone
Wavebox Singing Part 2/2: The continuation of Wavebox Singing.
FACULTY: Paul Ellinger TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
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SESSION 6 - Saturday, 3:15pm
House of Delegates Meeting: Representatives from each EVG chapter will meet with the EVG Board and OPS Team.
40-Minute Voice Lesson: This is your opportunity to have a scheduled 40-minute singing lesson. You'll meet one-on-one with a fantastic vocal coach who will help you personally become a better singer.
FACULTY: Ellie Osterman TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
A Character Driven Performance: Join us and explore the ins and outs of a good, character- driven performance. This is no joke! Give them a performance that touches their souls. Learn how. This is a physically interactive class.
FACULTY: LouAnn Hommel TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone, Quartets
Arranging for Beginners: This class is for those who are curious about arranging but don't feel like they know enough about harmony. In this class we will work our way through arranging a simple song with only 2 chords in it, so you don't have to be intimidated. Basic sight reading is the only pre-requisite.
FACULTY: Harry Buerer TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Being a Masterful Director (From the Inside Out): As director you have an enormous responsibility as the primary person inspiring your chorus’ success. It is a pressure-filled, highly-demanding role and one that is critically important for the chorus’ joy, happiness and growth toward excellence. Though we naturally expect our directors to be technically skilled and knowledgeable, your most powerful impact actually comes from who you “be”, not what you “do”. How you show up, how you model presence, vulnerability and resiliency and even how you speak is critical to creating a vibrant chorus culture of growth and success.
This session will help inspire your journey to personal mastery, and remove the barriers and interferences that get in the way of sustaining a personal position of strength, balance and positive leadership. Inner Coach of Barbershop Jan Carley has changed positively impacted dozens of barbershop directors through her innovative “Coach on Call” program. Come to this session with an open mind and heart. This could well be the class that positively shifts you and your chorus culture forever.
FACULTY: Jan Carley TARGET AUDIENCE: Chorus directors and Assistant Directors
Getting Beyond Scoresheets: Instead of using your score to judge how well you are succeeding, use two alternate yardsticks: The Comfort of the Audience and The Believability of Your Song. The target audience for this class is singers who care about getting better and who have worked at it but are frustrated that the effort-to-reward ratio has been so meager. Linear thinkers and logical rational sequential doers are prized students.
FACULTY: Raymond Schwarzkopf TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Getting Gigs, Getting Paid: Quartets are often a labor of love, but what about getting paid for some of that work? This class will guide you through the key elements that establish you as a professional, well packaged ensemble that is attractive to audiences AND paying clients.
FACULTY: Amy Rose TARGET AUDIENCE: Choruses, Quartets
Goodbye Stage Fright!: This session will allow us to rid ourselves of the fears of singing in any situation and only leaving just enough excitement to make it fun! It is so freeing to discover that our fears are based on flawed logic and inaccurate assumptions about what audiences are actually thinking. Join this interactive class and free yourself to sing and perform at higher levels like never before!
FACULTY: Paul Ellinger TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Grow Your Audience: A cappella music is experiencing a resurgence, but is your chapter benefitting from it? Are you struggling to find and retain an audience? Creating awareness of your chapter or chorus requires more than an advertisement in the local paper. Changing communication habits require that a chapter utilize a wide variety of marketing methods and tools. We’ll review audience needs and how to align chapter desires with them, as well as partnerships and other relationships that can help you grow your audience. We’ll examine your chapter “persona” (the public face that you present in your marketing) and how that helps or hurts your efforts. We’ll also review marketing techniques and their effectiveness, including social media, email marketing, SEO/SEM, and more traditional forms.
FACULTY: Chris Rimple TARGET AUDIENCE: Chapter/Chorus Leadership
How is THAT Barbershop: People think something is not contestable and then look at the score sheet to see nothing happened in the MUS category. Why? We watch some of the most controversial performances and discuss them.
FACULTY: Kevin Keller TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone, Quartets
Mining the Chart: There's so much music out there, and we're passionate about singing as much of it as possible in this lifetime! But how do we know which version of our favorite song is going to work for us? This class will look at what the chart (music) itself tells you, and help you identify the skills necessary to sing the arrangement you have. We'll do some marking of the music (octaves, P-theory, etc) and we'll look at the chords, embellishments, and traps in the charts, and discuss ways to use what the arranger has written. This class will work best for you if you read music, but will be of use even if you don't.
FACULTY: Sheryl Brook TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Put the best YOU in the UNIT with Renegade and Ryan Heller: Explore the elements of unity in this interactive class. From the aspects of vocal skills that need to be aligned, to the frequent causes of synchronization errors, we want to be sure that as many parts of our quartet/chorus unit are as together as possible...our goal is for all singers to bring their best selves to every rehearsal/performance!
FACULTY: Ryan Heller and Renegade Quartet TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone, Quartets
Ring Chords Like Never Before: You’ll walk through the crucial elements of barbershop singing that will leave you amazed. We approach the three elements of voice timbre, vowels, and tuning in some new ways. You’ll be ringing chords like a pro.
FACULTY: Ron Black TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Sing Your Part Smart - Putting It All Together: 8 separate classes where each member of Frenzy and Signature explores ways to better sing tenor, lead, baritone and bass. Class will use an 8-part arrangement of "Anything You Can Do" by Josh Ehrlich as the teaching tool for Sing Your Part Smart classes. Students who also attend part 2 in session 6 will be performing on the Saturday night show.
FACULTY: Frenzy and Signature TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
SmartScore for Learning Tracks: Would you like to generate learning tracks for your chorus? Or transpose it up or down? Of course, you would! Mike (and Judy!) will show you how to scan printed sheet music, and take it into SmartScore X2 Piano Edition. Then, you will learn to correct the few (but inevitable!) errors, mix the piece into part-predominant sound files, and convert them to MP3 format, for burning to CD or listening on a computer or mobile device.
For software, you will need SmartScore X2 Piano Edition, from www.musitek.com. The software costs $80 to purchase, but a non-saving, demo version is free. That’s all you will need for the course for hands-on learning. Please have it loaded onto your laptop computer when you get here to save a lot of time. If you just want to sit and watch, that’s fine, too.
FACULTY: Mike Rosen TARGET AUDIENCE: Arrangers, Quartets, Everyone
Smoke and Mirrors - Being your own Vocal Coach: Not everyone lives close to superstar voice instructors, but you can make tremendous progress with a recorder and a mirror. Learn how to evaluate your own singing as well as a few tips and tricks to make better and faster progress. Fantastic skills for when your coach is just too far away.
FACULTY: Will Fox TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone, Quartets
Tag Singing C: Darwin Scheel is so passionate about tags that he hosts an annual tag party and Brandon can't stop teaching tags everywhere he goes so expect a fun-filled 90 minutes of tag singing! Learn new tags, sing old ones, and learn how to teach tags. Offered in sessions 2, 4, and 6 with NO repeat tags!
FACULTY: Brandon Hall and Darwin Scheel TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
The Power of Five: The five most important questions is a practical methodology, designed and used by the pros to get an ensemble cast on the same page. It was developed to give performers the skills required to transmit the true message of the song to their audience. In this interactive class, we will take a song, analyze it together by using these specific questions, and develop a plan of action that will ensure an engaging, high level performance.
FACULTY: Theresa Weatherbee TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone, Quartets, Directors
Vocal Color and Blend: Listen to recordings of singers. Explore and describe diverse vocal timbre. Practice vocal techniques that will achieve beautiful ensemble blend. Everybody sings!
FACULTY: Beth Bruce TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone, Quartets
Why Is That So Hard to Sing?: You've purchased a published arrangement from Sweet Adelines Incorporated, but the chorus or quartet members are unable to sing the Intro successfully. Why is it so hard to sing? How to go about analyzing and fixing the problem/s using established principles of music theory and barbershop harmony.
FACULTY: Janice Wheeler TARGET AUDIENCE: Quartets, Directors, Arrangers
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SESSION 7 - Sunday, 8:45am
20-Minute Voice Lesson: This is your opportunity to have a scheduled 20-minute singing lesson. You'll meet one-on-one with a fantastic vocal coach who will help you personally become a better singer.
FACULTY: Sheryl Brook TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
40-minute Voice Lesson: This is your opportunity to have a scheduled 40-minute singing lesson. You'll meet one-on-one with a fantastic vocal coach who will help you personally become a better singer.
FACULTY: Gerry Borden TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone CANCEL OR MOVE
DCP Testing: Region 13 offers testing at this time for their Directors Certification Program. Judy Beckman
Filling Your Vocal Toolbox: Finding the right tool (vocal technique) for the job (diagnosis of vocal issues). Most vocal issues fall within four areas. In this class, you will learn to hear indicators of which area(s) to work on and what exercises (tools) are helpful remedies.
FACULTY: Lori Lyford TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Rhythm Basics: Feel the groove! This class will help you expand your rhythmic vocabulary - including note values, rests, and different meters - and introduce practical tips for reading and ‘hearing’ rhythms before you sing them. We will discuss tempo driven songs– fast and slow - and identify ways to sing them without speeding up or slowing down. Come ready to clap, tap and stomp your way through quarter notes, eighth notes, and triplets… and learn the importance of subdivisions and feeling the pulse. Basic music reading skill will enhance your experience in this class. Offered in sessions 2 and 7.
FACULTY: Lisa Schwarzkopf TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Setting and Achieving Goals: There are many areas a chapter could choose to use as a strategy for change. Using a Gap Analysis, identify which options and priorities have the most impact for short- and long-term goals. Then, use the goal process to create the details of implementation. Why do goals fail? Learn the principles of goal setting. Learn the SMART goal-setting process that supports your strategy and objectives. Understand the benefits, obstacles, and actions; measure your success using the right metric. This process works for individuals, quartets, teams, committees and chapters. Write a goal for your chapter.
FACULTY: Rob MacDonald TARGET AUDIENCE: Directors, Team Leaders, Section Leaders
SOP - Standing Ovation Program: BHS has a wonderful program to help you improve your future shows. They'll send someone to attend your show and send you a report about what went well and what could be improved covering everything from advertising to venue to emceeing! This is also an opportunity for you to become a reviewer.
FACULTY: Bobby Huber TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
The Independent Singer: Methods and techniques for taking charge of your own vocal development.
FACULTY: Jana Gutenson TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
The Language of Masterful Coaching: How to Inspire Change In Singers: Grateful singers have used the phrase “master communicator” to describe Robert Shaw, Jim Henry, Mo Field, Kevin Keller, Greg Lyne, and other inspiring musical leaders. This class will explore the language of masterful coaching and will provide practice in a range of coaching techniques to give you “power steering” over the hearts and minds of singers.
FACULTY: Elizabeth Davies TARGET AUDIENCE: Directors, Everyone
The Quartet Quandry: An open discussion on things we can do as directors, section leaders, and individual chorus members to get our chorus involved in quartetting (not just competitively).
FACULTY: Brandon Hall TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Vocal Exercises for Your Sectionals using the Clues in the Music: This class will cover some techniques to use during vocal warm ups that then specifically relate to music being learned or performed that evening. We'll discuss the advantages of using transferrable skills and techniques to actual performance for better section unity and accuracy.
FACULTY: Nancy Kurth TARGET AUDIENCE: Section Leaders, Assistant Directors, Quartets, Wanna-bes
What’s Your Vision?: Has your chapter lost its way? Is it difficult to explain why your chapter exists, what it does, and why someone would want to join? It may be time to revisit your Vision and Mission. We’ll review the purpose of a Vision and Mission, how to brainstorm and define them, and how they impact chapter culture. We’ll examine your chapter “persona” (the public face that you present to the world) and how that helps or hurts. Back home, you’ll have the skills needed to take your chapter leadership through a Vision/Mission brainstorming exercise. (Offered in Sessions 2 and 7)
FACULTY: Chris Rimple TARGET AUDIENCE: Chapter/Chorus Leadership
Woodshedding for Beginners: Are you curious about woodshedding, but don't have a clue how to do it? This class will start with the simplest-possible materials, and show you why some alternatives work better than others. It would be helpful if you knew a little bit about chord structure, but we'll try to cover everything so you won't be left behind. After this class, you'll have a good start at understanding woodshedding.
FACULTY: Harry Buerer TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
You're Such a Character!: Attendees will gain an understanding of how characterization is more than just choreography or showmanship and how it can enhance a performance and bring an audience into the moment.
FACULTY: Kathy Scheel TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
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SESSION 8 - Sunday, 10:30am
Champion-Level Performance: Will Fox has been directing groups that for years have claimed choir state championships, jazz festival championships, concert band state championships and barbershop chorus District championships and International appearances. Come and learn the keys to his success in all of these musical genres and start applying these keys to your own quartet, chorus or ensemble.
FACULTY: Will Fox TARGET AUDIENCE: Music Educators, Everyone, Quartets
Choosing Music: Selecting repertoire is the most challenging decision a quartet or chorus faces. This class offers practical advice on finding the perfect fit for competition or performance.
FACULTY: Jana Gutenson TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone, Quartets
Do Less and Sing More: Is your chapter spending more time on non-singing “jobs” than on singing? Is it getting harder to find volunteers for those jobs? We’ll review ways in which you can increase member and audience satisfaction by doing less and singing more, and how to get off the “financial hamster wheel” so that decisions are not driven by chapter financial needs. We’ll look at free and low-cost resources available to aid with chapter operations, performance, marketing, and other needs, and we’ll review tools, services, and other solutions that you can begin using immediately. (Offered in Sessions 1 and 8)
FACULTY: Chris Rimple TARGET AUDIENCE: Chapter/Chorus Leadership
Emceeing a Show: The emcees are the glue that pull the show together. We’ll cover emceeing basics (using a mic, finding material, pacing) necessary to emcee a division show which will help you emcee other shows as well. It is strongly recommended that each division in EVG send at least one member to take this class.
FACULTY: Bobby Huber TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Entertaining is Providing Nourishment to Your Guests: This class will help you see your role of performer as one who is a host for guests, and who provides musical and emotional nourishment for your guests. This class will include a discussion of how and why you should change your performance when the audience or the situation is different and show you myriad ways to become comfortable regardless of the occasion – for example, singing in a nursing home or at the fair is far different from singing on your annual show.
FACULTY: Raymond Schwarzkopf TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Getting the Upper Hand on Breathing : Hands on techniques for learning how to improve all phases of the breathing-to-sing process, including: inhalation, maximizing capacity, breath control, length of line, and sufficient movement of air while singing
FACULTY: Lori Lyford TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
How to get THERE from here: We know that we want to create an experience for our audiences, but how do we get there? Meet with the creator of The Performance Sphere (a conceptual tool presented during the General Session) and discover new levels of sharing music and experiences for both the audience and performer alike. This class will use a balanced approach to having both video observation, conversation and may even have opportunities for real time feedback for groups in the room. This could be the “don’t miss” class of the your weekend!
FACULTY: Paul Ellinger TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
How to Teach Tags: Ahhh, tags...those exceedingly excellent, enjoyable, and entertaining ear-candy endings of embellishments and echoes, eliciting extensive elation and ecstasy! But what to do when there are no Tagmasters in tow to teach tunes? This course will teach you methods and strategies for teaching tags, and teach you how and why world domination through barbershop harmony can be achieved with this humble musical device. Come, Harmony-walker, and begin your journey to becoming a Tag Jedi!!
FACULTY: Brandon Hall TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Mixed BBS Chorus: Spend an enjoyable Sunday morning singing in a mixed chorus. You'll get learning tracks and music before HCNW begins so you will be ready to explore the joys of singing together!
FACULTY: Gerry Borden TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
Rhythm in Your Music: This class will help you work through the rhythms in printed music. Learn about ballads, blues, swing tunes, toe tappers, and syncopations in the music and how to deliver them. What’s the difference between a triplet in a jazz song, a triplet in a swing song, and a triplet in a downbeat song? Basic music reading skills will be a huge help in this class.
FACULTY: Donny Rose TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
The Emoting Body: One of the unique challenges of singing in the barbershop style is the dual focus on sound and presentation. As stage performers, the body is perhaps the most vital way to connect with the audience, enhancing an interp's impact. This class focuses on unifying the body with the emotional content of the lyrics being sung and will be useful to front-row singers, those aspiring to the front row, and everyone else in the chorus. Please wear comfortable shoes, as we will be walking around the room. Offered in Sessions 1 and 8.
FACULTY: Ellie Osterman TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone
What Social Media Can (and Can't!) Do For You: The most frequent question about using social media for groups is "Is all that effort worth it?" This class will show you how using various social platforms can impact your success and will help you align your expectations about the results to expect. Not sure if it's worth investing the time and money? Join us to learn how to maximize your reach and minimize the workload.
FACULTY: Amy Rose TARGET AUDIENCE: Everyone