COUNTING ALOUD, TAPPING, AND SINGING WITH THE CHORUS
Do not make the mistake of counting or tapping on the desk constantly during the rehearsal. You may think you are strengthening the rhythm, but as a matter of fact, you are actually weakening it, for in this way you take away from the performers the necessity of individual muscular response to the pulse, and at the performance (when you cannot, of course, count or tap) the rhythm is very likely to be flabby and uncertain. Singing with the chorus is another mistake against which the amateur should be warned. The director not only cannot detect errors and make intelligent criticisms if he sings with the chorus, but will make the members dependent upon his voice instead of compelling them to form the habit of watching him. The only exception to this principle is in teaching new music to a choir composed of very poor readers, in which case it is sometimes much easier to teach a difficult phrase by imitation. Even here, however, it is almost as well to have the organ give the correct tones. In leading community singing, the conductor will of course sing with the crowd, for here he is striving for quite a different sort of effect.
VENTILATION
See to it that the practice room is well ventilated, especially for a chorus rehearsal. Plenty of fresh air will not only enable your chorus to sing with better intonation, but will allow them to sing for a longer period without fatigue. (We are tempted to add a corollary to this proposition: namely, that sleepy congregations are not always due to poor preaching, as is generally supposed, but are as frequently the result of a combination of fairly good preaching and a badly ventilated auditorium!)
A CAPPELLA REHEARSING
In directing a chorus rehearsal, have your singers study without accompaniment much of the time. The organ "covers a multitude of sins" and practising without it will not only enable you to discover weaknesses of all sorts but will help the singers themselves enormously by making them more independent, improving the intonation, and compelling them to make cleaner and more definite attacks and releases.
THE VALUE OF A SENSE OF HUMOR
Finally, in concluding both this chapter and the book as a whole, let us commend once more to the conductor that he cultivate "the saving grace of humor." This quality has already been commented on somewhat at length in an earlier chapter (see p. [8]), but it is in the rehearsal period that it is most needed, and the conductor who is fortunate enough to be able to laugh a little when annoyances interrupt or disrupt his plans instead of snarling, will not only hold the members of the organization together for a longer time, because of their cordial personal attitude toward him, but will find himself much less fatigued at the end of the rehearsal; for nothing drains one's vitality so rapidly as scolding. A bit of humorous repartee, then, especially in response to the complaints of some lazy or grouchy performer; the ability to meet accidental mishaps without anger; even a humorous anecdote to relieve the strain of a taxing rehearsal—all these are to be highly recommended as means of oiling the machinery of the rehearsal and making it run smoothly.
But of course, even humor can be overdone. So we shall close by quoting the Greek motto, "Nothing too much," which will be found to apply equally well to many other activities recommended in the foregoing pages.