Lyrics for Choral Work

I am writing a choral work and I am unsure about some of the lyrics. It starts out: Vul - tures Cir - Cling. I am afraid that this is to muddy to sing, however, I cannot come up with another word that has the same connotation as vulture. The closest is Buzzard. Any help would be appreciated.

I think it's alright to use the word vultures, especially if the piece starts out more homorhythmic, with a somewhat thinner texture so the words are more transparent initially. If the audience is provided with the text, that would make it even clearer...but I don't think it will sound too muddy the way it is. Besides, off the top of my head I can't think of any other word with the same connotation, so if vultures is what you really mean to say, don't change it. Perhaps you could have a read-through to see how vocalists would feel about it musically? I know it won't have the same sound as a full choir, but even getting four people for a simple SATB reading could provide you with some good feedback.

Thanks, it was a actually a Choral conductor at my University that mentioned it when we were looking for typos and what not. This is my first time to write for choir, as I am an instrumentalist.

The work starts with Sop. and Alto on a Bb moving to C and F. Therefore, it is very transparent at the beginning. I will post it sometime.

Cool, I'll give it a listen when it's posted. You've probably already thought of this, but adding a breath mark between the words could also clear it up a little.

Actually no I haven't, It's one of those things I will test when I get a mock reading. Thanks.

There is something I'm not really understanding here:

Are you writing the lyrics at the same time you are writing the music?

If so, I'd recommend you write your lyrics first (you can always change things on a case-by-case basis later when you work on the music).

You're only giving yourself additional headache by needing to work out the text as you write the music.

Get your entire text done, THEN you'll know what music goes on it.

Remember, your goal is to "set the text to music"... which means that the music should be serving the text. The text should not be forced onto pre-existing music. Each musical gesture should enhance the text, bring light to it, express it.

It is text from a pre-written poem, I wrote the music for the text but I was advised against using the word: Vulture because it was pronounced in the back of the throat and therefore hard to project.

Here is the work

It is text from a pre-written poem, I wrote the music for the text but I was advised against using the word: Vulture because it was pronounced in the back of the throat and therefore hard to project.

Here is the work

Any word should be relatively easy to pronounce.

I see nothing "back of the throat" in the word "vulture". It is actually pretty much all front of the mouth.

When writing text for vocal music, one might avoid "ng" sounds and excesses of "mmm" and "nnn" sounds, which require closed mouth position. But don't remove a word simply because it contains one of those consonant clusters.

I've sung Russian opera, and god only knows Russian is 15 consonants, a vowel, another 15 consonants, and a glottal stop at the end. It's barbaric.. but still singable.

It is the singers job to project whatever the sound is required. Only a rank amateur would suggest avoiding entire words because of projection problems.

It is the composer's job to make sure that any of those problematic consonant clusters is not placed in a difficult position. For example, you would not want to climax a musical phrase on one of those nasal sounds AND on a high note.

If your text is pre-existing, then use it. Period.

Thanks, that is what I thought. As this is the first time for writing for choir, these are the things I am learning. I talk the text and attempt to sing to make sure if it is singable and not completely awful sounding.

The russian languange, it did take until the early Romantic era to finaly come up with a way of setting the languange to sound reasonable.