Zach Perry Interview

Partial Transcript: Definitely, I would say that obviously the vocal range is a lot greater just because you can have a… well vocal range in the sense of power and strength, cause the belt for girls is going to lead to a higher range of songs that we can do, and the quality of sound is a lot stronger when you have the low notes with the basses or the high notes with the sopranos because they really can just put it out there without really having to strain their voice or even going into their falsetto where you lose that kind of quality.

Keywords: Vocal range

Subjects: Voice culture; voice types

Partial Transcript: Yeah, so for Choeurds it’s generally a younger audience. I mean for family weekend, we attract people from all backgrounds and all walks of life and age groups, but for Schola because it is catered towards more classical music or trained vocalists, there’s this, I don’t want to say an air of pretentiousness, but I mean it kind of is. It’s very sophisticated and prestigious, but for Choeurds were just trying to make it accessible and a good time.

Keywords: Audience; Music; Vocalists

Subjects: A cappella; Music--19th century; Popular music

Partial Transcript: So the typical curriculum that classes have like Schola or the Chamber Ensembles are very much based on a specific kind of music. So its more classically trained, more about the theory behind music and very traditional pieces, as opposed to more pop music that we can sing in a cappella groups, or even the dynamic between the people because there’s this environment that allows for personal relationships as well as going there for business as usual, so that kind of dynamic allows for a lot more opportunity and diversity and opportunities that we do. I mean the stuff that we do in Schola is typically like singing for school functions, in contrast Choeurds is able to sing for community events, whether it’s for an elderly home or singing for the school or have some kind of community engagement that the traditional curriculum wouldn’t traditionally allow for.

Keywords: A cappella; Community; Music; Pop

Subjects: A cappella; Music--19th century; Popular music

Partial Transcript: I think our sponsor is technically Dr. Riehl, but it’s very laissez-faire in the sense that it’s very much student run. We apply for all the funding, we book our own gigs, we reach out to things that we think will be good for the group and also receptive from the community. The music department I don’t really think has too much involvement, other than just by proxy of we use their spaces. We have a good communication with them, but nothing really concrete and set that their advocating for us to sing on specific events on behalf the music department.

Partial Transcript: It does create a challenge for booking because if we want to go for camp concert or something like that or Perkinson there’s precedent and also priority for things within the music department itself. Last year we had a lot of complications booking camp because both the Alice Haynes Theatre was flooded so they were like well we don’t really have space for you so try to find another find and we were scrambling and we were like oh well we thought we had a good relationship, but it’s fine. So just from a logistic standpoint it gets frustrating. We have a small department so they can only do so much.

Partial Transcript: Yes, I took them my freshman and sophomore year. But I stopped because my instructor was Jim weaver who passed away. So I wasn’t entirely willing to go to a new voice teacher, and there was also a weird dynamic that I feel like would happen with the new instructor just having that in the back of my mind. Plus also it was getting more academically challenging and I didn’t have the time that I had before. But it was extremely beneficial just from the technical aspect. And I noticed that in my range I lost a little bit of my lower parts, but my head voice and falsetto were a lot stronger.

Partial Transcript: There was mention… I got sick a lot my freshman year. I attribute most of that to not sleeping and the stress of being in college for the first time. And I would mention all the stuff that I did and I was in Choeur du Roi and he would kind of like make a face and be like well maybe you should stop singing for them for a little bit and I was like ahh okay…cause it does…it’s very taxing on your voice to just do syllables all the time, instead of…just constant loud syllables…without any break… as opposed to pieces where you actually have rests and it’s a lot more dynamic in terms of piano versus forte and that kind of eb and flow. And that created some tension in some capacity. And there was also…it’s very stream line to be in like Western mostly German music that I noticed and I mean my background is in German because that’s my minor and he definitely had that propensity to go in that direction just cause it was not English because everyone sings English, but also the style was also more what he was comfortable with. I was actually afraid to even bring up doing something like musical theatre or any other non-traditional form of music. That’s just such a focal point of the music department here, it’s so based on Schumann, Bach, and Italian composers.

Partial Transcript: I was interested in keeping with music cause I did some in high school and I was in Schola at the time and heard from a couple upperclassmen about the a cappella scene here and I auditioned for both Taves and Choeurds. Just cause I wanted to be involved in something a little different, but also still be involved in music more than just three days a week for like 50 minutes. And I don’t know, I like the crowd as well, they’re a fun group of people. It’s a good balance of we’re here to make good music, but also not going to wreck ourselves trying to make us sound perfect because we’re human. And I chose Choeurds over Taves just cause of the, again the coed dynamic. They’re not as intense, Taves does a lot of competition stuff and their events are a lot more rigorous. And I was like I still want to have some other free time because that seems a little too intense for me. I mean we still have a good relationship with them and I like all the other a cappella groups and get along and hangout.

Partial Transcript: We’re known as the edgy group on campus, and I don’t know what that means. But yeah, I would say each group has a sound and a vibe. I would say that yeah we are kind of the more wild… I don’t want to say wild because that has a negative connotation, but we have fun and we do a lot of different music from bangers from like the 70s and 80s like rock stuff, to pop stuff. We have the ability to do rap, and our beat boxer’s incredibly talented and we have some Greek life, we have some non-Greek life, I’m involved in debate, we have a couple people in student government. In terms of ethnicity we are predominantly white, we have an Asian guy, and a black guy, and two Hispanic people, which I mean is pretty typical for Richmond. But, we are as involved as we can be in a lot of different aspects in the community. We love doing Take Back The Night, we try to do TOTS if we can, we do concerts for the other a cappella groups, we have outreach in other ways, both within the UR community and the Richmond city itself.

Partial Transcript: I would say for Choeurds, oh yeah to expand upon on like what kind of person does Choeurds is everywhere and anywhere, just cause we have people in the leadership school, we have people in business, we have people in music, I’m a philosophy major, we have a couple science majors. So we I feel like in terms of involvement are the most prolific group cause we have involvement within theatre as well…our concerts are very much about reaching from all different aspects. But it’s a little bit more difficult when the groups are more intense. So Taves definitely has a lot more tight knit dynamic which is great for them, but it makes it really hard for outreach when we try to do events with them. Sirens, nobody really talks to, just cause they very much come from two different sororities, I don’t remember which ones they are and only one is in Schola, so that creates a huge challenge for us to try and figure out how to make a relationship with them. But OTC, they’re pretty much at the same caliber that we are. I think it’s also just the nature of coed; you have to branch out as much as you can. But they’re a little bit more lax in how they run things. But I think 5 of them are in Schola, but I don’t know it’s a nice cool, chill vibe.

Partial Transcript: We kind of just go by the wayside when concerts aren’t happening. So the names are out there, but I don’t think people will associate a person with that group, or a group with a specific person. So I mean it’s nice, and it’s bad because when it gets to concert season and you’re like trying to get people to go and it makes it kind of challenging because “oh im so busy and blah blah blah.” But it’s fun for family weekend, especially, just cause that is a way for the two different aspects of campus to meet. When we have our Christmas concert, that is another nice break from the stress and monotony of school, and then our individual concerts during spring, there’s different things to look for. So Taves does ICCA’s, we usually do a fun video, I know OTC has theirs tomorrow and they have like a roast. So it’s super cool just to see the different avenues that each a cappella takes, but also is still involved in the campus in their own special way.

Partial Transcript: I really like the sense of camaraderie and expression and it’s very nonjudgmental, which I will miss a lot when I graduate cause there’s nothing quite like singing with a group of people that come from a variety of walks of life. I would’ve never met probably about 80 percent of the people that I’ve met without music and its help me to have a distresser, its helped me to grow personally. I’ve been exposed to some beautiful arrangements and changed my outlook on what art actually means, whether it’s contemporary music to classical music to East-Asian music. So yeah I just like the beauty that’s found in a lot of different ways that music provides.