14.1 Choral clinics

Clinics

A clinic involves a critique of an ensemble or ensembles, as well as a rehearsal with a clinician. Clinics do not usually culminate in a performance, at least, not a public performance.

Clinics can be very advantageous to a director who knows how to use them. The best clinic is the one that you can have in your own school for your own students. This type of a clinic allows you to make maximum use of the funds spent for a clinician. Clinics can also be helpful with church or community ensembles.

There are several ways a clinic can be arranged to provide a valuable experience for your students. The most attractive schedule would be one that allows you to have the clinic on a school day and have the students released from classes, when necessary, to attend the clinic sessions. Obviously this is not possible in every school. It can only be possible through the cooperation of the administration. The expense is probably no greater than any other type of clinic but the scheduling problems are more complex. However, this can be dealt with by arranging a schedule as closely as possible to the normal school schedule. In this manner you can show an administrator that the students will actually miss a small amount of nonmusic class time.

Table 13.1 Schedule

The illustration given in the table above, is an example of a schedule that expands the normal school schedule.

The schedule does not require choral students to miss much class time. The clinic times overlap the normal rehearsal hours whenever possible. The first group would only miss the homeroom period, while the second ensemble would need to be excused from the first twenty-five minutes of the 10:50 class. The only other conflict occurs with the concert choir (the best mixed ensemble). It is best if the clinician can spend two hours with these students. Anything less than two hours with the top students will not allow the clinician to be effective. The boys' chorus that would ordinarily meet would have to be delayed one hour.

Several other scheduling possibilities exist, including a half day clinic, or a clinic on Saturday (that would not require any release of class time). An interesting possibility is a clinic that begins after classes are dismissed for the day. This clinic would involve a one and one-half hour rehearsal, an evening meal (choir members and clinician), and a one and one-half to two hour rehearsal in the evening. This type of clinic is best limited to only one or two ensembles and should be utilized for the best ensembles. Or, one might rehearse the chamber choir immediately after school, have the concert choir join for dinner, and rehearse the concert choir after dinner.