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Top five choral pieces from 2015

Posted on January 4, 2016 by Michael SandvikJanuary 4, 2016

2015 saw a significant interest increase in purchases and performances of my choral pieces. It was a truly exciting year as a composer. I am thrilled that many conductors are discovering and performing my pieces.

Like last year, I wanted to share my top five selling choral pieces of the past year (click here for the 2014 blog post). Three of the top five from 2014 are still on the list. Before the list is the rationale for making such a list. I hope it is useful and helps you discover some music you enjoy!

I think a list of the best selling pieces by a composer can be quite useful to conductors and performers. Why? Because the list is tried and true. All the pieces on such a list have been of sufficient interest to people to prompt purchases and performances.

1. My piece, “My Prayer,” for a cappella TTBB choir. “My Prayer” had a significant increase in sales, and has become my most popular piece for purchase by far.
2. My spiritual, “Soon One Day,” for a cappella SATB or TTBB choir (click here for the men’s choir version). This piece has been my most awarded/featured piece in the last year including being featured on choralnet.com, musicspoke.com, and in the 2015 Spring Edition of ACDA Minnesota’s publication, “The Star Of The North.” The TTBB version was also superbly performed by the Langowan 4 Male Choir of Langowan, Indonesia (Ricky Recky, conductor) for a choral competition in late fall, 2015. You can hear a recording of the performance here.
3. My setting of the famous Song of Solomon text, “Set Me As A Seal” for a cappella SATB choir.
4. My choral blessing, “The Lord Bless You,” for a cappella SATB choir.
5. My spiritual, “Sing Our Praise To God,” for a cappella SATB choir.

Three SATB repertoire suggestions for after the holidays

Posted on December 15, 2015 by Michael SandvikDecember 15, 2015

Hello choral colleagues! I hope everyone has had great holiday programs.

Although I do significant repertoire planning for the whole music year by September, about this time each year, I again take a look at some repertoire for my choirs.

For those of you who do the same here are three suggestions from my pieces that may be great fits for your choirs!

Some of you are already familiar with these pieces, but I invite you to take a look and listen again!

#1 Are You Ready?

For advanced choirs, this is an uplifting and joyous Spiritual that can really bring the house down.

Click here to look at the score: Are you Ready Perusal

#2 Set Me As A Seal

Here is an accessible and lovely unaccompanied setting of the famous Song of Solomon text.

Click here to look at the score: Set Me As A Seal Perusal

#3 Sing Our Praise To God

Exciting and jubilant, this piece is accessible and has been quite popular with choirs in past performances.

Click here to look at the score: Sing Our Praise to God Perusal

I hope you all find these pieces enjoyable and a blessing!

Merry Christmas and may God bless you all!
Michael Sandvik

Our Lamb Is Born: a choral setting of beautiful sacred poetry

Posted on November 3, 2015 by Michael SandvikNovember 3, 2015

In the fall of 2012, my wife, Heidi, and I decided to write a new Christmas piece to send as a Christmas card.My wife, who is a writer as well as a musician, would write the poetry, and I would write the music.

After we decided to feature the phrase of the angel choir, “peace on earth and good will to men,” she went to work crafting a poem. She settled on the theme of Christ as the Lamb of God and the Shepherd of His people. Mixing in the imagery of lambs in the stable, she crafted a profound poem built on beautiful theological comparisons. (read the poem at the end of this post)

I went to work on the music, trying to meet several self-imposed limitations. I wanted the music to be apparent and accessible to the average reader of the “card,” but interesting and deep enough to be of interest to a college level chorus. The piece would be homophonic to emphasize the text, but would still need to be expressive so as not to be “just another straightforward piece.”

I think the result was lovely (I am admittedly biased), reverent, and thrilling.

If you love rich, multi-layered poetry; and/or if you have interest in deep expressive theology about Jesus’ incarnation (especially combined with music), “Our Lamb Is Born” would be great for your choirs.

*click here to peruse the piece: Our Lamb Is Born*

Our Lamb Is Born
Heidi Sandvik

Born in a manger, He came among creatures
who knew not His mission to die as my Lamb on my tree.

Suffering my shame is the only way
He can earn the position as my only hope to find
Peace on the earth and goodwill to men.

Lambs in the stable see God born as man and a Lamb
one of me, one of them, the one Shepherd.

He leads me beside the still waters.
My cup overflows with His goodness for unworthy me.

He gives peace on the earth and goodwill to men.

Five College Level Pieces Worth Programming This Choral Season!

Posted on September 28, 2015 by Michael SandvikNovember 12, 2015

I love great repertoire! If you have been following my blog for some time, you know I devote a considerable amount of time to this subject. In this post, I will recommend five great college level SATB pieces that you absolutely must consider.

This past Spring, I wrote a five part series on finding great self-published choral music. The last two posts in the series presented several composers of self-published choral music and representative pieces by them. The post may be seen as a continuation of the series, but specifically for the college level.

Before diving into the repertoire/composers, I want to encourage conductors to make use of their conductor’s ear when perusing scores and listening to recordings. If a recording is less than perfect, the piece should not be discarded, but rather “cleaned up” by our conductor’s ear. I have found great pieces, that often only have a mediocre demo recording. As a composer, it can be difficult to get a good recording of a piece, even if sung by a fine choir. A lot of factors can mess up the recording of even a great performance. Of the five pieces presented, I would say two have recordings that do them justice, while the other three are adequate, but don’t capture the full life of the piece. One’s ear may make the difference in recognizing a great piece, even if only presented in “adequate” form.

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Dale Trumbore
Piece: Sing To The Lord (MusicSpoke: full perusal score and recording)
Personal Website: http://daletrumbore.com/Composer/Home.html

Dale Trumbore is a talented young composer that has several traditionally published choral works as well as a host of fine self-published choral works. She has been making many of these works available through MusicSpoke.com. “Sing To The Lord” is a quirky, somewhat mournful, and yet exciting piece that I think would make a great opener (it can program suitably elsewhere in a program). The piece also is a great conducting piece.

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Melinda Bargreen
Piece: There Is No Rose (Santa Barbara Music Publishing: full perusal score and recording)
Personal Website: http://www.melindabargreen.com/Melinda_Bargreen/Welcome.html

I became acquainted with this gorgeous Christmas piece a few years ago, when I was doing a search for self-published Christmas pieces. “There Is No Rose” has since been published by Santa Barbara Music Publishing. While I have generally focused on artist-owned music, I think this Christmas piece is a piece the choral world needs to know. Good intonation, vocal freedom, and choral balance are absolute musts to make a compelling presentation of the “There Is No Rose.”

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Rachel Devore Fogarty
Piece: Ring Out, Wild Bells (MusicSpoke: full perusal score and recording)
Personal Website: http://www.racheldevorefogarty.com/

Here is a fun piece that has depth to it. It is appropriate for a Christmas or more general winter themed concert. For maximum effectiveness, care should be given to very precise intonation (shouldn’t this always be the case) as there are many quick shifts between major and minor modes (often making use of flat-VII, and iv). I think this piece could serve as an “opener,” or even a “closing” piece as long as emphasis is given to the text. “Ring Out, Wild Bells” could then be a sort of choral New-Year’s resolution for singers and listeners.

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Michael Sandvik
Piece: Are You Ready? (this website – full perusal score and recording – also available from sheetmusicplus.com)

I decided to include one of my pieces, which I hope is not too shameless. I invite you to check you this very exciting Second Advent Spiritual that singers and listeners alike have loved. The piece builds in excitement until a final climactic ending, but care must be taken to not over sing. “Are You Ready?” draws from the rich history of Second Advent Spirituals, making the second coming of Jesus the primary theme. It also can bring the house down in concert. I think it makes a great penultimate or final piece in a program.

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Gordon Thornett
Piece: Gloria in D (Swirly Music: full perusal score and recording)
Personal Website: http://www.newcarols.com/newcarols/Home.html

Gordon Thornett’s “Gloria in D” for large chorus, soprano solo, and brass ensemble is a fantastic, compact work that could be featured in many Christmas programs. It sings (equally exciting and beautiful in my opinion) like a compact version of the Rutter “Gloria,” and could fill a similar niche in a program. In fact measures 226-227 seem to quote the famous Rutter work. It should be noted, however, that this 10 1/2 minute “Gloria” stands on its own merits. While written in one movement, the work has three clearly distinct sections. In my opinion, each successive section gets progressively stronger in a musical sense, although all three are well done. The “Cum Sancto/Amen” is positively thrilling and sure to excite both audience and singers.

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I hope you have found this insightful and helpful. If you like one of the pieces, be sure to peruse other works by that composer!

God Bless!
Michael

Cyrus, Called By Name: Sacred concert choral music and an inspiring story

Posted on August 31, 2015 by Michael SandvikAugust 31, 2015

Isaiah lived and prophesied in Judah during some rough times. Not long after his death, Judah was taken into complete captivity by the Babylonian armies of the famous Nebuchadnezzar. There they remained for 70 years before a chance came of returning to their homeland.

Toward the end of that 70-year period, Medo-Persia conquered Babylon. A few short years into the Medo-Persian reign, a King named Cyrus showed great favor toward the Jews and allowed all who wished, to return to the land Israel to rebuild and resettle it.

Where does Isaiah come into all that?

Amazingly, over 100 years before Cyrus allowed the resettling of Israel, the prophet Isaiah spoke a message from God specifically for Cyrus. In this message (found in the 44th and 45th chapters of his Biblical book), long before the birth of king Cyrus, God calls Cyrus by name, describes how He will bless his reign, and how Cyrus will perform God’s will and allow Jerusalem to be resettled.

In this message, however, God cares about more than just bringing the Jews back to Israel. God explicitly states that He wants Cyrus to know Him. “I will bless you” God says, “that you might know that I am God.” (my paraphrase of Isaiah 44:28-45:6).

God sees and takes interest in the heart of this king, over 100 years before Cyrus is even born. In addition, God wants not just the heart of Cyrus, but the heart of every person who is ever born. Isaiah 45:5-6 tells that God will bless Cyrus, so that all people may know who the real God is, and that there is no other god.

God is good! If he would take the time to let a king know that He cares about him and has a calling for him, even though the king did not know God at all and had not even been born or named yet, it shows me that God cares about you and me too. It makes me want to write music about how good He is.

That’s why, although most of the choral music I write is written for the concert setting, my music is primarily sacred. Stories like Cyrus’s make me want to praise God for His great care for us. A good example piece is my Spiritual, “Soon One Day.”

I’ve noticed a trend in some places to relegate sacred choral music to church choirs. Sacred choir music, specifically Christian choir music, makes up a huge percentage of all choir compositions, both historically and in modern times. And much of this music is intentionally written for the concert setting, though it’s generally appropriate in most church settings as well (varying somewhat from church to church).

Whether it is music of Handel, Bach, Brahms, and Verdi, or music of modern composers such as Eric Whitacre, Dan Forrest, René Clausen, and countless others, much of it is great concert music that is sacred in classification.

I would appeal to conductors not to forget or neglect sacred concert music. Music reflecting the rich and great history of the Bible deserves a place in the concert repertoire if it is great music. After all, great music is great music!

For me personally, I love writing sacred music because I love God. I believe He has blessed my life, that He offers hope and happiness to all who wish to take it, and that one day He will end all suffering, sorrow, and death forever.

I believe God is good.

30 piece challenge

Posted on August 21, 2015 by Michael SandvikAugust 21, 2015

My wife, Heidi, is having her piano students do a 30 piece challenge for the teaching year (She is participating as a pianist as well). The idea is to work on a few challenging pieces, a few medium pieces, and a few easy pieces, totaling 30 altogether by June, 2016. The pieces don’t have to be long, 16 measures is the minimum. The benefits include motivation, plenty of practice material, and perhaps especially, improved sight-reading skills. She invited me to join… as a composer.

I am aiming to write 30 pieces in the next nine months. It feels a bit daunting with my teaching schedule, but a lot of fun. Not all of the pieces will be choral, maybe not even a majority (I haven’t decided). Some will be short pieces suited for blessings at the end church or something in that vein, and a few others will be larger projects.

Heidi even got a sheet for me to put stickers on as I complete pieces. What fun!

If you are a composer, I want to invite you to join in.

“We’re Going Home” and Why I Love MusicSpoke

Posted on July 30, 2015 by Michael SandvikSeptember 13, 2015

MusicSpoke is a retailer of artist owned (self-published) music. There are several other companies/services (SheetMusicPlus, JWPepper MyScore, CadenzaOne, Swirly Music, and several coops) also retailing artist owned music. All of these organizations are doing a great job in their various niches. MusicSpoke has a special niche I will try to describe as best I can.

MusicSpoke is not a publisher, but from a conductor’s perspective, I think in a sense it fills the place of a publisher. However, and don’t misunderstand, MusicSpoke is definitely, completely, intentionally not a publisher.

A publisher invests in a piece of music. They say “we are endorsing, promoting, and selling” it. Their endorsement means that they are standing by the piece as quality. Thus the piece reflects on the publisher, and their reputation reflects on it.

MusicSpoke also invests in a similar way, but with a big difference. MusicSpoke does not invest (so to speak) in a piece of music. Rather, they invest in composers. With a selective process, composers gain the ability to retail music with MusicSpoke. MusicSpoke, by accepting a composer, endorses, promotes, and sells the composers works that are retailed with them. Like a traditional publisher, there is a vetting process that ensures a certain standard before pieces come to conductors. But the vetting is on composers, not pieces. In my opinion the advantages to this system are huge.

Here are a few of the MusicSpoke advantages: composers select the pieces to share with conductors and receive a more substantial payment percentage. Buyers always have the ability to be in contact with the composer of a piece they purchase, they always get to view an entire score before purchasing, and nearly always get to listen to a recording of the piece. Additionally, MusicSpoke promotes their composers at conferences, conducts reading sessions, maintains a very interesting blog, and is built on solid business practice. However, for composers, perhaps the best part is that they retain the copyright to all their own music.

This illustrates an advantage to retaining the copyright. I have a piece, “We’re Going Home,” on my website and on MusicSpoke (here) that I am very fond of. A little more than a minute and a half into the piece is a section that I wanted to update to make it easier to read. I did not change the music, just the layout of these two systems. I think you’ll agree when you look at the before and after pictures of one of the systems. I can only do this because I own the copyright. If it was with a traditional publisher, this would be either impossible or a trying hassle.

Here are before and after pictures, and a recording of the “the trumpet sound” section.

Before:

After:

Here is a full recording of “We’re Going Home” for your listening enjoyment:

If you haven’t checked out MusicSpoke‘s website, take a look and listen to some of the fabulous choral music available there!

Revisiting A ChoralNet Award: Prayer And Answer

Posted on July 22, 2015 by Michael SandvikJuly 27, 2015

My piece “Prayer And Answer” received a silver platter award on choralnet.org in September of 2014. The award includes being featured on the front page of the choralnet website for about a week in the site’s Composition Spotlight (by Jack Senzig). I wanted to share the link to the “silver platter” write up about the piece as we conductors are entering the season of viewing and purchasing new Christmas music.

Enjoy listening to the piece while you are reading.

http://www.choralnet.org/view/451064#451845

recording by Matt Curtis of Choral Tracks

“Prayer and Answer” is available for purchase on this site, musicspoke.com, or sheetmusicplus.com.

Starting with one voice

Posted on June 28, 2015 by Michael SandvikJuly 27, 2015

Several of my unaccompanied choral compositions begin with one voice part or one solo voice singing a principle melody.

I like this type of introduction because it allowallows the beauty of a single melody to really be absorbed. Also there it leaves much room for the piece to expand musically. Perhaps best of all, if sung well, it allows the listener to easily comprehend the text.

I generally would not want an entire concert to be built with pieces that all begin this way, but this type of opening has some musical and textual advantagesadvantages.

Here are some compositions that open in this way:

Are You Ready? – TB unison

In Heaven There are Mansions – treble solo

My Prayer – male solo

Prayer and Answer – SA unison

Set Me as a Seal – SA unison

Soon One Day – B unison

Website Improvements

Posted on June 7, 2015 by Michael SandvikJune 7, 2015

Balancing composing, teaching, conducting, and marketing my music with family, health, church, etc… takes planning and focus.

With my time spread between many important parts of my life, I have taken a simple philosophy for building up this website and marketing my music. It is this: make regular and consistent small improvements that add up to a strong presentation over time.

Here is what the consistent improvements have currently put on the website:

* 33 scores available for purchase.
* A description page for every available score.
* 12 scores with available demo recordingsrecordings.
* A functioning blog with enabled comments.
* A contact page.

Most recently, an automated purchasing system for the available music. This greatly increases the efficiency of the purchasing experience, while remaining equally secure. Replacing the old ordering system is a store with a cart and checkout. You can now decide to purchase a score, and in just a few minutes be rehearsing it. I am very excited about this improvement and would like to invite you to check out the new store. (Click the top menu tab that says store.)

Thank you all for your interest in this website. It will continue to grow and improve on a consistent basis. I’m happy with what has been developed so far, and am looking forwsrd for what is yet to come.

I hope you all find the site increasingly efficient and intuitive to use. Even more I pray my music will be a blessing to you.