The Tanglewood Festival Chorus is the Official Chorus of the Boston Symphony Orchestra and the Boston Pops Orchestra.

I watched a foggy clip — does someone need to wash their phone? — recorded on someone’s phone of the Tanglewood Festival Chorus (TFC) and the Boston Symphony Orchestra performing Beethoven’s Ninth, one of The Big Three.

Well, there’s this silly tradition — why is the classical music field so saturated with many silly traditions? — of performing Beethoven’s Ninth on the last night of the Tanglewood Music Festival, Summer 2023.

The “memorised” Chorus is an unfortunate gimmick used to “wow the audience” typically used by ensembles who apparently think they aren’t good enough — with few exceptions to that — to allow the music to stand on its own and speak for itself where the music alone “wows the audience.” What is the “memorised” Chorus trying to prove by not using their scores?

The first thing I noticed from the clip I watched was that the Chorus was doing that silly tradition — yet another silly tradition — of singing without their scores, also known as the “memorised Chorus” that they’re known for. I had hoped that James Burton — their current Chorus Director — was going to abandon that nonsense since his superb Choruses in the UK didn’t perform “from memory.” They used their scores and looked like musicians actively engaged in their performance. I’ve never understand the idea of the “memorised Chorus” and I never performed with a Chorus that sang “from memory” including the three major Orchestra Choruses I was fortunate to perform with (the Choral Arts Society of Washington, the University of Maryland Chorus and the San Francisco Symphony Chorus). What are they trying to prove by not using their scores? The Choral Final is not difficult to memorise. It would be a relatively easy thing to do. The thing is one does not get a better performance from performing from memory, especially when one still has cackling and shrill-sounding sopranos in the TFC. My friend said that the Tanglewood Festival Chorus (TFC) looked like a class graduation picture all standing like a bank of robots staring at the conductor nonstop and (mindlessly) regurgitating what’s been drilled into them on cue by James Burton. As my friend said: They don’t look like musicians. I agree. They don’t, in part, because they’re not holding their vocal scores or holding any instrument. And then they also have yet another silly tradition of everyone wearing all-white concert attire. (roll eyes) Or is it a Klan rally? Is the all-white concert attire for the entire festival or just the last night? Update: Looking at the cloudy video again, it looks like the Chorus wore white shirts and black pants/skirts.

The clip I watched was very short but what I heard was shrill, cackling sopranos on their high B. That was one of my complaints about them in my previous articles about them. So it seems that it doesn’t matter who prepares the TFC, they’re going to sound the same regardless. Sigh. What can you do? (Rhetorical question).

Part of the problem is the nature of the piece, particularly the Choral Final. Choristers tend to over-sing in this piece — and I saw and heard some of that in that foggy video I watched — and the choristers are at their extreme vocal range at times. I remember a broadcast from Tanglewood where I heard some cracking tenor voices in the Tanglewood Festival Chorus. The mic picked them up. One should not hear that in the finest trained Orchestra Choruses. Choristers must be trained to lift up to those notes at the end of their register rather than push up or force them which gives the cackling, shrill ugly noises. A soprano (chorister or soloist) might have a high B or even high C at the top of her register but how does she get up to it? By lifting up to it quickly and producing a beautiful sound like one hears from the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra Chorus soprano section? Or does she ram her voice up to it where she sounds like she’s cackling and there’s this awful shrill sound coming from the Tanglewood Festival Chorus soprano section.

Of course those listening on the lawn at Tanglewood don’t know what to listen for — or most of them don’t nor do they care — so they will “wow” and applaud for anything — even ugly sounds coming from the TFC — being half drunk on wine and cheese from their picnic on the lawn. Gasp! How dare you say that! Well it’s the truth. I’m just telling it like it is, which you don’t want to hear. Tough luck. One runs into similar problems in Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis with the extreme vocal ranges in that piece, especially for the soprano section.

Then you have the quartet of vocal soloists. I don’t remember ever hearing a quartet in that piece that did not sound like a train wreck. The soloists don’t try to blend their voices with each other but rather they engage in a competition of one screaming over the other to see which one can scream the loudest. Where did these soloists train? They were never taught to blend their voices with other? They’ve never heard the term perfect intonation? Apparently not. And one can not have or achieve perfect intonation with wobbling and fluttering god-awful vibrato, which most vocal soloists think they must use when serving as a soloist/screamer. And usually the soprano and tenors overpower the alto and bass soloists. And when they all get going, the soprano soloist will overpower everyone on stage. Her voice will be the dominant voice on stage that you’ll hear and she seems oblivious to it. Her obnoxious and ugly voice will overpower the entire Orchestra, the full Chorus and the other two soloists and sound like a train screeching on the rails trying to stop.

Beethoven’s Ninth is no longer one of my favourite pieces because of these problems and it’s also over-performed these days just like Messiah, being one of The Big Three, especially that quartet at the end of the piece and screaming and cackling voices.

After I heard/saw the clip from the Tanglewood Music Festival, I then listened to the superb Atlanta Symphony Orchestra and Chorus perform the same passage from the Ninth under Robert Shaw. The ASOC’s soprano section was superb and they lifted up to the high B. They didn’t resort to screaming out that high B the way the TFC did. There was no shrill or cackling sounds from Atlanta. No ugly sounds.

The Tanglewood Festival Chorus seems unable to sound like the superb Atlanta Symphony Orchestra Chorus under Robert Shaw or like the Orchestra Choruses I feature on this site from Deutschland, or others that I feature.

I somewhat had high hopes for them after the BSO hired James Burton. But at this point it doesn’t seem to matter who they bring in to prepare the Chorus. One will get the same results regardless.

Related: Tangling with the Tanglewood Festival Chorus,

Also: Is it a graduation picture, Kim Jong Un’s military or a “memorised Chorus?”