Repertoire for Students: Guest Blog, Laura Woolbright Mashburn

For this post I'm delighted to pass the baton (keyboard?) to my dear friend and colleague Laura Woolbright Mashburn. Laura is a wonderful singer and teacher with seemingly bottomless knowledge about repertoire:  whenever I feel "stuck", I ping her for a quick Facebook chat and instantly have a dozen suggestions to consider (many of them "new to me" selections)!  So much repertoire out there to explore ... :)

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It’s my pleasure to be a guest on Madeleine’s blog.  I have had a private studio of high school and community college singers for the past 28 years. I also teach applied voice to undergraduates majoring in music education and voice performance. While some of this is applicable to any level singer, the repertoire ideas below are meant primarily for high school students.

Where to find repertoire? I have found a lot of songs by making notes of pieces I didn’t know whenever I judged a competition or listened to juries. I have also kept rep lists for all my students. If I am feeling stumped for a current student, it can be useful to go back and look at songs that were helpful to a former student with a similar voice. In addition to resources Madeleine mentioned earlier, I find these series useful: 

• Finding Middle Ground (two volumes) edited by Lynn Eustis
• Introduction to Art Song (four volumes) edited by Joan Frey Boytim
• Pathways of Song (eight volumes) edited by Frank LaForge and Will Earhart
• The Young Singer (four volumes) edited by Richard D. Row.

I also have several folksong anthologies I use frequently. Keep an eye out for old anthologies such as Famous Songs for Soprano, the two volumes of Victorian and Edwardian Favorites published by Boosey and Hawkes, the two volumes of Elizabethan Love Songs arranged by Frederick Keel, etc. 

I have found a lot of out of print music at library book sales and tag sales. There is a wonderful resource book called Literature for Teaching by Christopher Arneson which is worth the investment if you can find a used copy. YouTube is a great resource. Use the sidebars that pop up on your searches to take you to places you never imagined. When you find a song you like, research the rest of that composer’s output. Curiosity is everything!

To get you started, here are several songs I find myself using time after time. Some are better known than others and each one is useful for different reasons.

Soprano

• Love has eyes (Henry Bishop)
  Useful for a soprano who tends to bring too much weight into the upper passaggio
  Fun text to delve into with students
  
  
• Lied der Mignon (Nur wer die Sehnsucht kennt) (Franz Schubert)
  Good exercise in 6/8 and in a minor key
  Middle section is rhythmically challenging but doable
  Fairly short so not a lot of German to learn
  Feels very dramatic and big to the singer
  
  
• Everywhere I look (Molly Carew)
  Upbeat
  Fairly quick to learn ABA song
  Introduction to staccato high notes with a sustained high note at the end

Mezzo Soprano

• In the springtime (Betty Jackson King)
  Lovely melody
  Great practice for singing sustained leaps of an octave
  Many of the beautiful songs by African American composers are musically and vocally challenging; this one is a moderate but very singable piece for most upper high school singers 
  
  
• Spring Sorrow (John Ireland)
  Lovely legato line
  Middle section has a different feel and offers good opportunities for word painting
  Relatively small range

Tenor

• Wayfaring Stranger (John Jacob Niles)
  Easily learned melody well supported by but not doubled by the piano
  Good exercise is making contrasts between verses

• Come again, sweet love (John Dowland)
  Small range
  The mounting excitement of the middle section makes it fun to sing
  Easily available in many keys

Baritone

• My lovely Celia (George Monro)
  Published in several keys so you can find the one most comfortable for the singer
  Opportunity to introduce the difference between the appoggiatura and the acciaccatura
  Opportunity to show off a good solid low note
  
  
• Pupille nere (Giovanni Bononcini)
  Short melismas introduce agility to the voice
  Interesting rhythms and mounting excitement in the middle section

All voices

• Widmung (Robert Franz)
  Short in length so learning the German is manageable
  Melody is almost constantly doubled in the piano
  Readily available in several keys

• Sally Gardens (Hubert Hughes)
  Lovely melody
  Relatively small range
  More supportive accompaniment than the Britten arrangement

• Black is the color of my true love’s hair (Jean Shackleton)
  Good for creating different emotional intent for different verses
  A more supportive and simpler accompaniment than the Niles version
  
  
• The Black Dress (John Jacob Niles)
  Sits primarily in the middle voice
  Different verses have different dramatic arcs
  
  
• I attempt from love’s sickness to fly (Henry Purcell)
  Good introduction to melismatic singing
  Readily available in many keys
  
  
  
• When love is kind (Anonymous)
  Teenage girls especially seem to relate to the message in this song
  Many opportunities to color words and work on expression
  Nice opportunity for showing off agility at the end

As I said earlier, curiosity is your best guide. Read through scores on IMSLP. Listen to every rep suggestion made in the various Facebook voice teacher forums. Listen to all sorts of music. And, if you’re lucky, find a friend and trusted colleague to exchange ideas with! Have fun!