Behind the scenes...making a recording

My choir is in the midst of making a recording. We just finished our second night of intense work. 6 hours down, 3 hours to go. It may sound exciting and fun, which it was, for the first 35 seconds... but mostly it's stressful and tedious. For instance, we may start and stop after the first note up to 12 times in a row. Then there are the times we start and then realize the church bells are chiming, or a train is going by. Stop! Do-over! Also, it's just plain unnerving to think that you could make a mistake which would force the entire group to come to a screeching halt...Re-do! Of course, we are insured against that somewhat because we have to do multiple takes of the same song, and sometimes extra takes of especially hard sections. The sound guys will seam the best parts together to make (hopefully!) a glorious and non-tedious sounding masterpiece. Supposedly these guys are really good. They better be.

The sound engineers are in another room, but we can hear them and they us. Not only is our director doing his thing, but the head sound guy is also giving suggestions, even musical ones, which I find interesting. I would find it annoying, except that I have agreed with everything he's said so far, and I wish we had addressed some of these things before now. Then we have the diction coach yelling out corrections, choir members asking questions and making suggestions, and the "perfect-pitch guy" giving a blow-by-blow account of our tuning adventures. Pass the vodka, yo.

Probably the most amusing part is that when you reach the end of the song, you're supposed to stand stock still and not make any noise for a good 20 seconds. That's a loooong time, and I find myself looking around, trying not to laugh at how hilarious everyone looks.

All of this, to bring to you a recording of your favorite secular Russian romantic choral masterpieces. I know it's something you've been pining for, and believe me, I'll do what it takes to get it done. :)