Christmas Eve We Sing!

It's Christmas Eve tomorrow!

We're going to sing Amen and Thankful tomorrow!

I can't wait to share those songs with everyone! I think they'll love them!
I especially love how beautiful you sound in the chorus of Thankful. You're going to impress everyone.

We're meeting with Emanda to go over Amen with her at 6:30 in the Fellowship room or in the music room, we'll see where she want us.

See you tomorrow at 6:30!

Looking forward to singing together again tomorrow! Tuesday, November 19th

Teen Choir is back to regular meetings tomorrow.
Let's sing!

UPCOMING EVENTS FOR TTC

Saturday, November 16th (9:30-noon)
on the church lawn
Santa Claus Parade 
TTC will sell hot chocolate and hot dogs to raise money for our World Vision child. 

Friday, December 20th (6:30-9:30)
in Trinity Hall
A Christmas Carol: Comedic Reading
TTC will sell refreshments to raise money for our World Vision child and possibly for our choir fund.

Tuesday, December 24th (7-8)
at church
Christmas Eve Service
TTC will sing Thankful and Amen

I found a recording of our Amen!

http://choralmusic.com/audio/amen_satb.mp3

It's slower than we'll do it, and too sweet, but it's pretty much the same arrangement. We'll have piano and guitar and I'm thinking, clapping at the end. We have a drum part written in our music, and I'll see if we can find someone to do it for us.

October 29th TTC Cancelled Sorry

Sorry to say that choir tonight has been cancelled. See you next week!

Sunday, October 20th Singing at Church!

We're going to be singing 
10,000 Reasons
Undignified
in church 
on Sunday, October 20th!
Choir meets at 10:00 in the Fellowship Room
We sing during Family Time
We can join the Sunday School downstairs right after

Thankful for this inspiring performance

We've decided to sing this song for Christmas. Josh Groban is awesome, but Todd is ours and awesome. Todd is a member of the York Region Community Choir, my adult choir in Newmarket. Listen to this amazing voice, fabulous performance. Todd owns this song.

As usual, we will look at what other people do with our song, and then we'll play with it and make it our own. I'm looking forward to seeing how Thankful  turns into a TTC song!

September 17th Review

Hey! We have a new member! Yay!

We're doing well making our own versions of Undignified and 10,000 Reasons. We'll work on adding a bit of harmony to them.

It was the first time a couple of us had ever heard 10,000 Reasons, but we picked it up very quickly. It's a really pretty song and has a very catchy chorus.

We started learning Amen and it went really well! We have 3-part harmony!

In addition to learning our performance pieces, we sang along with:
What I Wouldn't Do (Heather's version with guitar-cool)
Wake Me Up
Breathing Under Water

We took turns again with the cajon, and I think we're starting to get more comfortable with it.

At the end, we danced with:
I Need Your Love

I'm looking for a nice slow and pretty song for Christmas, something beautiful and impressive for us to sing with Amen. So far, I'm liking Thankful by Josh Grobin. There's an SSA version if your up to it.
But, I'm willing to hear other suggestions. Let me know if there's a Christmas song that you'd love for us to sing.

New season and new songs!

We are singing some fun songs this season.

Amen is going to be a good challenge for us, with several sections in 3 part harmony, and some fancy timing. I hope someone will be able to play the cajon with that. There's a drum part written for it.

Undignified will be fun for sure! It's so easy and repetitive, but we'll be adding some percussion, some harmony, and some moves!

I've been falling in love with the song 10,000 Reasons, and I think that it will be a good addition to our repertoire. Can't wait to hear Heather play it!

Tuesday, September 10th is our first day back!

Please come out to Trinity Teen Choir 
starting Tuesday, September 10th at 6:30!

We're going to sing and make some musical noise together. We sing mostly for fun, but also learn a couple of songs to sing at church a few times a year (2-4 performances/year TBD).

You can register (for free!) on site, or if you want to register in advance, that would be nice. Call or email the church office and speak to Dianne, or email me, Renate, at renatesdesk@rogers.com.

We need your (or your teenager's) name, a parent/guardian's name, and a telephone number and email address where we can contact you.

Let us know if you play any instruments and we can plan some jam sessions, and try to incorporate your instrument into our performance. 

We are looking into getting a cajon/box drum to add some extra "boom" to our sound. Sometimes, we have a professional drummer accompany us, but not every time, and we love the added rhythm. 

Summer of 2013: Here we come!

WE'RE OFF for the Summer!

(well, summative assignments and exams first, but...)

See you in September!

Keep singing!

TTC is taking a break so you can focus on school for a bit and then enjoy a relaxing and fun summer. We'll start up again once school starts in September. Watch for posts and announcements at church and on Facebook. 

Mother's Day: My momma loves me, she loves me like a rock

Jammin'

Don't forget to bring your instruments to choir tonight!

Hope you had a sweet Easter!

Jeremiah Joy to the World

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BV6kDiStK6U

Watch the video of our Joy to the World.
Great job, Teen Choir!

Easter Sunday- black bottoms and white tops

Easter Sunday, meet at 10:00 in the Fellowship Room, as usual, and then we might go into the choir room or upstairs to rehearse with everyone else.
Don't forget to wear black pants or a black skirt and a white top that's not a T-shirt: blouse, sweater, shirt, and plain white is best.
Sunday School will be good this time. For sure.

TTC Rocks Palm Sunday with Hosanna!

Hipsters: Check out this trend. I like it!

Check out this wikiHow article! 

http://www.wikihow.com/Be-a-Hipster

I was wondering what all this talk about hipsters was all about. It's all there: the fashion, the music, the attitude. It's not just about glasses and hats. 

I like that there's an anti-consumerism element and I love the rejection of the cultural ideals of beauty for a more natural look. Yay! I've been a hipster without even knowing it ;)

• While hipsters do shower regularly and clean their teeth, they're just less interested in forking out money for hairstyling, spa sessions, pedicures/manicures, and large make-up kits because these are signs of conforming to cultural ideals of beauty.
• Arguably, hipsters aren't so interested in "making the most of their assets" because they see their entire self as an asset; from a self-esteem point of view, this is actually a rather healthy outlook.
• Commonly known old things associated with hipsters include Parliament cigarettes (and a devil-may-care attitude about smoking laws), Pabst beer, grandparent's clothing (or thrift store finds), bicycles with fixed gears (often ridden to the night clubs), analog cameras, and recycling and reusing almost anything (ingenuity, common sense, and fun comes into this).
• Do a lot of reading, even if it means sitting in the local bookstore using their space and not actually purchasing the books you're siphoning up knowledge from. Seek to go to higher level education if you're in your element at college.
• Many hipsters base their career choices around music, art, or fashion. While these areas of work aren't essential choices, they are probably a natural outlet for a hipster's creativity.
• Education is what helps a hipster to be dismissive about the hue and cry of others; they know it's just history repeating itself, or it's all much ado about nothing.

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

A song in your heart is a blessing, indeed!
We're so blessed to have the time each week to sing and make music together!

You Are Beautiful

You will start cello lessons now.

Leah and Eddie Live at Trinity

Here's another cool offering of music at Trinity.

Happy Valentine's Day!

A love song for you. Happy Valentine's Day!

He'll be back for you-ou. 'Cause he loves you cheeseburger!

Taylor Swift - White Blank Page Cover - BBC Radio 1 Live Lounge

She's okay, this Taylor Swift.
I love this Mumford and Sons song.

Feb 5

Teen Choir on my birthday!

We had fun warming up rotating our hips while singing to focus on using our whole bodies to get the sound out. We sang Row Your Boat as a round while rotating our hips to keep strong and focus on our parts, and not get distracted by the others.

We sang Joy to the World/Jeremiah was a bullfrog, with Heather on the electric guitar. Cool.
We sang Stompa! Clappa your hands! Stompa your feet! We do love to move to music!
We sang A Thousand Years.
We had juice boxes and 2 kinds of cookies for snack.
We sang Hosanna/Praise is Rising with the chorus in 3 parts, and it's very good.
Hannah did a solo- the Cup Song. It was amazing! She is so talented!
We danced to Disturbia. I really like it when we teach each other new moves.

Your Love Never Fails -Chris Quilala / Jesus Culture

Cool song for you to listen to.

What we did Jan 29

Jan 29

1. Warm-ups included marching, clapping, snapping and singing all at the same time :)
2. We walked, shook shakers, and sang Hosanna-Heysanna, then we sped up and skipped around the room singing and shaking
3. Joy to the World is coming along well
4. For fun we sang Don't You Worry Child
5. Linda from Trinity had a snack for us-Goldfish crackers and juice boxes! Thanks, Linda Prior!
6. During break we listened to songs on Samantha's iPod, because Renate finally got the cord that can connect the laptop and the iPod to the amplifier. Yay!
7. Hosanna/ Praise is Rising is really going well. We got 3 parts going!
8. Feel Again was another free song to sing
9. Heather and Renate sang a duet for solo time.
10. We danced to Stompa!

awsome song with beatboxing (song=we will praise him)

Yes! It's Awesome! Well done, Hannah!

Eddie Zeeman - Improvised Drum Break With Brushes.

Hey guys, here's a video of Eddie and Emanda playing at church. Randy Leaman is also there on guitar.
Really hoping that Eddie can be there for Palm Sunday.

High School Teen Choir members, get your exam survival kits!

It's not to late to use your exam survival kit. I'm bringing them to choir tomorrow, Tues. Jan. 29. Rev. Heather made up exam survival kits for those of you who are writing exams this week. Included are several important snack foods, an inspiring (and really funny) prayer, and a list of study tips. Since today's exams were postponed to Thursday, you've got an extra day to be supported and uplifted with this special study aid.
Thank you, Rev. Heather!

You're normal enough. Work on what makes you outstanding. Like singing :)

Funny Music Joke

Found this music joke on tumblr:

I’m so sick of people thinking they can just waltz into my room when I’m obviously listening to music in 4/4.

Different kinds of music express things differently

I saw this post on Facebook today that I wanted to share with you but there were too many f-words. I cleaned it up a bit here without taking it out completely because I wanted you to see this. It's funny but true. Why do rappers and punks have to swear so much?! My sister had me listen to a metal song that repeated the f-word ad nauseam too. Really nauseating. The samples are interesting. See what they're trying to say about how each genre expresses itself. 

I think that we have to be careful about what kinds of music we consume, in the same way that we have to be careful what we eat. 

We are what we eat, and we are what we listen to (and watch, and read...). 

It's okay to have greasy fries once in a while, but we need a good balance of lots of healthy things. Variety is good. And, there's lots of good music in lots of genres. I would worry about you if you just listened to Emo all the time. Ouch. Tummy ache for sure. Pop all the time would be like drinking pop all the time. 

Listen to other kinds of music and see how it affects your moods and attitudes. It's powerful. Ask your friends what they like to listen to while they study, or when they're sad, or when they're cleaning their rooms. What does your mother listen to? Compare notes. 

Here's the edited Facebook post:

Different Music Genres

“I saw a flower.”

Rap:

Yo! I was hangin’ with my muthaf*ing homies and we saw a muthaf*ing flowa’ in a muthaf*ing garden.

Pop:

I saw a flower. I saw a flower. I saw a flower. It had blue petals, blue petals, blue petals…

Rock:

In a field where nothing grew but weeds, I found a flower at my feet, bending in my direction.

Emo:

I came across a flower, but it F*ING DIED!

Metal:

AARRRGHSCHHHHHHDGIRRRRRRGGGG! FLOOOOOWWWWEERRRRRRR! AGGGSCHYZGHRRK IN A FIELD!

Country:

I was ridin’ a tractor and I was drinkin’ a beer, but then I saw a purty little flower, and I said, “Hey, yall, its one a them flowers!”

Carmen Campagne - "Joy to the World" (for children) (with lyrics/avec pa...

Jan 22 Teen Choir cancelled for tonight

Sorry to announce that we won't be meeting tonight, Tuesday, January 22nd, 2013. We've got colds, homework, and other issues keeping the majority of us away. Don't sweat it. We'll meet next week, hopefully. When you have time, sing along with the videos for our songs that you'll find here in previous posts. We'll be fine.

ThePianoGuys A Thousand Years

These guys have such passion, you can feel it. And, the settings are amazing. (I love their videos. Have a look at them. They do amazing music. Subscribe to their YouTube channel.)
I want to go out into the forest and sing with you! Field trip in the spring?

Hosanna/ Praise is Rising (with lyrics)

Here you go!
You can practise at home.
We'll probably sing it in a different key, but you can get used to the words and melody.
Enjoy!

January 15th

This is what we did on January 15th:
1. Warm ups included clapping patterns and marching and stomping to keep us warm lol
2. We decided that the easy part of Hosanna-Heysanna just repeated several times will be good enough for our entry song.
3. We worked on clapping with 2 different patterns for Joy to the World/Jeremiah was a Bullfrog
4. We sang Lights, for fun, and it was hard. We appreciated the talent it takes to sing hard songs, and make them sound easy.
5. We had chocolate chip cookies and some kind of KoolAid for snack.
6. After break, we listened to a new Hosanna song which we all like and decided to use as our second song. It's called Hosanna/Praise is Rising.
7. Samantha sang a solo with her iPod, Diamonds.
8. For fun, we sang I Will Wait and danced to Lights. We ended up dancing in a circle and learning some cool moves from each other.

Next week we're hoping for an instrumental solo from Ethan.
What kind of solo are you going to do?!

Tuesday, January 8th

Here's what we did at Teen Choir on Tuesday, January 8th:

1. Warm ups included lots of breathing, and loud (with all that good air) and quiet sounds.
2. We listened to Hosanna from Jesus Christ Superstar (Heather knew all the words, even the Caiaphas part) and sang it a few times to get a feel for what key is best ( starting on A felt much better than D) We talked about how Palm Sunday might work.
3. We listened to and then sang along with Joy To The World (Jeremiah Was a Bullfrog).
4. For fun, we sang I Will Wait and Safe and Sound (we worked on singing soft and airy like Taylor)
5. For snack, we had grape Koolaid and all-dressed Crispers.
6.We sang Thy Word with Heather on guitar
7. We sang Good Time and some of God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen (by request, with the Barenaked Ladies and Sarah McLachlan)
8. We danced with I Will Wait.

Preparing for Performance: Sunday March 24, 2013

My dear Teen Choir,

TTC, Trinity Teen Choir, was such a hit at our performances last season that Trinity wants more of us!

I hope that's okay with everyone. We were planning on one performance per season (winter/spring), but it looks like we're going to do at least 2 each season.

We've been asked to lead the Palm Sunday Procession! They love our energy and want something cool and energetic to really capture the joy and excitement of Jesus's entry into Jerusalem. Who better for the job than us? And, I think I've found the perfect music. It's from the musical, Jesus Christ Superstar.

Palm Sunday is the Sunday before Easter: Sunday, March 24 this year. Please mark your calendars.

I've got some good ideas for other songs to sing that day, and Heather and I are working on the music for us to learn and we've got some just-for-fun music lined up for our Tuesday nights too.

Victoria and Soraya let me know which songs they like and want to sing and you can too. Send me an email and let me know what songs you like. I will review them and if they don't have inappropriate language or subjects then I can get them and prepare the lyrics for us.

I hope your Christmas Break was fun and revitalizing. I hope you had lots of opportunities to go outside and play in the snow and be silly. I'm glad we're all going to be back to school and work though. I look forward to working with you on our new music and learning and growing with you, but I look forward to dancing and being silly with you too!

Yours in harmony,

Renate