Hi all, I noted with surprise in my use of the site's search engine that there is no thread about jokes connected to the liturgy and Gregorian chant. Please do share some! Choir directors can always use these to break the monotony of a rehearsal, and I don't have any myself. :(
OK, I just went out and grabbed one. With apologies to all Tenors....
A soprano died and went to Heaven. St. Peter stopped her at the gate asking, "Well, how many false notes did you sing in your life?"
The soprano answers, "Three."
"Three times, fellows!" says St. Peter, and along comes an angel and sticks the soprano three times with a needle.
"Ow! What was that for?" asks the soprano.
Peter explains, "Here in heaven, we stick you once for each false note you've sung down on Earth."
"Oh," says the soprano, and is just about to step through the gates when she suddenly hears a horrible screaming from behind a door. "Oh my goodness, what is that?" asks the soprano, horrified.
"Oh," says Peter, "that's a tenor we got some time back. He's just about to start his third week in the sewing machine."
This is so bad I hesitate to repeat it. Why was the soprano standing outside in the rain? Because she couldn't find her key and didn't know when to come in.
This is very, very bad. It also has some truth to it, which is what makes it funny:
Q: What is the Jesuit definition of good liturgy?
A: Nobody gets hurt.
And one that's musical, but not necessarily about chant. It's also a true story.
I teach my choirs the principles of the various kinds of "R's" we sing: flipped (as in "Gloria"), rrrrrrolled (and I always said it that way, with plenty of rolled "R's" at the beginning of the word) and modified (as in Lord = "Lohd", or something like that). Once during my boys' and girls' choir rehearsal, I asked how many kinds of "R's" do we sing? A very talented and precocious boy answered, "Four!" "Four?" I asked. "What are they?" He said without dropping a beat, "flipped, rrrrrrrolled, modified and bad!"
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