Renaissance Man - Philip Brunelle And Music

Welcome to Episode 6, the first part of a longer conversation about Opera. This episode dives into Philip Brunelle’s 17 year tenure as Music Director at Center Opera — which later became Minnesota Opera. It’s a fascinating journey akin to today's technology start ups, filled with lots of musical entrepreneurialism. If you’ve got questions for Philip about choral conducting or music in general, please send them to us: renaissancemanpodcast [at] gmail [dot] com.

In this bonus episode, Philip talks about recent travels to Ghana and South Africa and then offers perspective on the role of music in presidential elections and politics - including the origins of The Star Spangled Banner.

Here’s a bonus episode on the role of a choir director and the business of choral conducting. Philip offers a handful of choir directing tips honed over decades of work.

In episode 03 we continue the conversation on choral conducting and the role of a Choir Director. This part of the conversation focuses on the practicalities of being a choral director (e.g. selecting music, administration, scouting venues, recruiting talent, preparing a score, allocation of voice types, etc.); as well as the business of rehearsing (e.g. how to motivate singers you’ve never conducted before, how to handle challenges with voice ranges and abilities, etc.) and finally,performing. If you’ve got questions for Philip about choral conducting or music in general, please send them to us: renaissancemanpodcast [at] gmail [dot] com.

Episode 02 is the first of several episodes focusing specifically on choral direction and the job of being a choir director. We open with a brief review of Philip’s choral directing schedule in the month of June 2016, traveling from South Korea to Sweden; followed by a discussion of how and why Philip became a choir director. Then we dive into the job description, the “101" of Being a Choir Director. Philip talks about why choirs and singing matter today, the essential need for a steady pulse, the differences in conducting singers versus instrumentalists, diction, rehearsal techniques, mixing voice types in a choir, as well as giving answers to questions from composer Dominick Argento and others. Philip also offers a few choral directing tips learned from Robert Shaw and over 50 years of conducting singers around the world. If you’ve got questions for Philip about choral conducting or music in general, please send them to us: renaissancemanpodcast [at] gmail [dot] com. And thanks so much for listening!

Welcome to the debut episode of "Renaissance Man - Philip Brunelle and Music," an ongoing podcast series with noted conductor, organist, musical leader, educator and entrepreneur Philip Brunelle by his son, Tim. This show connects the dots across all kinds of music - especially choral, church and opera, with the arts, non-profits, entrepreneurialism, education, and travel around the world. In this first episode, we're going to start at the beginning and focus on Philip's musical education. We talk about being a boy soprano performing at age 4, about requesting and receiving - at age 6 - a vocal score of Handel’s Messiah for Christmas. We talk about his piano teachers and organ teachers - and the influence they've had on an extensive career. We also talk about how a musician becomes a musician. And about the state of music education here in America as well as around the world. It's a fitting start to Renaissance Man.