Conductor Steve Sano raised his arms, then stopped. Taking car keys out of his pocket, he laid them on a nearby pew. There would be no jingle-jangles in this recording.
“Take 201. Rolling,” the publisher shouted from the west transept. Seated behind a mixer, recorder and power conditioner, Robert Schuneman was listening for the occasional stray G where a G sharp was indicated.
But there was little to critique in the Stanford Chamber Chorale’s performance of Christmas works by San Francisco composer Kirke Mechem. “The Christ child lay on Mary’s lap,” 22 chorale members sang, accompanied by pianist Laura Dahl and standing in a tight horseshoe on the white marble steps that lead to the chancel of Memorial Church. “And all the stars looked down,” they concluded, as angels in cerulean blue mosaic tiles gazed down on them.
The CD, to be released in August, will be the first commercial album of Mechem’s holiday works. Mechem, ’51, and Schuneman, MA ’58, who is president of Boston-based E. C. Schirmer Music Company, approached Sano, MA ’91, DMA ’94, with the idea for the recording project last year. “It’s a huge honor to be involved,” says the associate professor of music and director of choral studies. “Mechem is a great friend of the department and has enormous renown and recognition in the choral music community.”
“This is a wonderful bunch of singers—one of the best Steve has ever had,” says Mechem. He did not attend the January recording sessions, he says, because having the composer in the house tends to “shut down creativity” and sometimes turns performers into automatons.
Schuneman was returning to the church where he’d once subbed for the late Herb Nanney, MA ’51, a professor of music who served as University organist for 38 years before his retirement in 1985. “The sound has changed since the building was cleaned and acoustic material was removed during the renovation,” Schuneman says. “It’s warmer and much more open today.”
It’s also warm enough, in a temperature sense, that two members of the Chamber Chorale chose to stand barefooted for three hours each evening of the weeklong session. But junior Alison Whipple brought wool socks to wear, in place of clacking heels: “I didn’t want to make any noise.”
Bass Michael Mastrandrea, a postdoc in environmental science and policy who has been singing with the group since he was a junior, is the appointed “chorale king,” having recorded two previous CDs. The Mechem material “really takes a lot of concentration,” says Mastrandrea, ’00, PhD ’04. “It’s precise and unforgiving in some ways.”
Sano, unfazed by the omnidirectional microphones, coaxed luscious tones from his performers as they gathered in the softly lit chancel for the a cappella portions of the recording. “Don’t let it die,” he warned about the energy required for one final verse. “Get richer and warmer so you’re in good shape for a strong ‘peace on earth.’”
