I think I had a breakthru the other night. I'm struggling with "how" to conduct Gregorian Chant. Fr. Columba says that there's a close relationship between the St. Gall neums and the movement of the conductor. I've been taking that as my starting point, and the correlations are there, and possible.

BUT I was conceiving the movements as I see them on the paper. Last night, driving down the interstate, conducting, I realized I'm doing it backwards. The motions have to be oriented so that the CHOIR sees them as they are on paper (not literally, but as a starting point). And, this feels MUCH MORE RIGHT.

I'll try this with St. Joe Choir on Wednesday and see what happens.

I'm also reading Justine Ward's introduction to the Catholic Education Series 4th-year Gregorian Chant. I'm surprised at how insightful this is for conducting, (even though we often say that "historically-informed" chant is a different animal from the Ward method that was taught in Catholic institutions before Vatican II). There's nothing stodgy or metrical about this woman's description of conducting. I wonder how many of the 50's era teachers actually read the material?