Rhumba

Rhumba
Composed by Michael Coolen
for Flute Choir
Published by Alry Publications
Includes score and parts

Instrumentation:
Piccolo
4 C Flutes
Bass Flute (or Alto Flute)

Performance Notes:
      The Rhumba (pronounced here “roombah”) is designed to encourage eye contact and interaction between performers and audience members. Before beginning the piece, performers should first make eye contact with each other, then turn slowly to the audience, and each should point to one specific audience member. The purpose of this is to provide the performers with a specific person to whom to sing/speak the text in the composition (rather than having eyes wandering around the house). After that performers should consider beginning to move gently in place (getting “into the rhumba mood”). Of course, performers are free NOT to do the above, but the audience generally loves the interaction. If at all possible, the text in the score should be sung on pitch by the performers. Since this is not always possible, the next choice is to “perform” them in a highly sprechstimme style. The words “dance” and “dancing” are pronounced as in “dahnce.”
– Michael Coolen