Songlife, The Music of Ooolation

Our sessions are kept to a small ensemble of 20-30 singers so that individual voices are heard and everyone’s natural musicality can come into play. Attendees work directly with artists as they bring new compositions to life. From day one, music is pulled off the page and put into moves that gradually replace the need for scores. Learning sessions, large, small, or individual, are organized around the specific needs of our repertoire.The aspen grove is our rehearsal space, where each year we put together a show with high-spirited moves, and spine tingling harmonies.

Ooolation music is born from and inspired by roots vocal traditions over time and around the world. Our staff brings a vast array of exquisite singing styles from other times and worlds, and their amazing song writing craft is matched by their joy of teaching. Campers are encouraged to bring songs to teach as well. Compositions are developed in an organic improvisatory fashion. They are taught utilizing movement and theater, giving the songs a physical memory. Singers discover how the scores, though challenging, really have a comfortable home in the oral tradition. Each song is a playground for the voice and a vehicle for the spirit. Here’s a sample list of some of director, Malcolm Dalglish’s songs and the places we’ll go.

Live Concert Recordings:
Dando
If We Ever Needed Love Before
Ye Ye Bongye
Time After Time
Ozdolu
Into and Among You

Songs From Ooo Recordings:
Reel a Bouche, Pleasure, Hm Bidi De Je: Songs in which the invented syllables of mouth music, lilting or scat singing carry the music and inspire its movement.
Swifts: The joys of family life and these winged acrobats that sweep the summer skies above our towns.
Sail Away: Vocalizes the hypnotic rhythm of an old time fiddle tune in a song of liberation.
Pegasus: A song in which despair rises in dreams of flight through the dark melody of a modal 14th century Italian Laude into a dreamy and ethereal vocal carousel.
Now and Here, Lasting World, Pie March, Pie R Pie: Celebration songs and vocal marches that have led hundreds to midwinter bonfires and the enjoyment of pie.
Walking in The Cradle of Our Land: An old Irish bagpipe march has us walking among the natural forms that remind us of the gentle fall and graceful spiraling down of gravity.
Into the Sky: An Ancient Chinese poem by Li Po explores the mystery of birds, clouds and our vanishing in time.
Bottom of the 9th: Closing song of Free Range, A Baseball Dream, in which the about-to-be-slaughtered chickens turn into baseball players, win the game and then fly away.
The Selchie and the Fisherman, Bayou Sara, Quil O Quay, The Brink, How Long Watchman: Epic stories of seal people, roustabouts, moonshiners, survival and the apocalypse.
Bushy Tail, Kitty Alone, By Oh Baby, Sheep in the Meadow, Woody Knows Nothing: Old world Lullabies and critter songs that open like a classic children’s picture book.

Settings of Wendell Berry Poems:
Epitaph: A Scottish bagpipe lament with words on how we carry the memory of a deceased elder.
Woods / Field of Wings: A transformative awakening in the forest opens to mouth music depicting the cacophony of a Nebraska farm field full of Sand Hill Cranes and Snow Geese.
The Broken Ground: A tone poem exploring the sensuous mystery of earth and seed.
Peace of Wild Things: Finding peace in the world and “the day blind stars waiting with their light”
The Wild Geese: Vast and intimate images of flight and autumn carry visions of a lasting world.
Great Trees: An anthem to the many splendors of trees.
To the Holy Spirit: A short prayer for guidance and grace through life’s vast array of opposing forces.

Songs range from unison to 6 part mixed voice arrangements. Feel free to make requests. For a complete list of over seventy songs, please go to the Ooolitic Music website.