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Chamber Music by James Joyce: A Choral Commissioning Project

ing as more instruments are added. Thankfully, An- be and the mic placements? Is that all done by your
drew Mellor was able to handle the complexities of the engineer and producer?
space.
Earley: Yes, mostly by the engineer. However, we do
Scheibe: Yes. It is a smaller rectangular space. It has collaborate with the players, who sometimes ask to
an anteroom, or a foyer, in the front. And I love the fact move their position for a particular piece or reason.
that your recording engineers were not in the room, and And it’s always best to accommodate the players and
they were able to be outside in the back of the sacristy. singers if possible. At Blackrock College Chapel, it
turned out best to have the instrumentalists face the
Earley: If the engineer and producer are in the same choir. This demonstrated Andrew’s expertise in man-
space as the musicians, it becomes muddy in their head- aging the space. He folded the space in on itself, in that
phones. They need that isolation so they know if what way.
they are hearing—what the mics are doing or what’s
happening in the room—is accurate and clean. Person- Scheibe: You’re working primarily with the university
ally, I don’t think anybody should ever record anything ensemble, which changes year to year. So, you had the
with the engineer and producer in the same space as 2020, 2021, 2022 group, and then you had the 2022
the microphones and musicians. and 2023 group. You basically had a two-year window
with COVID in there, but you’ve managed to keep the
Scheibe: I agree with you one hundred percent. Not quality. When you listen to the album, you can’t tell it’s
always possible in some venues, but it certainly was a different group from one piece to another.
there, and it was a great place to sit in back with them
and listen to them and hear their banter of what need- Earley: It was essential that there was consistency over
ed to be addressed. What do you believe is the role be- the life of the project. Central to my sound-concept of
tween conductor, producer, and engineer? this predominantly student choir is a warm, open, re-
laxed technique, and this is something that has been
Earley: We all know that a conductor’s job is to get the cultivated over our twenty-plus years of existence. Vo-
best out of the performers, both by rehearsing them cal coach Síle [pronounced “Sheila”] McCarthy has
really well and by gesturing on the night in a way that been instrumental in helping to achieve an identifiable
offers them what they need. Leading up to a recording, sound. Our approach to teaching the technique of
of course, the conductor’s job is to rehearse, put an ar- the Choral Scholars to each new class, year after year,
tistic shape on the music, provide nuance, and prepare also involves having alumni come back to sing with the
the musicians. younger singers. They slot into the sound with ease. It’s
When you get into the recording session itself, it be- also advantageous that Solstice Ensemble includes stel-
comes important to trust your producer, because the lar singers.
producer becomes your ears. They’re on the other side
of the microphones and ideally in a different space. Scheibe: I met Síle in the recording session. Desmond,
The conductor might have the instinct—because of the you opened up such a window of opportunity to see
conductor’s role in rehearsal—to want to say, “No! Let’s the choral conductor and voice teacher cooperating to-
just do that again!” or “Let’s not!” It can be challenging gether to produce a great choral recording.
for some conductors to trust the producer when they
get into a recording studio. Trust is the most important Earley: Yes. Síle has been involved, and the students
aspect of the producer/conductor relationship, and if have been going to her for vocal lessons for the bet-
you can achieve this, your entire process is elevated. ter part of two decades. She is a phenomenal singer
in her own right and a renowned educator. She has a
Scheibe: Who decided where the instruments should very clear sense of performance and how to motivate

18 CHORAL JOURNAL May 2026 Volume 66 Number 8