Red Chant

[Christopher]

Achant (from French chanter,[1] from Latin cantare, "to sing")[2] is the iterative speaking or singing of words or sounds, often primarily on one or two main pitches called reciting tones. Chants may range from a simple melody involving a limited set of notes to highly complex musical structures, often including a great deal of repetition of musical subphrases, such as Great Responsories and Offertories of Gregorian chant. Chant may be considered speech, music, or a heightened or stylized form of speech. In the later Middle Ages some religious chant evolved into song (forming one of the roots of later Western music).[3]

Chanting (e.g., mantra, sacred text, the name of God/Spirit, etc.) is a commonly used spiritual practice. Like prayer, chanting may be a component of either personal or group practice. Diverse spiritual traditions consider chant a route to spiritual development.

Some examples include chant in African, Hawaiian, Native American, Assyrian and Australian Aboriginal cultures, Gregorian chant, Vedic chant, Quran reading, Islamic Dhikr, Bahʼ chants, various Buddhist chants, various mantras, Jewish cantillation, Epicurean repetition of the Kyriai Doxai, and the chanting of psalms and prayers especially in Roman Catholic (see Gregorian chant or Taiz Community), Eastern Orthodox (see Byzantine chant or Znamenny chant, for examples), Lutheran, and Anglican churches (see Anglican Chant).

I'm looking for a song or chant I can use in my classes and rehearsal. It would be a warm-up, to bring them into the space, and a dismissal, showing that this is the end of rehearsal and bringing them together when we have finished. I want something that will begin to be a tradition in my program and that alumni can sing when they come back to visit. In college our improv class had a Swahili chant we would use to bring us together.

My troupe absolutely LOVES the chants we do together, and they very quickly become tradition. We have a couple of fun "casual" warm-up rituals, but there is one chant we do every time after a rehearsal or show.

One of my troupe's favorites is called "Ride my Pony". It's just like the childhood game "Little Sally Walker" but with a different chant/tune. The group forms a big circle and one person starts to skip/dance around the inside of the circle while everyone chants:

The chant gets repeated every time and the person skips around and stops at the first "this is how it goes". When you sing "front to front to front my pony" you dance facing the person you stopped in front of. Then they both turn around and dance during the "back to back to back" portion. They turn to the side and dance during "side to side" and then the two people swap and start back over from the beginning.

Another one we do is called "Form the Corn". This game is super fun, and gets everyone involved. You start chanting "Form the corn, form, form, the corn. Yeah, you form the corn, form, form, the corn." During this, one person should be leading and raising one arm at a time to "form" the shape of the corn. When both hands are over your head, you begin to say "Shuck the corn, shuck, shuck the corn. Yeah, you shuck the corn, shuck, shuck the corn." Then you lower your arms from above your head while rotating your wrists to "shuck" the corn. After your arms are lowered, you jump around in circles and go crazy while chanting "Pop the corn, pop, pop the corn. Yeah, you pop the corn, pop, pop, the corn." You can "form the carrot" by forming, peeling, and pulling the carrot by jumping. You can "form the potato" by forming, peeling, and mashing the potatoes by stomping. You can "form the cow" by forming the cow, tipping the cow, and having a cow. You can "form the house" by building the house, painting the house, and rocking the house.

We have tons. One thing we use that I like is "I feel so good". It can be a shakedown exercise with repeating the verses for appendages. You start by teaching it but then to get it going you loudly ask someone " (insert name) how do you feel?" and they respond with:

They typically do this by themselves and then everyone joins in after. You repeat it for each appendage so it culminated in a full icy shakedown (which if your students are awesome- I'm sure they are) is like a little dance party. I thought of this when you mentioned seniors. My students love to ask this question of someone when they come home for a visit.

Well, clearly not based on the email I've received from many readers responding to my column suggesting FSU dump the War Chant and work harder to keep fans from making fools of themselves by doing the Chop.

My reply: If the chant and chop don't bother you, that's your right. There's no universal view on any issue among any group of people. All I know is that there are plenty of respected organizations representing Indigenous populations that are passionately calling for sports teams and universities to drop nicknames and other things that reduce them to caricatures.

Roger, do not mess with FSU. The Seminoles were here way before you. We Floridians honor them and respect them. Unlike the way we feel about you and your opinion. Go back to Ohio and take your woke opinion with you.

Trope signs are a set of symbols arranged in the text. Just as the Hebrew vowels in the text help us with pronunciation, the trope signifies the melody. If you look closely at the Hebrew text in the Chumash- the printed version of the Torah, such as the Etz Chayim that we use during services, you will notice these symbols above and below the text. Trope symbols are generally arranged in patterns and the reader learns the melodic patterns associated with each symbol and sequence. Functionally speaking, the trope also serves to help shape the grammar and punctuation of the text. Personally, I found that learning to leyn helped me understand the text better and improved the accuracy of my Hebrew.

Just as vowels are not included in the Torah scroll, the trope symbols are also not included. Chanting a section for an aliyah from the Torah scroll requires the reader to learn the text well enough so that it can be chanted without vowels and trope marks. While it is customary and preferable to chant directly from the scroll, in our sprit of inclusiveness at Dorshei Tzedek we also welcome members to chant from the Chumash if they prefer, while someone follows along on their behalf in the scroll.

Over the years we have trained more than 40 adult members to leyn or chant Torah, and many continue to do so at our Shabbat morning services. Some chant regularly, some less frequently, some from the scroll, some from the Chumash, and all are welcome and appreciated for their efforts on the bimah.

Atlanta Braves fans took up their version of the song and chant when former FSU star Deion Sanders came to the plate as an outfielder. The Kansas City Chiefs first heard it when the Northwest Missouri State band, directed by 1969 FSU graduate Al Sergel, performed the chant while the players were warming up for a game against San Diego.

Ever since it erupted on the night of October 17th, the uprising in Lebanon has unleashed a wave of creativity that continues to rock the very foundations of Lebanese politics. Whether to express anger or joy, or somewhere in between, the chants have become a central point of unity. They are often created on the streets, improvised from scratch or adapted from a pre-existing chant or tune from Lebanon or the region.

This popular slogan first emerged during the Tunisian revolution of 2011 and has since been adopted throughout the Arabic-speaking parts of the Middle East and North Africa (MENA), from Libya to Yemen, passing by Egypt, Bahrain, Syria and Iraq. In Lebanon however, it is not a single ruler who is the problem. There is no Assad or Mubarak/Sisi or Gaddafi/Haftar or King. The regime here is the sectarian regime, proposed up by a collection of warlords and/or oligarchs who benefit from it and benefit those around them. The closest system in another Arab-majority country is in Iraq, which has been seeing its own protesters, and has been facing much more brutal repression with extraordinary creativity and resilience.

A new, innovative and interdisciplinary collection of essays by leading scholars in two volumes dealing with chant transmission and manuscripts in both East and West, this publication is the first of its kind in the wide scope, both geographical and historical, of the variety of traditions it covers.

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