Why put the choir next door?

[@fiddeou]

There's another reason the choir is in another room: The audience is not supposed to know there's a choir, so when the orchestra quiets down and the choir starts singing, the audience thinks they are suddenly hearing ghosts or angels or whatever

[@SomeOfTheJuice]

Music nerd here to give some context: this isn't about singing quieter. It's about evoking distance. Holst could have had them just sing softer, but singing softer doesn't evoke the same distance as hearing someone singing from another room. That's why he did that and why they slowly closed the door: it creates the effect of them getting further and further away as they softer and the sound has much further to travel, much like how much space has to be covered to get from the Sun to Neptune. This technique was used in a lot of pieces in the late 1800s/early 1900s, including composers like Mahler, Berlioz, Strauss, and Shostakovich, to the point that the offstage performer to create distance or an echo to an onstage performer almost became a cliché.

[@nialltracey2599]

Thank you. I kind of felt that given the topic he was probably dealing with planets rising and setting somehow.

[@scottmartin5990]

While a choir can definitely "sing softer", it's actually extremely difficult to fade to complete silence (unless you're humming). A chorus trying to fade out while singing a repeating musical phrase with complex harmonies is going to sound ragged as the singers are forced to adjust their vocal quality to accomodate the shift in volume and as individual voices cut out at different times. In contrast, the closing door allowed the choir to achieve a smooth fade that was unprecedented. Audiences at the time were astounded by the effect. Today we're so used to the ease of creating a fading outro with sound equipment that we've forgotten how difficult it is to produce in live music. With many instruments it's downright impossible.

[@francescamcclean7271]

As someone who has been a part of this female choir, you are totally right! The repeating phrase is also at a very high pitch, making it even more difficult to sing quietly. I was on the soprano 1 part and there's no way I could have faded out by just singing quieter 😂

[@widicamdotnet]

Halfway through I had this idea that there would be another choir on stage, but not actually singing, just mouthing the song, and the sound coming from the hidden choir and sounding implausibly far away, for a kind of uncanny effect.

[@SpiacyLos]

Jokes aside, the planets suite is an amazing work and the ending to Neptune is rally eerie

[@Keenath]

It is! I knew the answer immediately on this one because the Planets just happens to be my favorite piece of classical style music.

[@francescamcclean7271]

I was part of the female choir when The Planets was performed in the first night of the proms in 2018! They had us hidden in the top level of the Royal Albert Hall so it sounded like a heavenly choir from above. When it was time to start fading out, we all crammed into a tiny storage room and they shut the door on us lmao. One of the coolest moments of my life which I will always remember ❤

[@protocol6]

Makes sense to me. Full throated singing sounds quite different from a quiet whisper of singing, not just in volume. It'd be significantly easier to make it sound like the singing moved away but didn't diminish or cease by closing a door.

[@fornaxian]

By happenstance something I can answer with ease as I have had the wonderful pleasure to have enjoyed live performances of The Planets suite for the last two years at the proms and indeed the performers do exactly as Holst suggests, albeit not the handkerchief option. In one performance they were even located directly behind the audience to give you a truly incredible ethereal tone that surrounds you.

[@fornaxian]

Also the spit thing is definitely true as I recall Andy Serkis being especially proud that Gollum's spit in The Two Towers was his own and not cgi!

[@JoeBleasdaleReal]

I’ve played The Planets - I knew instantly that these guys would never think it as simple as “shut door, no noise” 😂😂😂

[@jordansean18]

When the contestants are too smart for the lateral thinking question 😅

[@petertaylor4980]

When he said to dumb it down I had to reject my idea that it might be related to diffraction.

[@michaelavanessian8558]

They brought a 3D Chess board to the checkers match

[@alexanderhoak]

Why not have them decrescendo? Because instruments (voice included) have different timbres at different volumes. Singing loudly sounds different than singing softly. A great way to experience this is through a DAW, where you can separate velocity and volume. If you record something with a high velocity/volume, and the same thing with a low velocity/volume, and alter the outputs so they have the same output volume, they will sound different.

[@elisam.r.9960]

Spoilers incoming: I think because decrscendos can only go on for so long. . . . . . . Since Holst was trying to musically depict an infinite sense of fading, the decrescendo would have stopped far too quickly for his liking. Elliot del Borgo probably had a similar consideration with having the ending trumpet solo performed off stage for "Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night".

[@JimCullen]

Oh, a rare one where I have to just bow out. As a musician, I already know this.

[@LiinaTarvis]

Oh, this is the first time I knew the answer as soon as I saw the question! The Planets is incredible and hearing that chorus live made me teary. Love seeing it pop up here!

[@zainuddin3680]

Tom's delivery of the "sync up" joke was HILARIOUS XD Can't stop laughing lmao

[@TarunoNafs]

I swear, every time Tom talked about a bullet whizzing past his ear...

[@daniellemurnett2534]

Two nickels so far

[@JosephWithaG]

​​@@daniellemurnett2534 It happened twice? That's not a lot then, kinda weird though.

[@mokumoki]

And the fact that they recorded this before Donald Trump’s assassination attempt (for context, in the complete Podcast, Jordan said it is currently pride month during the podcast).

[@AltonV]

@@JosephWithaG it was with the same group

[@DelphinusZero]

I somehow heard that as “Sandra Bullock” whizzing past his ear and was very confused.

[@mostlysondheim1930]

An extremely rare case where I knew the answer from the title alone. Great question!

[@square1k]

Me too: I have been one of the female chorus members. We actually couldn't close the door, but we were in a building with long corridors, so we walked slowly away along the corridor, still singing... and ended up in a storage room.

[@sledgehammer-productions]

same here. Even in full concert attire, just for the applause at the end 🙂

[@Keenath]

@@square1k That's hilarious.

[@daerdevvyl4314]

square1k Imagine stumbling across that happening. Like you're working as the janitor in the theatre or something, and next thing you know there's a group of people walking slowly towards you in the hallway, singing.

[@square1k]

​@@daerdevvyl4314I think they've probably seen it all! It was probably the oddest thing I had to do in my years in choirs, though. I'm glad I didn't have to stuff a handkerchief in my mouth as well!

[@Alsadius]

It's worth noting that the sort of fade-out effects we take for granted weren't really a thing back then, so it's going to have created a sound effect people wouldn't really be familiar with at the time.

[@donaldasayers]

The Royal wedding demonstrated a similar volume control on the bagpipes with the piper simply walking out of the building. Not far enough obviously...

[@Hdtjdjbszh]

I remember learning about this in music class! Finally one I know!

[@abracadabra8501]

these guests def have one of the best chemistry between them

[@unholycrusader69]

This is like a wackier and less insane version of Tchaikovsky using actual cannons in the 1812 Overture.

[@Cchogan]

There is a difference between singling quietly and fading out. Also, the effect is very specific because it is different to slowing fading down with a fader (volume control). As the door closes, just like Tom mentioned earlier when talking about the wall, the tonal quality changes. Even turning away creates a tonal change, though not such a dramatic one. Tom also mentioned "stereo," and in this case, he is thinking two-channel, left and right, rather than spacial which is the sense it was first used in regards to stereophonic back in 1927. Although stereo (2-channel) recordings were not as early as 1918, the first demonstration of stereo was in the 19th Century in France. It was part of a demonstration of telephony where an opera was picked up and played in a nearby exhibition hall. To get the full opera, they used several telephone lines connected to pairs of earphones. The result was a true spatial sound and a unique experience as the transmitters were much farther apart than your two ears are!

[@Cchogan]

Singling? What is singling?? I meant singing...

[@RJSRdg]

Not sure about horses instead of cows, but film productions do use: * Apple juice instead of whisky (so the cast don't get drunk if they have to do multiple takes) * Cold tea instead of beer (ditto) * Mashed potato instead of ice cream (because mashed potato doesn't melt)

[@lmpeters]

Also, in older movies they would bang coconuts together to simulate the sound of horse hooves. The practice was finally abandoned after "Monty Python and The Holy Grail" made it into a running joke.

[@RoweClementine]

I love how we’ve gotten to a point where the contestants are overthinking their answers

[@jamesaditya5254]

"Decrescendo is not real, it can't hurt you" Composer: "PUT THEM IN A ROOM AND SLOWLY CLOSE THE DOOR ON THE LAST BAR"

[@OzoneTheLynx]

Handkerchief!

[@saoirsedeltufo7436]

The Planets Suite is one of my favourite orchestral pieces of music! The wonderful fading out is also why Neptune should always be the last piece played, even though some directors switch the order up (which Holst hated)

[@genevarailfan3909]

As a choir member, closing a door or turning around will definitely create a different sound than simply decrescendoing, so I definitely see why he wanted that. I really don't see how handkerchiefs are going to help though!

[@Doug4E]

I have 4 daughters. They were all teens at the same time. They DID NOT sync up.

[@SillySpaceMonkey]

Bless you for your strength

[@maxpayne2574]

You poor bastard

[@PassiveDestroyer]

Damn, did they have 1 a week per month?!

[@Doug4E]

@@PassiveDestroyer Pretty much. I used to tell people we played PMS roulett.

[@alveolate]

from what i remember, it's an artifact of confirmation bias... i.e. girls and women tend to remember the coincidental "sync ups" they've had but completely overlook the wayyyy more common non-sync ups. in case anyone is confused... periods vary from person to person in its periodicity and duration, so if two people had one period apart by a week or so, they may eventually "sync up" due to one of them having a shorter cycle. this also means that periods desync, but you'd need to live together for _even longer_ to ever notice the desync.

[@SMmarcus100]

The fact that I guessed the QUESTION right before it popped up based on the thumbnail and title! Great piece, and I would have sung it if I was a soprano or alto! But alas...

[@civiccattle6730]

They close the door to said adjoining room to fade them out at the end. Something that may or may not have been brought up: this chorus only sings during Neptune.

[@IlTrojo]

H2G2's Disaster Area show sprang into my mind: "Regular concert goers judged that the best sound balance was usually to be heard from within large concrete bunkers some thirty-seven miles away from the stage, whilst the musicians themselves played their instruments by remote control from within a heavily insulated spaceship which stayed in orbit around the planet - or more frequently around a completely different planet."

[@hotelmario510]

As someone who has seen _The Planets_ performed live I was almost screaming in frustration at this.

[@lucase.2546]

This comes up in quizbowl all the time because it’s simply such a baller move (in chamber music terms)

[@gljames24]

Cuz the acoustics are great.

[@samfisher6606]

I honestly thought it was going to be something like "there was enough room on the stage"

[@ThursdayNext67]

Old school foley artistry

[@skivernatnjilten493]

I thought this was gonna be a "In space no one can hear you scream" thing.

[@qwertystop]

I was thinking some kind of "the choir singing is a surprise because there's no choir visible on stage"

[@TheWolfHowling]

I believe, IIRC, the closing of the door was supposed to convey the vast, unimaginable distance that Neptune (The furthest known planets at the time) was away from the Earth

[@dianefields6056]

As is often the case, it would be nice to see and hear it.

[@jjohn1234]

I directly thought is was to get only the base of the female singers. And to have that added to the bass of other intruments to get some very unique bass timbres. (Honestly curious to hear this now)

[@myladycasagrande863]

Fun fact: choir members' heart beats synchronize as they sing together.

[@sophiamarchildon3998]

Initial thoughts: the female chorus (Venus) on one side; then parts of or the whole orchestra (Earth); and then the male chorus (Mars). Maybe some sections of the orchestra are set apart to represent other astral bodies? If "The Planets" refer to what we associated with them, i.e. Greek/Roman gods, that would separate the characters of Venus/Aphrodite and Mars/Ares, each represented by their own chorus. But that doesn't feel Lateral enough...

[@mellamobob]

my guess was so that the choir didn't need to be present during the entire performance. they could just enter the room, out of sight, when they were needed to sing, and then leave when they were done, all without distracting the audience.

[@markchapman6800]

I suspected that I knew this one, as as soon as it was confirmed that the work was _The Planets_ , I was certain 😁

[@GordonHugenay]

So my guess would just simply be to create an effect of the choir members being far away, since the planets are also far away. Seems to be too simple though.

[@isaacbobjork7053]

Makes me think of a certain Ace Ventura balcony scene

[@Conicee]

Of all the answers to this question THAT was not one of them that I would have EVER guessed.....

[@markblacket8900]

I was sure that the answer will have something to do with reverberation Also I'd imagine that closing the door will sound a bit different than just singing quieter, as it will dampen the higher frequencies more than the lower ones

[@Qermaq]

it's a women's chorus singing reasonably high. There aren't any appreciable low frequencies.

[@SamuelGeist]

It's so strange, Holst had been a choir conductor, surely he'd know that you don't have to stuff a handkerchief in a chorister's mouth to get them to sing softly and trail off?

[@TarunoNafs]

Why are the string musicians holding the bows with their left hands though?

[@Enteropy23]

today im in the lateral podcast

[@nariu7times328]

way too smart haha

[@Rognik]

There are definitely better examples of movie magic than spit. The first would be using chocolate syrup in the old black and white movies. Sadly, the colour doesn't hold up. Another is mashed potatoes used instead of ice cream, as it won't melt between multiple takes.

[@ecchikitty1395]

I was thinking a visual effect, audience can hear the voices, but not see the source, so is a more etherial effect.

[@Rollermonkey1]

Time delay via an echo, the singer is not facing the rest of the performers?

[@AnonymousFreakYT]

Seeing Tom Scott in SciShow Tangents is very confusing, since it feels so similar to Lateral.

[@kriskehrer6410]

Speaking as an actual choir director, there is a significant difference in timbre between a choir singing in full voice vs a choir singing in sotto voice. The closing of the door (or stuffing of the handkerchief‽) is significantly different than having the choir simply sing softer. That being said, it still comes off as rather pretentious.

[@IceMetalPunk]

Okay, but really... is there a good reason for not just singing lower?

[@fademejake]

There will be tonal differences, much like the difference between someone shouting while they are a good distance away (or in another room) and someone talking in a normal voice but closer to you. The volume level might be the same, but you would likely be able to tell the difference even if you could not see either of the people.

[@Meefer]

Singing softly makes for different tonalities than singing loudly but with a muffling of the sound. Holst wanted strong singing but fading out.

[@chevronagon9912]

Think of how different someone shouting compared to someone quietly pretending to shout. He didn't want the singing to "get quieter", he wanted the singing to get "further away".

[@SomeOfTheJuice]

​@chevronagon9912 this is it exactly. There is a big difference in sound between someone singing softly and someone singing far away, and Holst wanted far away, much like Neptune is the furthest planet from the Sun in the Solar System.

[@JimC]

Holst wanted a sound like singers receding into the distance. The good reason is that even the softest singing doesn't sound exactly like that. He wanted something closer, and that's what the separate room accomplished.

[@Maedroth]

What movies is he watching that involves spitting?

[@kriskehrer6410]

Speaking as an actual choir director, there is a significant difference in timbre between a choir singing in full voice vs a choir singing in sotto voice. The closing of the door (or stuffing of the handkerchief‽) is significantly different than having the choir simply sing softer. That being said, it still comes off as rather pretentious.