Word: barber
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...clouds, at 35,000 ft., Adnan Khashoggi's DC-8 is cruising noiselessly toward his estate in Marbella, Spain. His guests, sipping 1961 Chateau Margaux from crystal goblets with triangular silver bases, lounge on the jet's cream-colored chamois-and-silk banquettes. His masseur, his valet, his barber and his chiropractor -- they accompany him everywhere -- are relaxing as well because "A.K.," as he is known to his employees, is fast asleep on the $200,000 Russian sable spread covering his 10-ft.-wide bed in one of the plane's three bedrooms...
...waft," Barber encourages, beginning to relish the sound...
...trick for Barber is to blend the changing cast and the varied talents into a unified voice. He drills them on breathing and on the peculiarities of sung pronunciation. At verse 9 of Psalm 37, he interjects, "This is my favorite: 'For evildoers shall be cut off. ' With a big t before the 'off.' Crisp as a knife." He is relentlessly attentive to the details that weave together the different parts: "Everybody, on the bottom of page 3, let's make that a dotted quarter note with an eighth rest, so we can hear the soprano entrance...
Buswell is unaccustomed to choral singing, and he drowns out everybody else. A few singers simply stop in the middle of a hymn, overwhelmed. Barber glares. Privately, he tells Buswell that he is even louder than the organ -- to no avail. Finally, at a Sunday rehearsal, Barber dresses Buswell down: "Look, your pianissimo is not our pianissimo. Turn it way down." In the hallway afterward, Buswell, abashed, tells the other singers, "I guess I really blew it in there...
...evensong for All Saints. On the big afternoon, they assemble for a final rehearsal. Nothing goes right. The choir's attempt at a Nunc Dimittis produces dissonance and glances of distress. Some heretic in the alto section sings "Holy Spirit" when everybody else is singing "Holy Ghost." Twice Barber loses his place...