I gave an hour of my time this morning to Polly’s top choir at Tremper for some entertaining which they agreed to do at the local Sentry supermarket.   By my rough count there were about 30 of her students there, which I thought was a wonderful turnout, and fortunately she had an excellent balance among the four sections of the choir.  They were stationed close to the front entrance of the store, and inside, I’m happy to say.  They sang a number of pieces from their upcoming Christmas concert – and fairly weighty stuff, actually. (No “I saw Grandma kissing Santa Claus” crap at all.)  In fact, the first piece they sang was ‘In the Bleak Midwinter.”  Eventually they did some more familiar things like “O Holy Night” and “The First Noel”  but it was all good stuff and all very nicely sung.   I was playing a little electronic piano that someone set up without the sustain pedal, so needless to say I didn’t sound like Vladimir Horowitz by a long shot, but it still went okay.

There were a couple of things that were interesting,  First of all, the acoustics of the place were surprisingly good.  I sort of expected it to be dead as a door nail, but it was a pretty lively space in which to sing.  (Must be the all the canned goods.)   Second, I was truly amazed that the choir members were as focused as they were – eyes pretty much fixed on Polly.  Of course, she runs a pretty tight ship and they known better than to be watching the action at the deli counter checkout rather than their director.

Third, what was in fact most interesting of all was to watch the customers walk in and try to guess who would actually pause in their quest for canned peaches long enough to take in a bit of music.  A significant majority of shoppers did not appear to even break stride as they entered the store; they looked like they were on a mission and listening to “Ding Dong Merrily on High” was clearly not on the flight plan.  A few would linger for maybe ten seconds or so before heading on their way.  Only a tiny handful would actually stop altogether and camp out for awhile.  And of those who did so,  I suspect that a few of them were parents of the singers.   But there were a few strangers who found themselves drawn in by the music – and sometimes you could even see right on their faces the undermining of their resolve to stick to their schedule.  And in a few cases, the person would grab a cart, stop mid-aisle, look over at the singers with absolutely no hint of a smile,  begin listening- and end up standing there for maybe ten minutes, apparently moved or intrigued or otherwise drawn to listen, but with no outward sign of it being a pleasure to do so.   Towards the end of the hour, the number of lingering shoppers grew – and I also noticed that a few people were really taking their time as they strolled through the produce section – glancing over ever so often.  And certain shoppers who seemed hell-bent on shopping actually swung our way and listened a bit before checking out.  So music ended up exerting a lot more pull over people than it initially appeared. And having been on the delivering end of such a moment, I think I will be more attentive when I’m out shopping during the holidays and a group of singers is doing their thing.  Actually, Kathy has always been good about that and I need to follow her lead.  In the hustle and bustle of our modern lives, we should be grateful for anything that causes us to pause in our frenetic chasing about.

pictured:  the madrigal singers in Polly’s top choir step forward to perform a couple of pieces from their upcoming Madrigal Feaste.