I’ve said it before, but I still can’t quite believe it. . . there are strangers – hundreds of them, in fact – singing my music right now. On some level, I of course understood that this is what having a piece of music published is all about – sending your music out beyond your own church or school and out into the wider world. Duh. And yet it continues to bewilder and baffle me: the whole notion that someone who doesn’t know me and might not ever know me can know my music- and, even more amazingly, like it.
One of the highlights of this past week was the visit I paid to Shoreland Lutheran High School in Somers Thursday morning. Their choir director, Pastor Tom Bauer, sent me an email at Carthage telling me that his choir was going to be singing my “Great and Glorious Light” on their upcoming December concert. He wondered if I might be willing to visit their rehearsal so they could meet me and hear the story of how this song came to be written.
I nearly did a cartwheel. (Or at least thought about it. Actually attempting a cartwheel would not be all that good an idea for me- not until after I’ve gotten back into a workout routine at Razor Sharp.) I couldn’t imagine anything more fun.
Then it occurred to me… What if this group isn’t all that good? What if they are struggling terribly and essentially making a mess of my piece? Will I be able to conjure up compliments? How will I make diplomatically phrased suggestions? I wasn’t worrying because of anything I had heard about Shoreland’s choir. The two or three alumni from there that I had taught at Carthage have been fine singers and students. But still, it was a relatively small parochial school and it was possible that they had a choir director with limited expertise, as sometimes happens in small private schools without a Rockefeller on their board of directors. I also worried because I am outrageously spoiled by my sister-in-law Polly Amborn and her superb choir at Tremper High School, which has sung a lot of my music over the years. The choir there is always first-rate, so I have grown accustomed to hearing my pieces sung there with accomplished excellence (and with enthusiasm.) The thought of hearing one of those same pieces battered and bruised by a choir not up to its demands was a little disconcerting. Of course, it was unlikely that Pastor Bauer would want me to come if they were slaughtering the song. Maybe it was that they were struggling to catch the spirit of the song and he hoped that I might be able to set off a spark. Whatever the situation, I hoped that I would have something worthwhile and helpful to say. So it was with a strange mix of enthusiasm and nervousness that I walked into Shoreland’s choir room Thursday morning, hoping for the best but gritting my teeth for the worst.
It was the best. It was the very very best it could have possibly been. First of all, it was a roomful of energetic, enthusiastic students who – once the rehearsal began – were serious, focused and attentive. And when the group started to sing “Great and Glorious Light” (with a student playing the accompaniment) what I heard was a vibrant, beautiful performance. And I had this palpable sense that they were eager to please me with their singing – especially certain guys who kept stealing quick glances at me, as though trying to read my facial expression. Did I like what I was hearing?
Boy, did I ever! It was an absolutely incredible experience to be in that room and see these young men and women giving all they had to their performance. And aside from a missing note in a few chords, what I heard was a truly fine performance that also had tremendous heart. Afterwards I told them the story of how Kathy kicked me out of the house one Thanksgiving Day because I was getting underfoot while she was trying to prepare a huge meal for her family. (I have to be careful how I tell this story, so Kathy doesn’t come off sounding like the world’s crabbiest wife. She’s actually got the patience of a saint- several saints, in fact- as many of you know. ) This was back when we lived on Carmel Avenue, two blocks from church, and so I walked to church to mess around on our beautiful, newly-acquired Baldwin grand piano. And that’s how I ended up writing “Great and Glorious Light” – which Nick Barootian sang as a duet the following Sunday to kick off the season of Advent – and which one year later I arranged for the Carthage Chamber Singers for the 1998 Christmas Festival.
The Shoreland students’ questions for me were rather sparse, but that was okay (I wasn’t expecting a grilling) – but there was a fun moment towards the end when someone asked me if I had other things I hoped would be published. I replied that I have three pieces I am about to submit, and I just have to find out if they want them on paper “hard copy” or if I should just send them in an email. And one of the guys raised his hand and asked if I would mind copying in their director on any music I might email to Hal Leonard. So there was at least one guy in the room eager to see what else I had written – which is the best compliment in the world for a composer.
What was also so cool about this visit is that I was in a church school environment where matters of faith could be talked about without hesitation or apology. Their director, Pastor Bauer, said that one of the things that jumped out at him about my piece (which he encountered at the Conductor’s Craft event at Carthage this summer) is that is was one of those uncommon Advent or Christmas texts in which Jesus doesn’t remain a Baby in a manger. It’s a text that carries us to Good Friday and beyond to Easter. It was neat to be able to talk about such things without fear of an administrative thunderbolt incinerating us. (By the way, I happen to firmly believe that it is important that our public schools be respectful of all religions and traditions, so I fully understand and respect that line that should not be crossed. I only mean that it was fun to be in a place where those concerns weren’t present in the same way.)
Mostly, it was just neat to meet these students – none of whom I knew – who now feel more like friends. Because when it’s all said and done, a composer can receive nothing more precious or gratifying than a stranger’s enthusiasm and gratitude about their music. Yes, it’s fun when a friend likes your music- but there is always this sense that part of why they like a song is because they like you- which is great. But when a complete stranger likes something you have created, that is a different kind of satisfaction. And when that stranger is a high school student? That’s worth far more than all of the royalty checks in the world combined. Truly.
pictured above: The Shoreland Choir sings my piece. It’s a fine group, and the balance between guys and girls is uncommonly even. And as it so often the case in small schools like this, almost all of the guys are football and basketball players who also sing. The girls also represent that music-athletics combination, but I think for guys it’s a trickier thing to embrace, so I love how that plays out in places like Shoreland. And I want to acknowledge the very fine work of their student accompanist; she did a very nice job at the piano.