Suzanne Calling

With the holidays around the corner, I am drawn to things like Messiah Sing Ins and other songs of the season, or songs that to me, are part of the season by virtue of singing them for a winter concert or two (or five) as a teen. One of the great things about that choir reunion I attended back in September is that various alumni shared their recordings of concerts with everyone else via Dropbox. Each year, the members of the choir chose whether they wanted to record the Winter or Spring Concert, as it was not an inexpensive proposition. I remember one year, getting two votes, because I'd sold double the quota of fruit in the recent fundraiser. I chose Winter. Alas, it didn't make it to vinyl like years past, we got cassette tapes. Mine was lost years ago. However, the archives restored the concert to me, and the memory holds musical scores much better than anything else. Still, I would like to have the sheet music for favorites we didn't record-and that's wh...

I have mentioned before my beloved high school Choir director, S. Talbot Thayer. The easiest way to explain Mr. Thayer is if you've ever seen the movie 'Mr. Holland's Opus', picture that passion for teaching kids music of the choral variety, and you have Mr. Thayer. (Or Tal, as we'd call him behind his back when we were in school and even now, almost 30 years later, it feels strange to use his first name!) Anyway, back in December, several alumni of the Choirs started a group on Facebook and added members, and the conversation got around to having a reunion of his students. Ideas were bounced around, a few of our former presidents tried to work on organizing things, but it was a case of busy people trying to squeeze more into their lives, as well as a few people saying what kind of event it should be. Frankly, any event where I could again see the teacher I easily consider my favorite and perhaps sing some songs under his leadership would make me happy. I'd...