Sounds of the season
What triggers your most powerful association with Christmas? Scent of evergreen? Aromas of gingerbread fresh from the oven? Jack Frost nipping at your nose?
For me, it's music. Christmas music -- sung throughout preschool, grade school, junior church choir. My most potent musical memories though, are bound up in high school choir. I've written about my choir in earlier posts to this blog (see "Don't shoot the piano player," October 2016), but not about the iconic Vespers program that lay at the heart of every a cappella musical year. So as I sing along with my favorites from those days, as I do every December, sentiment takes over. Some thoughts:
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She was a tyrant. Tiny, maybe 5'1" in stocking feet, a state in which we often saw her as she directed choir rehearsals. Now in her 60s, she had short, permed hair-- the red of old (indicative of temperament, perhaps?) long faded to gray. For all this, she stood cloaked in the aura of royalty. Which, as director of the Webster Groves School District music department, she was. When I knew her, her reign had lasted nearly 40 years.
On any early December day, Miss Esther Replogle was found deep in preparations for her annual Christmas concert and pageant, known simply as Vespers. Featuring three choirs and a large cast of familiar and occasionally exotic characters, Vespers' repertoire and format had not varied a jot in decades. Choir alums from 30, 40 years back, some now grandparents, returned annually to re-experience the magical choral music that had defined the Christmases of their high school years. This was the one moment in a frenetic season during which peace and deep joy could be reliably found.
Vespers under Miss Rep was a military maneuver in musical guise. She insisted on perfection in every tiny detail. We sang all the music from memory, with nary a choir folder in sight. There was never a gaffe during Vespers, because, well -- that was unthinkable. She forbade it. We drilled and drilled and drilled.
However. Here's a story from my friend and fellow choir alum, Anne R. She sang soprano in a sweet, true, though light tone. Not a soloist, she would tell you. But she was present in December 1961, as Vespers was unfolding, when a soprano did pass out, shortly before her big solo in "Lullaby on Christmas Eve." Her comrades managed to get her propped up on the riser bench...but she had sung her last note for the day. So what about her solo? It was two full verses, spanning the entire song!
Miss Rep, (did she somehow not notice?), gave the "Lullaby" downbeat. A terrified choir hummed their intro as written, drawing ever closer to -- what? Three measures to go...two... then whack! My friend Anne took a thump between the shoulder blades as the soprano behind her hissed: “ DO it!!"
So she did. Autopilot was her friend that day. The service went on, concluded, and ranks of sweaty, swaying singers recessed to the back of the auditorium. Anne had saved Vespers. But I'm pretty sure she never sang that solo again.
Hear it now in two different versions [editorial notes appear after conclusion of post]:
Lullaby--Lake Wobegon Lutheran Choir
Lullaby--St Olaf Choir
Hear it now in two different versions [editorial notes appear after conclusion of post]:
Lullaby--Lake Wobegon Lutheran Choir
Lullaby--St Olaf Choir
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Esther Replogle's Christmas season went beyond Vespers. She (and we) maintained a full schedule of off-campus performances for civic and charitable organizations. These featured a few Vespers numbers along with a repertoire of light seasonal music: "Sleigh Ride," "Holly Jolly Christmas," " Jingle Bells." Again, these were memorized to promote unflinching eye contact with our director, and to leave hands free for the "choreography" on the fun stuff.
One piece was not fun for me, because I had to play the piano accompaniment. Does anyone remember "The Night Before Christmas" -- the Harry Simeone arrangement?
It was written in 1945 and Harry gave it a Looney Tunes riff that was popular in his bygone day. By the mid-60s, we were way too cool to be singing in that style, but Miss Rep hadn't got the memo, so off we'd go. It fell to the pianist to supply all the ricky-tick, cartoonish sound effects. Crashing bass notes. Chromatic scales. If a piano had a slide whistle, that would have been in there, too. As any teen would, I felt beyond ridiculous.
But you know what? It's never too late to gain a better perspective. I just listened online to several choirs performing The Night Before Christmas, Simeone version, and I discovered that from the other side of the keyboard, half the goofy grace notes can't even be heard. And the whole silly song is kind of fun. Maybe you'll enjoy it, too.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oAGCBZh2UkY
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oAGCBZh2UkY
Merry/Happy to you! ("And to all, good night..”)
plink plink
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***Choir alums reading this may wonder how I made my selections from the many renditions out there. With LULLABY, I was captivated first by Janis Hardy's crystalline soprano in the Wobegon version, and next by the St. Olaf Choir's almost hypnotic reading. The composer, F. Melius Christiansen, founded this Northfield, Minnesota choir at St. Olaf College and wrote Lullaby for them. His original soloist was Gertrude Boe Overby, whose son, the late Osmund Overby, served as my beloved mentor and advisor as I wrote MEETING LOUIS AT THE FAIR.
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***Choir alums reading this may wonder how I made my selections from the many renditions out there. With LULLABY, I was captivated first by Janis Hardy's crystalline soprano in the Wobegon version, and next by the St. Olaf Choir's almost hypnotic reading. The composer, F. Melius Christiansen, founded this Northfield, Minnesota choir at St. Olaf College and wrote Lullaby for them. His original soloist was Gertrude Boe Overby, whose son, the late Osmund Overby, served as my beloved mentor and advisor as I wrote MEETING LOUIS AT THE FAIR.
