I love music and have my whole life. I love it all...well....almost all! I love to sing, play the flute and pound the piano. I remember hearing a song on the radio that I liked and then trying to figure out that song on the piano when I was a teenager. I love going to hear Handel's Messiah performed during the holidays. I love cranking my iPod and listening to a rock song and then a song from my favorite musical the next. I played in Band all through Jr. High and High school. I became involved in musical theatre in 9th grade and have been in dozens of shows even after I returned home from my mission. I was in A'capella choir and Chamber and Show choir my Senior year.
1983-84 Orem High A'capella choir with J.Preston Woolf conducting
1982-83 Orem High A'capella choir at the Lincoln Memorial
I love it! It's a part of my soul! Sadly, since I've been married and had a family I just haven't made any of this a priority in my life. I've missed it badly and other than singing in the ward choir I just haven't had it in my life. The thing is, what can I do? Where can I go to sing? I'm not that good, so I will never be in the Mormon Tabernacle choir. I just love it and want to use the little bit of talent I've been given.
Well, about five years ago I was asked to help organize a reunion of our choirs from high school so that we could have an excuse to get a bunch of us together to sing. We got together on a Friday night and rehearsed some of our old familiar music and the next night performed it for our families and anyone else that was interested. It was so fun and we had such a great turnout! And we did AMAZING! Most of us still had the music memorized and even the dynamics that Mr. Woolf, our director had taught us. Well this started an avalanche! After this great event, some of these former choir members decided to organize into a non-profit alumni organization to help out the music program at Orem High. Since then, we've included all Orem High choir alumni to join and we've learned new music and do this as a yearly event to raise money and give back in order for Orem High students to have the same kind of wonderful experience we enjoyed. But for some of us, this just isn't enough!! We still feel drawn to gather and sing. In September we organized into a community chorale! The Orem Chorale gets together for one night a week to rehearse and sing beautiful music and now we have over 90 members from all over the area (some even come from Salt Lake) and had our first concert on October 20. I can't express how this has filled my soul! Now we are working on Christmas music and adding an orchestra! I think there are so many others that have felt the same as I did and finally, someone (thanks Stacey) put it together. We have a brilliant director, Sterling Keyes (great name, huh? He's the current director of the OHS choirs) is perfect for the job and has been so helpful in getting this put together! Anyway, I am the historian for this organization and am so happy to know and understand the importance of the history of this choir.
2005 Rehearsal
2005 Concert
2006 Concert
The Orem Choral October 20,2010
Sterling Keyes, Conductor
2 comments:
You are great, Shaunna. I love that you organized this. Neat!
Awesome!
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