Choir brings home silver medal, lasting memories

by SANDRA DAVIS - Monday, April 19, 2010

Submitted photo

This article is courtesy of Telegraph-Journal

Saint John High students also participated in workshops and took in the sights and sounds of New York City
SAINT JOHN - The 57 members of the Saint John High School choir earned a silver medal for their performance in New York City but that trophy may not be the most important thing they came away with.

It was the workshops they participated in, the Broadway shows and jazz clubs they experienced, and their immersion in the overall vibrancy of the city that choir director Trish Gallagher expects the students will forever remember.

"They were eating everything up," said Gallagher, who has been choir director for eight years.

The Saint John High School choir was the only Canadian entry at the ninth Annual New York Choral Festival at Lincoln Center last month and was one of four who performed; the others were from Bermuda, Czech Republic and Africa.

The choir performed six Canadian pieces - about 25 minutes worth - and sang in Italian, French, Latin, old English and in Xhosa, one of the official languages of South Africa.

They scored just shy of gold, which was clinched by the choir from the Czech Republic.

"We were really excited about that," Gallagher said.

The group was graded on diction, vowels, ensemble appearance and discipline as a choir.

The workshops were particularly enlightening, she said.

"The adjudicators have doctorates in choral conducting and choral singing and they've travelled all over the world.

"They bring with them a knowledge that we just don't have around here. They worked on their sound to create a bigger, more mature sound, and they worked on their breathing and their vowels. (They learned) how to vary their sound . . and bring colour into the sound," Gallagher said.

"These people got a change in the choir almost instantaneously. They came away with so much. They worked with me, too, on conducting. We all learned a lot."

When they weren't performing or attending workshops, students were able to experience the city and many other musical events: they went to a gospel church service on a Sunday morning to hear the choir, for example.

"It was like something out of a movie," Gallagher said.

In addition to performing at the Lincoln Centre, they took in the Les Paul Trio at a jazz club, and got to sing en masse with the other participating choirs.

"That was another dimension to the experience," Gallagher said.

"When we sang the first piece at our rehearsal (at Lincoln Centre) it was like we were in a giant cathedral. It was beautiful. The kids seemed to appreciate the grandeur of the whole thing."

The trip to the Big Apple has been more than a year in the making, beginning with an audition tape the choir sent.

Once the choir was accepted, the fundraising began for the $75,000 excursion, as parents, students, alumni and community members came together to make it happen.

"We just want to thank the public for all their support," Gallagher said.

"We really could not have gone without the many contributions and efforts of so many in our community. We had so much help and we appreciate that."

Each choir member was provided with a camera for the trip and the pictures will be compiled and set to the choir's music. The end result will be a DVD of the trip with the choir singing in the background, a certificate, a T-shirt and, for the school, a big plaque recognizing the choir's accomplishment.

The choir really made an impression at the event, Gallagher said.

"Our choir really was the favourite. They were so friendly. I was so proud of the kids. They cheered on the other groups and they mingled with them.

"There was one night we went on a cruise and a dinner around the Statue of Liberty. Our kids were right in there, dancing with the other kids.

"They definitely had a great time and learned a lot."