29 September 2010

my life's parallel to last night's "glee" episode

Many people know I'm a singer.  A choral singer.  I started singing around the time I could talk and apparently never stopped.  From church choir to high school concert choir to college and beyond.  Yes, I was a Glee-clubber. But in the real world, the University of Georgia Women's Glee Club was just a large female choir.  No, we didn't dance, and neither did Men's Glee.  That is called a Show Choir, of which I have never been a part.

Anyway, even though they're using the name incorrectly, I still love the show "Glee."  And last night's Britney/Brittany episode brought back a few interesting memories.  (If you didn't see it, click the link to watch it on Hulu.)  The part I'm talking about was when the club was performing at the assembly, and Sue pulled the fire alarm on them declaring, "It's a Britney Spears sex riot!"  Ah, Sue, hilarious as always.

No, I've never performed a Britney song (I don't think?), but I have had a fire alarm go off in our set and had to evacuate the building!  It happened in my last semester of college, when I was blessed with the responsibility and respect of being the Women's Glee Club president (no solos required).  Our Women's Glee had the AMAZING honor to be invited to perform at ACDA Regional Conference in Charleston, WV.  Quite a ways from Athens, GA.  It was such a huge deal because our group was a non-auditioned choir.  Why the heck were we so awesome?!  (While I think our fabulous director had a lot to do with that, the girls who couldn't hack it pretty much weeded themselves out during Drop/Add week.)  No, it wasn't a competition, just a wonderful privilege and a possible ticket for our director to take a group to the national conference in a few years. 

Our trip to West Virginia had already gotten off to a rocky start even before we left.  We did a preparation concert in Athens at a local church, and one of our girls passed out in the middle of a song.  I think I heard a thud, but just thought it was a shuffling chair or something, then noticed our director cutting us off.  (Fainting actually happened to us AGAIN later in the semester when performing for a lunch meeting of the Kiwanis Club.  Different girl though.)

Less than a week later, at our biggest performance to date in Charleston, we had just started the last piece in our set for these big-wig choral directors.  I believe it was a difficult jazz arrangement of "My Favorite Things" from the musical The Sound of Music.  There are a lot of things you can tune out when you're performing, but a blaring alarm is not one of them.  Our director cut us off ever-so-professionally, and we shuffled out of the building into the cold.  Luckily, the building was not on fire, and we were soon informed we could go back in and finish our set!  Yay!

 The problem with an interruption like that is that it kills your momentum.  The set was laid out in a specific way to showcase our versatility as a choir and capitalize on audience interest.  Well, just like in last night's "Glee" episode, the momentum was lost, and I'm pretty sure all we were remembered for was being the unfortunate victims.  However, we're good sports and like to say that our ladies were so hot, we set the place on fire!

And while I don't have a video of me singing with my college choir, here's a video from last year of me singing with the old ladies Bellissima! Women's Chorale in Virginia Beach.

 

And now I need to find a choir here in Pensacola.  Or maybe I'll try some theater instead?

1 comment:

  1. What a fun memory to look back on though, even though it's a sad one! I had no idea you were a singer!

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