Doubt Not, Fear Not

Yesterday was my official goodbye to Women's Chorus. Although I sincerely hope I can sing in another choir after graduation, I am already feeling the loss of this part of my life. I've been going strong with choir for six years now, ever sing I gave up orchestra after ninth grade, and I love it more than I usually realize when I'm just going to class every day.
We had our closing social last night and talked about our theme for the year, "Doubt not, fear not." It was definitely the theme of my year, and I thought about how choir always seems to give me a soundtrack that reveals truth to me. In honor of leaving, I'm going to post a list of things I learned from WC, serious and silly.

• Hope is a thing with feathers. (That one is for you, Katherine.)
• Eyeliner is not nearly as scary as it looks.
• I now have several hairstyles in my repetoire, and I am inventing them all the time. I've come a long way from the days when bobby pins completely baffled me.
• Little ways to flirt and flounce *ooh!* (Cringes while remembering singing "Popular." I still think it's wrong to sing that in a choir. Oh well.)
• How to be a train
• Sparkle is a good thing
  
• How to put on stage makeup without looking like a hooker. It took awhile.
• Listen louder than you sing.
• Trust your sisters
• No ugly mugly vowels
• Love your belly. Love it because it's round. Women are supposed to be round.
• It's prettier in tune.
  
• Peace comes dropping slow (Yeats)
• My future is unlimited
  
• How to eradicate breast cancer
• When the sun god gives you sight, don't hesitate. Just fly away.
• Wine when it runs in abundance enhances the reckless delight of the wildest of dances.
• One little maid is a bride - yum yum.
  
• I'm through accepting limits 'cause someone says they're so - some things I cannot change, but 'til I try I'll never know.
• This grace hath brought me safe thus far and surely grace will lead me home.
• I am a child of glory - I am born from above, my soul is filled with love.
  

The pure, the bright, the beautiful
that stirred our hearts in youth,
The impulses to wordless prayer,
The streams of love and truth,
The longing after something lost,
The spirit's longing cry,
The striving after better hopes--
These things can never die.

The timid hand stretched forth to aid
A brother in his need;
A kindly word in grief's dark hour
That proves a friend indeed;
The plea for mercy softly breathed,
When justice threatens high,
The sorrow of a contrite heart--
These things shall never die.

Let nothing pass, for every hand
Must find some work to do,
Lose not a chance to waken love--
Be firm and just and true.
So shall a light that cannot fade
Beam on thee from on high,
And angel voices say to thee--
"These things shall never die."
- Dickens

This is the short list. Truly, I have been changed for good.

Best Cheesy (and doubtless premeditated) Line of the Day

As the Women's Chorus was heading onto the stage tonight, one of the Men's Chorus guys said, "Give 'em heaven, ladies."

Aw.

Is it cynical of me to wonder how long he's been waiting to use that?

Me=Train

In choir, we're singing a song called "Heaven Bound Train." It's a glorious spiritual, but the best part is that I'm one of the eight first altos singing in the chamber choir, and we get to make all kinds of amazing train noises, i.e. tshhhh---- tschika-cha-tshicka and also a-wah-wow with a fall off at the end that sounds just like a train whistle. Guess I can check "be a train" off my list of life goals. To see me playing train, come to our concert on March 27th or 28th. (Shameless plug. Sorry. Sort of.)

Lauda

At our choir concert this week we sang a baroque set, complete with baroque organ (tuned down) and cello. I didn't think I really liked "Lauda Jerusalem," partially because it was ridiculous trying to memorize the words. However, I changed my mind after we heard the story on Thursday.
If you are a history buff, forgive me, because I'm just going by what I heard from Ruth, our organist. Apparently, "Lauda Jerusalem" was written for an orphanage for girls in Italy, an orphanage established specifically for girls who were the product of their fathers' philanderings. (Good word, eh? If that's not a euphemism...) Anyway, at the door of this orphanage there was a drawer, and the mothers of these illegitimate girls could just drop them off and push in the drawer. Naturally, the orphanage was only for girls, because the fathers were willing to endure a little shame to claim their strapping boys. (Sorry, the feminist in me shudders.)
So the thing is, they taught these girls to sing, and some of the best composers in Europe wrote for them. It was better than the Italian opera, and the girls sang like angels, but no one ever saw them because there was a metal grate between the girls and the audience. Once Rousseau visited and asked why no one ever got to see the girls. It seemed to him to be the perfect opportunity for them to find husbands and get out of the orphanage. He was invited to eat dinner there and meet the girls.
The first girl came in and she was hideous, horribly disfigured. The next was missing an eye, and another's face was covered with pockmarks. Nearly every girl had been abused and bore the scars of her past, but Rousseau talked to them, and he said that when he left he was nearly in love with all of them.
The girl telling the story asked us all to think about these girls as we sang, we, the girls of the 21st century who get to go to college, hold jobs, live our lives. Suddenly, "Lauda Jerusalem" became a more beautiful song, and I sang for those girls who never had a chance. I do.