Golden Gate '08

Will says:

     "I've put MP3 files of the 2008 Golden Gate Singing at:

     http://entish.org/sh/gg_2008/

     Unfortunately, only the afternoon session was recorded. Still, enjoy!"

Thanks, Will!

Here are some of my trademark bad photos:

Tenors!



Jessica leading:



More tenors!



Connie leading:



Lara leading:



We had a lot of wonderful visitors from out of town, and Shelby passed on something Charles said that I thought was really apt: "This is what it looks like when people are cooperating." Thanks for a great singing, everyone!

Shapenote on KUSF's Classics Without Walls

Several local singers will be appearing live on Monday, April 21 on KUSF's Classics Without Walls, hosted by Mark Theodoropoulos. We'll be talking and singing. The program runs from 10 to 11 p.m., so tune in -- or better yet, come along. Contact David for more details.

Golden Gate job update, once more

Here's the job list, now up to date! We still need a few people for registration...

• Arranging: Betty


• Secretary: Linda and Cindy


• Finance committee: Mark and Inder


• Chaplain: Jim


• Resolutions


• Set-up
  
  
  
  • Supervising (if you are not sure what to do, ask her!): Susan
  
  
  • Cindy
  
  
  • Inder
  
  
  • Betty
  
  
  • Lara
  
  
  • Terry M.
  
  
  
  


• Clean-up
  
  
  
  • Supervising: Susan
  
  
  • Betty
  
  
  • Gretchen
  
  
  • Peter
  
  
  • Lara
  
  
  
  


• Registration: Rebecca and ...
  
  
  
  • 8:30-9:30 Philip
  
  
  • 9:30-10:30 James
  
  
  • 10:30-11:45 ??
  
  
  • 11:45-12:45 Peter
  
  
  • 12:45-2:00 ??
  
  
  • 2:00-3:00 Mark
  
  
  
  


• Hospitality: Carolyn


• Public Relations: Chris, Hal, David


• Refreshments: Terry B.


• Supplies: Carolyn and Cindy


• Green committee: Carolyn


• Social: Philip and Inder


• Food: Shelby and Jill


• Location: Carolyn


• Betty will make name tags and bring pins

May we all go home a-praising / and rejoicing in Thy love

Well, I couldn't make it to the party, so here's my unfinished business - and it's even singing related. Linda explicitly requested a report from the Western Mass convention. Be careful what you ask for! I'll try to be concise and keep the gushing to a minimum. If you didn't know already, WMSHC is my favorite holiday. It's like some kind of ultimate Christmas/family reunion montage of all my friends together, new babies, too much food, too many trips to the airport. Followed by that time of year when we compulsively check for pictures online and start counting the days until the next convention (340).

Uh, there's some singing in there too. Some of the best singing around. After an unprecedented year away, I'd started to chalk my yearning for Northampton singing up to nostalgia, but then I walked into the chapel on Tuesday night and it was better than I remembered. (As much as I love California, there's nothing like a little New England fervor.)

Thanks to the officers and everyone who made the weekend what it was, particularly those responsible for the seamless arranging.

Let us turn to photos, all shamelessly stolen from those more talented than I.

God bless Sheldon Finlay and his unmatched singing photography. This year's convention was so well attended (412 registered, it was standing room only on Saturday) that many people led in pairs or groups, which was a lot of fun and made for excellent photo ops. Such as this one, featuring my very best friends, who've just set their wedding date! (In the interest of not embarrassing Katie further, I will point out that contrary to popular belief, Richard is not about to kiss her in the middle of the square. He is merely leaning over to remark, "Oh, I don't hate this song!")



And this one of the Wojcik family.



The children's lesson, led by Jenna and Kelsey. (courtesy of Kevin, another Sacred Harp photographer extraordinaire)



Leyland del Re leads. (also courtesy of Kevin)



Look, you know this guy! (courtesy of Mary Whitehouse)



In conclusion, come sing with us next year! In fact, the WMSHC board is extremely generous in providing travel grants.

And perhaps Mark can provide us with something more resembling an objective report? Much obliged.

Late for the singing

Great singing this afternoon, and excellent spread. In honor of my tardy arrival and general nostalgia for new england:



(From now on I promise to use my posting power for good rather than gratuitous youtube embedding. Not a guarantee.)

Possibly my best idea ever

I'm fettered and chained up in clay; I struggle and pant to be free...

Three words, people: election day singing.

What do you think?

Golden Gate delights!

The 4th annual Golden Gate Singing will be held on the Saturday before the fourth Sunday in April (a.k.a. "April 26") at Potrero Hill Neighborhood House in San Francisco (unless something odd happens).

Ah, the Golden Gate. I remember when that all started. Jill was new to the Bay Area and raring to go, and caused us to have a singing school and an brand-new annual one-day singing. Jill was the first chair, and Carolyn and I spent the whole day cutting up arranging.

We had a boatload (carpool-load?) of Portlanders come down to support the new singing, and a pretty great crop of SoCal folks, too. PHNHH was packed. Oh, what a good singing that was. That was 2005, I guess. Before I had even taken my qualifying exam! Wow. It was also before I owned a digital camera, which would explain why I do not have pictures.

The second Golden Gate, in 2006, was chaired by Betty. I cannot even tell you what a great chair Betty was. People all around her would be freaking out about one thing and another, and Betty would just turn around and fix it. This was also the year in which the distinctive Golden Gate paper name tags were introduced, and I believe it was also the year of our making it a "green" singing: cloth tablecloths (thrifted! yes!), metal silverware (washed by Chris), and composting (taken care of primarily by Carolyn). Yes, that was a great year for the Golden Gate.

The third Golden Gate, i.e. last year's, was chaired by Mark, and went very well. Betty and I were the arranging committee that year, because for some reason a lot of people trust me with the registration cards (fools!). Composting and such went forth as usual, and we outdid ourselves with the food that year, due primarily to some well-placed threats on Mark's part (go Mark!).



Oh, the food. Let me just say that Susan and Shelby have always handled the food with incredible elegance and efficiency. As a nut-allergic person, I had a deep love of those little tags that said whether the food contained nuts (although I have my doubts about how many people actually know what is in the food they make, since most of them say unwitty things like "bread doesn't have peanuts in it!," but that is another rant for another day). I am sure the tags were also useful to vegetarians and vegans.

And that brings us to the fourth Golden Gate. That's this year! It's going to be great.

Mark, bless his trusting heart, for some reason let me be the vice-chair last year, which means that I'm chairing this year.



What's the matter? Don't I look like a responsible chair?

So, lemme see...there are some jobs to assign!

I've already gotten Susan to agree to be vice chair. It gives you confidence in the future of the Golden Gate, doesn't it?

Some of the other jobs have already been claimed/delegated, but here is a list of jobs (most of this is cribbed from a list Mark made last year, by the way).

• Arranging committee: coordinates the order of the leaders and the general flow of the singing. This job is a lot more complicated than you might think, which is why I am glad Betty is going to be in charge of it this year.


• Secretary: takes minutes, turns the minutes in, and makes a report at the end of the convention (number of leaders, songs led, and states represented). This job isn't hard per se, but you constantly have to keep your wits about you. The secretary typically works closely with the arranging committee (to ascertain name spellings, etc.). Linda will be secretarying this year, along with one or more others (pending!).


• Finance committee: passes the hat, counts the money, makes a finance report at the end. I think Chris has done this in the past?


• Chaplain: says the opening, noontime, and closing prayers.


• Resolutions committee: gives a report at the end of the singing thanking the appropriate people etc.


• Set-up and clean-up committees: this is self-explanatory, but I would like to have a leader for each of these jobs. Usually there is a passel of helpful singers that shows up early or lingers late to help with set-up/clean-up tasks, but we wind up wandering around like confused monkeys because we're not sure what needs to get done and what goes where. So we'll need some people to promise to set up and clean up, because we don't want to be caught short-handed, and we also need someone to be the point person who can tell everybody what to do.


• The registration table is really important, but it's also an easy job and good for a new singer. Best of all, you can take it in one-hour shifts. You get everyone to fill out a registration card, distribute name-tags, keep an eye on the cash box and loaners, sell loaners as needed, and get registration cards (for those who want to lead) to the arranging committee. So it's a lot of little jobs, but usually not all at once, and they're all pretty self-explanatory. I recall liking how the Portland singers had a box on their registration cards that you could check if you wanted to lead but needed help. We should think about doing that this year.


• The hospitality committee coordinates housing for out-of-towners. It's best if this person knows a good number of locals. Locals with spare room in their abodes. This job also entails having contact info listed on our propaganda.


• Public Relations: get us advertised! Handle flyers, mailings, PSAs, community calendars, etc. I must admit that I myself am crap at this sort of thing.


• Refreshments: coordinates refreshments on the day of the singing, like coffee, water, and lemonade. This person needs to have a valiant heart. And a car.


• Supplies: makes sure we have all the supplies we need (napkins, compostable paper plates, etc. -- I've got a list somewhere) and buys more of anything we're missing. Currently, our supplies are housed in these big green tubs in Carolyn's garage.


• Green committee: handles recycling, composting, and the washing of the silverware.


• Social: someone has to organize it, and someone has to host it. It would be convenient if these two people were the same person, and Philip's house is really nice (hint)...


• Food committee: In the past we've had one or two people coordinating this job, and a few minions to help arrange food in a logical order, direct the traffic, unwrap/uncover food right before lunch, etc. Shelby has already volunteered to do food, but she'll probably be needing some help, because food is a big job. At least, if we do it right!

Which leads me to add that if you have a kitchen, you should bring food. We do not want people to have guilt about taking the last piece of lasagna, or, heaven forbid, to go hungry. (That said: why does everybody bring lasagna to potlucks? Granted, it's a pretty good potluck food, but we only need a couple of lasagnas, tops. Not twelve of them. The same goes for green salads. I'm going to be pondering good potluck recipes between now and April, for sure. Perhaps Rebecca could share some recipes...)

Holy crap, that's a lot of work. But now I expect the singing masses to rise and volunteer to do it all so I can just sit around stressing out. Whoo-hoo! This is going to be fantastic.

(P.S. - Inder posted on the Time magazine article!)

All-California Convention

Well, the California Convention in San Pedro was pretty dang nice.



Pat Keating (pictured above with Richard's nose) was a gracious and with-it chair, and the L.A. local singers were excellent hosts. Rick Russell and Bruce Hayes arranged; Laura Boyd Russell pitched, with assistance from Richard DeLong.

Mary Rose valiantly tried to keep it green, although L.A.'s recycling regulations didn't turn out to be quite as liberal as originally thought (let's face it; nobody believed for a second that those waxed paper cups were recyclable).

I liked how this convention was friendly to beginners while still keeping things together -- i.e., the front bench always had responsible singers on it, with few gaps.
Several new singers led, and were well supported by the class. The convention also drew visitors from all over, including many excellent leaders who stretched the class (in a good way!).

It was great to see Ted, Anne, Steve, and Lisa from Chicago; Richard from Georgia, Claire from New Mexico; Leyland and Mary Chris from Virginia, Kiri and James from Rhode Island; Jerry, Carla, Carroll, Midge, and Jeff from San Diego; Steve and Karen from Eugene; the Los Angeles singers; and some semi-locals like Cindy and Jeanette, who live nearby but who I don't sing with that often for various logistical reasons. There were just boatloads of people there with whom I'd sung before, and with whom I was glad to sing again. I'm missing tons of names in this list.

Lots of Bay Area locals went down, and it's always fun to see how we behave when not in our Bay Area bubble. Every Bay Area singer led, including Caroline, who claimed she hadn't meant to sign up to lead, but in fact led really well.

I wasn't able to take that many pictures before my camera batteries crapped out, but here are a few.


This is Linda in front of the Korean Friendship Bell in Angels' Gate Park. No, Linda, you can never escape the paparazzi.


Here are a few pictures as the convention was beginning on Saturday:

Mark, Ted, Carolyn, and Carroll (who was also the outgoing chair).


Claire and Susan


Wade from Utah, Cindy, Inder, and Xaris. Xaris, a treble, claimed to be a new singer but sang everything perfectly, including the shapes. Which makes me wonder: how many singers would be willing to make a dark Faustian pact in exchange for sweet Sacred Harp skills? Is that Darlene's secret?


Here are some leaders:


Anne from Evanston, IL -- who always rocks.


Carla from San Diego


Inder!


Kiri


Laura and the dude from the hostel, whose name I did not catch. Also, part of Leyland's face, because that is the nature of taking pictures from the second row.


Susan and, um, Richard's ear.


Betty from Oakland: my sole singing shot on Sunday before my camera ate Linda's batteries.


Here are some random singing shots:


Linda and Chris in the tenor section


Linda and Chris in the tenor section, with Chris taking a picture. He probably has some awesome ones; hopefully he'll post them.


A piece of the tenor section: Richard, Carolyn, and Mary Rose.


Some basses: Ron H., Steve W., James B., and Paul L.


Here are some (poorly taken) photos of the social:


Linda and fellow tenor Kasia


David and Susan, at whom I tried to pitch a truly brilliant film idea while they smiled and nodded and checked their watches


And finally, the Korean Friendship Bell:




In conclusion, why do we have a "Sacred Harp" label? Aren't all of these posts Sacred Harp posts?

Pictures from Portland, At Last

Flickr has been obnoxious... but I managed to get some pictures of the Portland convention 3 months ago loaded there before my laptop's battery died (it's a very good battery, by the way. Flickr was just three hours worth of obnoxious!). Jessica Beer of Portland has graciously supplied names, notes, and flattering comments.
I'm having trouble getting Blogger to cooperate as I try to post a few favorite shots here, but I think I've found a way to outwit it. Anyway, check out the Flickr link and have fun.

Here's Natalia's shot of Betty:

This one, also by Natalia, was added to Flickr's Global Spirit pool at their invitation:

I would like to repay Natalia for the oh so many shots of me posted here by posting tons of pictures of her. However, I'm really short, and she's not so tall, so all of my pictures of her are obscured by the taller people on the first few rows of the tenor bench. Sigh.

Not all my pictures were terrible, though. Here's one I like:

And this, while not technically perfect, did capture a great moment:

So now we should all be in the mood for the All-California this weekend!

Singing in Santa Cruz

Since Linda initiated this blog, I thought it would be funny to post a bunch of pictures of her all at once.







But actually, there really was a singing on Sunday in Santa Cruz: Rebecca hosted her last singing as a Santa Cruz local, because she is moving to the East Bay. MUAHAHAHA.

I'm a truly terrible photographer; nonetheless, here are some of my photos:

Carolyn Deacy: Sorry, I won't be much help. Driving down friday morning leaving SF at 6am possibly going on highway 1, car full. Going to San Diego on Monday returning to SF on Wednesday. 

All California Convention

The All California Convention is January 19-20 (MLK Day weekend) in San Pedro, CA. Let's coordinate rides and such-- it's more fun and it saves on greenhouse gas emissions. Check out the lodging options here.

Here's what I know about everyone's travel information so far:

Linda, Natalia, Paul:

travel: driving on Friday, leaving East Bay at 12:30 pm, returning Sunday after singing. We might have room for one more passenger if there isn't room in another car, but we'll be a little squished.

lodging: Pacific Inn, 516 W. 38th St., San Pedro (about 1/2 mile from the singing).

other: will go to Sat. social, and can offer ride to/from for at least one other person.

Betty:

travel: flying in Saturday morning, flying out Sunday night

lodging: staying with Marilyn Murata

other: perhaps needs ride to/from airport

Terry B.:

travel- driving

lodging: staying with Marilyn Murata

Caroline:

travel: needs ride

lodging: 3431 MacLaughlin West LA 90066

other: will have car in LA and can offer rides to convention.

No one else has given me definite information yet. Please post to the comments your travel plans/needs, your lodging info, and other information.