Friday, 30 March 2007

Chapel Choir tour reflection

After some ample time to recover from it all and get back into the swing of things, I think I can finally write a bit about tour.

First off, a full tour is very different from a half tour. The trip to Cincinnati and working back towards Holland with Dr. Buettner was great fun and a wonderful experience, but it was a lot different than this. I wasn't completely prepared for 8 days on the road with Dr. Richmond, 38 other singers, and a bus driver with his wife. A full tour is more grueling, tests everyone's patience WAY more, and also brings us even closer together.

Secret pals also got more intense this year, at least in my mind. A few people guessed their secret pals right off the bat, which is a bit disappointing but I noticed most of them still exchanging gifts. I had great fun with mine; here's the rundown.
-Gift No. 1: a lovely green Easter basket with Easter eggs filled with Reese's Peanut Butter Cups was my first gift with the veiled clue "I'm a wolverine."
-Gift No. 2: the most powerful cough lozenges on the planet-RICOLA and some bonus Reese's. What surprised me was that this was Emily's favorite type of cough drops. I appeared to be a very sneaky, smart secret pal, but apparently I just share her tastes in fighting coughs. The next clue was a bit unhelpful: I prefer Lemonjello's to JP's.
-Gift No. 3: an extreme version of the first: a big green bag of full-sized Reese's and a clue saying I like Psalms.
-Gift No. 4: a burned CD that revealed some of my musical tastes. Emily had me pinned at this point, but I had a final gift for my two-time tour secret pal.
-Gift No. 5: a great big pink fuzzy bunny! Mary quickly noticed and excitedly told her that I give nice giant stuffed animals. Apparently the big green frog I gave her at Christmas was highly appreciated.

Spending time with Uncle Wade and the cousins was pretty cool too. I got to experience authentic New York-style pizza at Patsy's Restaurant in good company! I'm not sure if I like New York or Chicago pizza better now; they each have their good points. Chicago has that huge, thick layer of cheese and the cheesecake-style pie, and New York has the nice thin crust with tons of toppings... mmm. Now I might be hungry. Getting the chance to sing for them and letting them see/hear what I spend so much time doing was gratifying. A possibly even bigger surprise was seeing Will at the concert. I couldn't have been much happier. Oh yes, and Uncle Wade gave me a REAL New York adventure. When it was time to head back to the hotel, he gave me a ten dollar bill and sent me away in an authentic New York yellow taxi! That experience and riding with the nutty cab driver in Salzburg last summer has cemented my notion that taxis are where the real adventures lie in the bigger cities.

Home stays are a lot of fun-I really enjoyed meeting all the different folks along the tour. The Peters family were cool-we ordered Pizza Hut, drank Coca-Cola till Branden and I were staring at the ceiling at 1 a.m., and watched Raiders of the Lost Ark and fed us a wonderful breakfast! The Aras family gave us our own corner of their house and we got to hear about life with a volunteer firefighter. No thanks to those obnoxious radios and loud pagers. Yay for breakfast sandwiches! And then there was the Hart family in Three Bridges, which took Cam and David along with Branden and me. Their daughter knew the Wisconsin Milk Song and I sang it with her. I really liked the Harrises; their dogs jumped on me when Branden and I walked in the door and the mother is quite a choral conductor. I enjoyed talking up music with her. The Halseys looked after our group of four quite well-some of the finest cinnamon rolls I've had in awhile!

Probably the most fun was playing on that playground in Colts Neck. Jeff's church has a playground on its property and I enjoyed playing on the playground. Sam, Kara, Chris, Lisa and I liked the turtle in particular, and apparently Lisa learned how to balance on them as a kid. Dr. Richmond seemed amused when I mentioned it's the best exercise I've had all tour.

The most amusing concert memory probably was in Blawenburg in the church fellowship hall. Dr. Richmond wasn't feeling 100% and accidentally left out a whole page from the Sanctus in the African Mass. What made it even better was we played along and he told the audience after some goading from all the guys. The close second "not" concert memory is probably singing in the Great Auditorium in Ocean Grove, NJ. Moses Hogan's setting of "Elijah Rock" is not a fun piece to sing in the morning, but it was worth it when we heard what we sound like in a highly resonant, wooden structure. The final chord of the song rang and rang and rang.

And here's the story I've told multiple people, for everyone else. This was the single most interesting thing that happened to me while on tour. The setting: New York City, in the middle of Manhattan. We're along Broadway Avenue somewhere near 42nd Street, just south of Times Square.

The state high school basketball championships have gone awry at Madison Square Garden. A fight has broken out among the players. Knowing basketball's record within the past few years, the brawl soon spreads to the fans, and basically a riot has ensued. People begin flooding out of the building and running towards Times Square and Broadway. It becomes a near stampede. Someone calls 911, and the NYPD mobilizes.

Meanwhile, Susie, Ross, Jeannette, and Tyler have just walked out of one of the theatres after watching a stage performance of Rent. Seeing a nice-looking woman on the sidewalk, they ask her to take a group picture of them in the city. She obligizes, and then everything descends into chaos. The stampede has reached Broadway Avenue and is now running south along the sidewalk, directly towards our four Chapel Choir kids. They dodge the first wave and try to figure out what just happened. Meanwhile, squad cars continue to stream down the street and mounted officers appear seemingly out of nowhere. The four attempt to head north towards the hotel, only to be greeted by another wave from this mob. The four begin to get scared when an ambulance also finds its way into the crowd of traffic.

Then the crowd begins throwing snowballs. Big ones, at the buildings. Who knows what might be next; with such an overwhelming police response (30-40 troopers on the nearest corner), I begin to wonder about tear gas, rubber bullets, or fire hoses. Meanwhile, Jeannette has started running farther after almost getting hit by a giant chunk of flying snow. We finally dart into this little cafe, try to figure out what's happening, and discover another ruckus outside as the owner locks the door. They finally venture out again 45 minutes later, discovering officers on every corner and advice to head north and to not wait around. Thankfully we weren't injured, but it did make for quite a story the next morning and it was all over the New York Times.

The best part though is still the chance to make music and minister to the audiences. Chapel Choir always circles up and prays as a group before every concert, and I had the honor to pray for our last tour concert in Rochester. I specifically remember praying that we would go in with the mindset that even though it was our seventh time running the program, that we would still remember that it was the audience's first hearing and that it would minister to them and to us as a choir as well.

That, above all, is the greatest reason for a tour. I saw this tour as a missions trip. It wasn't like what some of my friends did down in the subtropical areas, but it was outreach through song. My prayer now is that our music DID speak to those audiences and that they left the concerts with something new, and that everyone on the tour left with something new and came back to Holland better Christians.

I've seen this reflected in our efforts to show sympathy and love towards Andrew Franks. No one could have known that one of our own singers would be in such a horrible car accident one day after coming home, but that's where life surprises us all. Thankfully he and his girlfriend survived and despite some incredibly nasty injuries, and they both seem to be on their way to full recoveries. Chapel Choir mobilized very quickly to show support for him; a bright yellow posterboard covered with notes from everyone and a nice picture from Vespers is soon headed for Andrew along with some lovely present and some of our own ranks. I couldn't be more proud. Despite the ribbing and endless teasing we give each other throughout the year, I think this ordeal has shown that the Chapel Choir really does care for its members.

It seems to be the cliché right now, but we love you Andrew. We're praying for you to get well. Chapel Choir must carry on with our last concert duties, but we're still thinking of you while we sing.