Women in Song

I’ve often heard my siblings and I compared to the von Trapp family from the Sound of Music. Is it because there are 7 of us? Is it because we are music-oriented? Is it because I sang “Sixteen Going on Seventeen” the day I got my driver's license, and didn't stop for a solid year?  

Although my mother was never a postulant at an Austrian abbey, I do come from a rather singing-oriented family. My earliest memories are of my mother singing hymns to me as I drifted to sleep. My Sundays spent in church were full of those same hymns, and when my Dad sat beside me, I learned to follow the melody in the hymnal while he sang the bass line. I first joined a real choir in the summer of 2013, when my piano teacher sent me to a singing day camp at a local college, and as soon as I had that taste of a choir, there was no going back.  

For several years, now, my oldest brothers have been in the Highlands Youth Ensemble, a local high-school aged choir. When I was still in high-school, I sang in that choir as well. Every fall, the boys got to participate in Men in Song, a choral festival put together by Milligan College and ETSU, and I got to enjoy the resulting concert.

I was very excited last year when ETSU and Milligan decided to start a Women in Song festival as well. The girls in my choir learned a gorgeous Alice Parker arrangement of Hark I Hear the Harps Eternal, and an elegant arrangement of the Hebrew song L’ador Vador. For a whole weekend, we rehearsed with about 120 other women in the Seeger Chapel at Milligan College: a combination of singers from local women’s choirs and women who signed up for the festival just because they liked to sing. My mom isn’t part of a choir, but she decided to come too. Saturday night, we performed for the community. Each participating choir sang several songs, and at the very end, all the participating women joined together and sang one final set of songs, together. 

This semester, I was not able to be in a choir. The University Honors Scholar program required a class that conflicted with the ETSU women’s choir. I assumed I wouldn’t get a chance to sing in a concert at all this semester, but my mom emailed me in January, and asked if I would like to sing in Women in Song with her again. The decision was an easy one. We both wrote the date on our calendar, and Mom signed us up online.

I am very appreciative of the inclusive way that Women in Song is organized. The single weekend of rehearsal is much easier for a busy college kid and a busy homeschool mom to commit to than a semester of constant rehearsals. Not only that, but Mom and I have a chance sing in a very high-quality ensemble, under a very well qualified director. 

Two happy soprano IIs 

I volunteered to help an ETSU graduate student with the sign-up process before the festival started. Since I wasn’t committed to another performing choir, I could help with the logistics of such an event, and interact much more with the other participating women.

This year’s director was Joan Szymco, a renown composer from California. Since she has written so much for women’s choirs, we sang a lot of her songs. The opportunity to learn a song from the song’s original composer is always something to be jumped at. I am still impressed that the ETSU music program was able to convince her to come to East Tennessee and work with all of us.

The final performance this year was beautiful. I got to hear such a large collection of women’s choirs, and enjoy a very broad repertoire of songs. I cried during at least 3 of them. And when the collective choir walked on stage to sing the final set of songs, I got to stand next to my mom, one of my friends from my high-school choir, and one of the friends I made in the ETSU women’s choir last semester.

I hope that more mothers and daughters decide to do participate in Women in Song together. I think my mom and I were one of the only mother/daughter pairs there, but it feels like the festival was designed for us. We’ve done it twice now, but I guess that means we’ve been to every Women in Song festival ever. It’s our tradition. And this, I’ve decided, is a tradition I love.