Faculty Choir Concert

So, as many of you know, I love to sing. So much so, that I volunteered willingly to participate in the Faculty Choir for this year's student choir concert. I had a blast. We sang The Christmas Song (better known as Chestnuts Roasting on and Open Fire) and Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree. We were a huge hit. There is a long instrumental during Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree so some of the students came out on stage and danced so that the audience was entertained throughout the whole song. You'll notice that I am dancing too.....but I am the only one dancing at "the grown up table".

That's me in the upper right hand corner of the pic. Suckers. They should know that the only reason we were invited to sing was so that the audience could have a laugh at our expense. Therefore, I felt obligated to give them a good show. The young man dancing in the forefront of the pic is one of my students--he rocked this show!

A special note goes out to my good friends Jac and MC. The both of them sat through this entire, boring concert that was filled with way too much Jesus to be a public school concert, just to see me live out my dream of singing on the stage. ***They didn't schedule the faculty songs until after intermission--and not accidentally***

The song after us featured my superintendent in angel wings pretending to be a tone deaf angel auditioning for the heavenly choir--again, way too much church for school. Sorry if the pic quality is bad.

After all of the squirming from the uber religious songs, I was beginning to feel incredibly bad that I had not forewarned my friends in respect of their anti-religious sentiments, sentiments I share by the way, when all of a sudden we hit paydirt. For the very last song of the night (Go Tell it on the Mountain, which I did not realize was a 'holiday' song, but apparently is because I was at a holiday concert afterall, what the fuck happened to Frosty the Snowman????!!! but ANYWAY) the choir director asked for all of the alumni to come on stage to participate in the singing of the final song, apparently this is a time-honored tradition.

A couple of recent high school grads bounded on the stage and were greeted by the hoots and hollers of their underclassmen buddies who were excited to see them back from a semester away at college and were immediately absorbed into the upper risers and took places next to their closest friends. Lastly, a near 40 year old man follows the young 20-somethings and shakes every hand belonging to the choir students along the first row of risers on stage. He then remains on stage at stage left. Alone. The young girls that were positioned closest to the stranger turned their backs to him and squished towards the center of the front row of singers as far as they could without looking off balance in an attempt to physically separate themselves as far from the 'alumni' as they could. Apparently all of his underclassmen admirers had all graduated long, long ago.

The choir director, not wanting to postpone the end of the show, prompts the students to begin singing. This song is labor intensive and supposed to be fun for the kids because they have traditional hand gestures and body movements that all of the current and past choir members know and join in on, all except the odd looking 40 year old at stage left.

Everyone in the audience, some of whom have been too polite to not notice the mistake that the man has made, cannot help but snicker to see the realization come over the strangers face as he too figures out that the choir director's call for alumni was for choir alumni, NOT Marshall alumni. But it is too late for the man to retreat and he just stands there swaying back and forth, clapping his hands, and hand gesturing 'bravo' at the students as they sing. The look on the students' faces as they quickly finish the song seems to scream..."Stranger Danger, Stranger Danger!" But as quickly as they sing, the song is way too long and the awkwardness of the moment has me shaking with laughter because I am at a work function and could not laugh out loud, but the situation was way too funny for me to just sit there stone like. It was a case of the church giggles.

After the show, MC tells me that the ending made up for the rest of the concert hands down. I jokingly ask DDV's hubbie what his brother was doing up on stage to which he quick-wittedly replied "I don't know, you used to date him. You tell me!" Fun times!

P.S. My conscience makes me add to this story, but I am adding it to the end after all of you have laughed so that you can share in my guilt. I later found out that the 40 year old man was actually in the choir at our school a long time ago, but it was the special education choir. So technically he was a choir alumni, he was just....wishing you the best year ever...Mel!