Suzy Q Homemaker

Every few years, I fall in love with a new (to me) band.  Let me back up.  I am a radio listener when I’m driving.  While I do have an ipod and we have hundreds of cds in the house, I rarely bring them with me in the van because it is pointless to listen to “good music” when I’m spending most of our drives talking to the kids.  It takes us at least 20 minutes to get anywhere from our house and I’d love to listen to my albums from college, but I don’t want to if I can’t sing along.

That being said, when we saw Kings of Leon on SNL, what? a year ago?  or longer?  I think I turned to Jamie right then and said, “Wow.”  You never know what you’re going to see on SNL, and most of the time, the “artists” who appear on that little stage are just big and famous and lip-syncing to their songs with fly girls shaking their asses in the background.  I had to pick my jaw up off the floor after the Kings of Leon finished their second set because they were actually GOOD.  Like, they played real music without a lot of showy hullabaloo and special effects.

I kept forgetting about them, though, until we saw a repeat of that episode of SNL, then there was some commercial with their song, and then the top 40 radio station started playing “Use Somebody.”  Finally I started bugging Jamie to go buy the album for Christ’s sake.  We still buy cds!   With those paper booklets in the cases!

What’s funny about this, too, is that when “Use Somebody” started getting radio time, it instantly became Corey’s new favorite song.  I was thrilled about this because I was tired of turning it up when Taylor Swift’s autotoned voice came on.  Don’t tell Corey, but “turning it up” in the van really meant “fading the speakers all the way to the rear.”  Corey loves singing with the Kings of Leon and he has actually mastered all the vocal idiosyncrasies.  It’s cute.  As soon as Jamie brought home the CD, he told Corey to put it in his CD player and turn it to track four.  So the song started playing and Corey was dumbfounded.

“HEY!  THAT’S THE.  the.  That’s like ON THE RADIO!!!!!!”  And he stared at Jamie in wonder like he was the coolest dad on the planet.

I imported the entire CD to my iPod, and have deemed this album worthy of plugging my ipod into the crazy radio adapter thingie that gets annoying when there’s too much air static.  I can’t say what I like most about the Kings of Leon.  Maybe I love that they actually make music.  You know, with instruments and stuff.  There’s a great drive to a lot of the songs, with wonderful instrumental bridges and solos.  I love it.  “Revelry” is my favorite song on the entire album.  Corey calls it the “Dancing Machine Song”.

I talk about this a lot amongst my peers.  People have asked me what I want to “do” with my music.  I’m three years out of my vocal performance degree and aside from my church section leader job, the occasional solo gig, and numerous opportunities to sing with impromptu chamber groups within the church, I haven’t really “done” anything.  Since I graduated, I have had one headliner gig where I got to choose the repertoire, a couple solo appearances for major choral works (one complete work, the others were excerpts), and featured solos on choral pieces in church choir concerts.  I’ve also done a handful of weddings.  The biggest paying gig was the Duruflé Requiem earlier this year that I wish I could un-sing.  I could blame the flu I was trying to recover from and the fact that I was enormously pregnant, but in all actuality, I was a nervous wreck because of those things and ended up gurgling my way through the first page of my solo.  UGH.

Back to the issue at hand.

My dream job.  What I would love more than anything in the whole world is to be teamed up with a few like-minded singers in a group like Anonymous 4 or Trio Medieval.  Whenever I listen to these musicians, I weep.  The first time I heard Anonymous 4, and every time since, I get goose pimples and I am completely carried away by their flawless ensemble.

And I’m jealous!  While I like soloing, I really don’t enjoy being the “star” of anything.  I’ve been shoved into the spotlight over and over but in all actuality, I want to be a part of a team.  I just don’t know how to make it happen.  All I’ve done over the past few years, aside from having babies of course, is wish that an opportunity would fall into my lap.

Putting together a solo or joint program is hard.  I have a problem with self-motivation because I’ve been so used to other people telling me where to be and when.  If I didn’t have someone on my tail all the time, I would probably never practice.  I like having someone else run the show.  Maybe I’m just lazy? In any event, I would rather be a part of an ensemble so that we could have a rehearsal schedule, performance schedule, and I would only have to worry about making sure my part was learned and that I was in good vocal health.  I don’t like deciding on my own repertoire or trying to coordinate schedules.  With two small children, it’s insanely difficult for me to ask for help anyway, and I’d rather someone just tell me when to be somewhere so I can find a babysitter based on a prearranged timeline.

I ramble, I ramble.

So how did these small ensembles get together?  Where do I sign up for being in a small ensemble and actually be able to pay off my student loans with that money?

Musically, I’m stuck.  And I don’t know how to get out of this rut.  I love my church choir, we have fantastic performance opportunities, but I’m singing for peanuts and if Jamie loses his job, we’re totally screwed.

I wish we could have extended our trip to Louisville so that we had been able to sleep more and enjoy our sight-seeing with leisure.  Despite the lack of sleep and emotionally exhausting people-meeting, our concert was a huge success.  I’ve never sung in a space that large AND reverberant.  It was gorgeous.  Christ Church’s new Létourneau organ was everything I expected and more.  I don’t claim to be an organ expert, but not only is it beautiful to look at, the range of this instrument is amazing.

Dan Stokes, the director of music ministries at Christ Church is an energetic, enthusiastic, and downright adorable conductor.  I enjoyed working with him in the short time that we had.  I felt like I knew him from somewhere, but I think it was just the twinkle in his eye that made him so approachable and fun.  The eccentricity that he has of winking before cuing entrances makes you feel like you’re in on a major musical secret, the likes of which can only be shared between fellow musicians.

The guest organist Andrew Risinger played well, and as an aside, my choir director, Mr. Risinger, and a member of the Christ Church choir all studied under the same organ professor.   Of course, this concert wasn’t planned around that little nugget of info, but it was a neat thread that tied the whole thing together.

I was proud to be a part of Christ Church’s Inaugural Concert.  It marked the beginning of what looks to be an exciting new concert series in Louisville, KY.  Our church has a similar series called “Concerts with a Cause” to support our Dobson organ.  I have a feeling Christ Church is going to enjoy great success with their Sanctuary Series.  Not only will the community luxuriate in the music of a beautiful instrument in a fantastic space, but through these things, they will be treated to musical events that will make any person feel like they have experienced something of another world.

Read more about the new organ and sanctuary of Christ Church here.

If you live in the Louisville, KY area and are looking for something to do this weekend, consider attending the Sanctuary Series Inaugural Concert at Christ Church United Methodist on Sunday, August 30 at 7:00 p.m.  My church choir, St. John United Methodist (look at the picture of our choir with Jimmy Carter–that’s me in the front row with baby Simon), is traveling this weekend to sing with the Christ Church Chancel Choir (take a look at their organ–it’s beautiful).

It’ll be my first time in Louisville!  We’ll arrive Friday night, tour Churchill Downs on Saturday, and the concert is Sunday. See more concert details here.  We are also going to sing during the service Sunday morning.  I just might have a solo to bless everyone with…

I hope to see you there!

If you do miss this concert or don’t live in the Louisville area, this concert will be rebroadcast on WUOL 90.5.  I’ll be sure to post the link when it’s live!

I was going to apply for grad school at either IU or Yale.  Indulge me.  I’m feeling nostalgic today.  In this clip, I was eight months pregnant with Simon.