Hello to all my faithful readers. I am back from our break and I want to welcome all of the new members of the chorus who have joined us and been through our first rehearsal of "Street Requiem". I thought I would do something a little different for these next few weeks and write about some of the various recordings we have produced.

Our first recording was titled after our motto "Together in Harmony". Pat Parr was our Artistic Director and the music was recorded in November 1993 at First Unitarian Church in San Francisco and live at three different concerts from 1992 and 1993 and we released it in 1994 on CD and cassettes (you do remember cassettes). During the time when this was recorded the chorus was at 108 strong.

Here is what Pat wrote, in part, in the liner notes: "'Together in Harmony'" is the first recording released by the Lesbian/Gay Chorus of San Francisco. It is also among the first recordings released by a mixed group of Lesbians and Gay Men in the United States - perhaps the world! The music we sang ranged from Brahms to Jule Styne, from ballads to joyously rhythmic exclamations. We are especially proud that five of the pieces were written specifically for LGCSF. It is one of our goals to encourage and perform new music written by and for members of our community."

The five pieces that were written for us are: "Love Song" with music by Marty Stoddard who was the Assistant Conductor and lyrics by Leslie Steere, one of our lovely altos; "Passengers of Infinity" by Kirsten Nordeval; "I Am Here" written by Marty Cormier; "Reason to Sing" written by Rick Weaver, one of our lovely basses; and "Three Songs on Texts by Marguerite Radclyffe-Hall", written by our glorious accompanist Dwight Okamura. The three songs were: "At the Shrine of Aphrodite", "Hands and Lips", and "Take Me With You When You Fly".

One of things that I have always loved and been amazed by is the enormous amount of talented musicians that I have had the privilege and honor to have sung with and been friends with and shared time with and this is something I will always treasure and hold in my heart. So how about we do another recording for our 40th anniversary!

Next week I will write about our recording with Michael Carlson "Wish You Were Here".

Much love to you all, Michael Lucero, your lovely chorus historian.

Cole Thomason-Redus - Fall of 2010

After Stephanie Smith stepped down after the 2010 Pride concert, we were on the search again for an artistic director. We were grateful to have Cole Thomason-Redus on board as our Interim Director. Cole is a fifth-generation San Franciscan and is a sought-after conductor and educator of choral music and musical theater. In 2010 Cole was in his eleventh year as an Artist-in-Residence at Ruth Asawa School of the Arts. Cole has also been a vocalist and composer for the renowned choral ensemble, Schola Cantorum San Francisco. Many of his works written for the Schola have been recorded, broadcast on NPR and have been performed by the San Francisco Symphony Chorus.

Cole led us in our fall concert called "Dead White Men," which was a "mostly classical concert". We sang a Gregorian chant as well as pieces by J. S. Bach, Samuel Barber and Brahms. We also sang a Canadian folk song in French, and two Irish folk songs. We also sang music from Bizet's "Carmen" and Verdi's "La Traviata". And to round out the concert we sang music by Jonathan Larson from "Rent" and "Bohemian Rhapsody" by Freddie Mercury.

Cole also led us in our 4th Annual Christmas Crap-Array and we performed an outreach gig at a gay bar on Larkin Street and we also sang as guests of SFGMC in their 21st Annual Home for the Holidays concerts at the Castro Theater.

As with any change in leadership, our singing membership went down but our Board of Directors and others kept things going behind the scenes as they were extending the search for a new permanent Artistic Director. I will be writing about that AD, William Sauerland, in the next edition of our History Corner.

I would like to take a break from writing the blog until we come back full time when we start rehearsals again for our fall concert.

Cheers and love, Michael Lucero

Stephanie Lynne Smith, Part 2 - 2006-2010

Hello faithful readers, here is my continuing blog about Ms. Smith as she continued to grow the chorus both in membership as well as our musicianship and our willingness to try new things. We also had new accompanist and assistant artistic director in Michael Anthony Schuler. Another thing that happened in these years was that Stephanie married Dr. Kathleen Maguire, who was the AD of the San Francisco Gay Men's Chorus so in a sense both choruses were their adult children and we all had to get along. Both choruses had great times at the Pride Concerts in this decade. We also performed in the SFGMC's Home for the Holidays concerts on Christmas Eve at the Castro Theatre and also traveled with SFGMC to Santa Rosa and Modesto as part of their outreach shows in December as well.

Starting with "Group Therapy" in 2005 we began expanding our musical chops as we performed full musicals written for us by June Bonacich and Jack Curtis Dubowsky who gave us "Halloween in the Castro: A Horror Opera." We also staged a one act operetta by Gilbert and Sullivan called "Trial by Jury" and of course we gayed it up to modernize it and make it our own.

The 32nd Annual Pride Concert in 2010 was Stephanie's last concert with us as AD and was titled fittingly enough "The Sound of Fabulous." This was our 30th anniversary season finale and was a fitting tribute to Stephanie as she was on her way to the next part of her life - the stage with her "Fifi and Fanny" shows. Stephanie has since moved to Portland, Oregon, with her wife, Jen Brown. She was artistic director of Confluence, the Willamette Valley LGBT Chorus, and she now has her "Ms. Smith Presents" adult performance classes in which she encourages her students to be the best they can be in their quest to be wonderful and fabulous performers. I guess once a teacher always a teacher and for me that best describes what she brought to LGCSF as she gave us the freedom to be the best we could be in our performances. I love you, Ms. Smith.

Next time I will write about our next Interim Director Cole Thomason-Redus.

In harmony and love, Michael Lucero

Stephanie Lynne Smith, Part 1 - 2002-2005

Stephanie Lynne Smith came to the chorus as an occasional accompanist in 2001 and 2002 with Michael Carlson and Jerry Foust. From this time, the chorus began to know her as a great pianist and we could see her potential of leadership. She is originally from Wichita Falls, Texas and received her Bachelor of Music in Piano performance from the University of Colorado at Boulder. She also did extensive study in Music Education. In Colorado, she was busy as the assistant choral director at Aurora Central High School and a choral, solo and conducting pianist at the university.

She moved to the Bay Area in 2001, where she received her Master of Music in Chamber Music Performance from the San Francisco Conservatory of Music. While at the Conservatory, she played for such luminaries as Menahem Pressler and Emmanuel Ax.

When she became Artistic Director of LGCSF in fall of 2002, she was also the music teacher for K-8 grades at St. Lawrence O'Toole School in Oakland and pianist at Max's Opera Cafe.

We rehearsed at St. Francis Lutheran Church on Church Street across from Safeway. Our first show with Stephanie was a cabaret called "Full Moon of Love" at Cafe du Nord. I noticed on the program sheet that our special guests for this show were Coley Grundman and Barry Lloyd. Our pianist for this show was Vincent Peterson, who eventually became our Assistant Artistic Director. This cabaret was a fundraiser to send singers from the chorus to Sydney to sing in a mass choir for the Gay Games. Stephanie liked these cabaret shows since they were relatively easy to put together and showcased our solo singers to great effect. Eventually in 2004 Stephanie and the Artistic Advisory Committee came up with the idea for our Love Bites shows to be performed around Valentine's Day and to showcase our soloists, duets and trios again singing about the bitter flipside of love - in other words no schmaltzy love songs here.

Our first full concert with Stephanie was our Fall Concert at St. Francis Lutheran Church which became our home venue for our concerts at this time. At this first concert we were 33 strong and singers then and now are Yolanda, Kim and Lisa Vogt sopranos and Deb, Joan and Linda in alto section and yours truly. On December 24 we were again the guests of SFGMC on their annual Home for the Holidays concerts at the Castro Theatre. The year 2003 began with another cabaret at Cafe du Nord called "Role Playing", then an outreach performance at the 8th annual HIV Prevention Awards followed by our Spring Concert - Hope, and the 25th Annual Pride Concert, a fall concert and Home for the Holidays.

February 13, 2004, was the date of the very first Love Bites cabarets and was held at the Rainbow Room at the LGBT Community Center. This became our home for several following Love Bites shows. Next came our spring concert in April, another outreach performance at the SF Jewish Community Center, the Pride Concert and our big trip to the GALA Choruses Festival in beautiful Montreal, Quebec. After we got back from GALA, Stephanie kept us busy as we sang in the Oakland Pride Concert, another cabaret "Somewhere Over the Top," our fall concert and Home for the Holidays.

In 2005 we opened with "Love Still Bites" followed by our 25th Anniversary Concert which was held at the Brava Theatre. Then came the SF Pride Concert and the Oakland Pride Concert and then came "Group Therapy", an original musical composed for us by chorus member the wonderful June Bonacich. More to come on all of these concerts and shows when I return to writing about them individually.

Next time I will be writing more about Stephanie in 2006 through her last year with us 2010.

Cheers and love, Michael Lucero

Artistic Director Jerry "J.R." Foust, Fall 2001 - Fall 2002

After Michael Carlson stepped down to become Artistic Director of the Oakland/East Bay Gay Men's Chorus, we went through another AD search and we selected Jerry "J.R." Foust. Our first rehearsals with him began in October, 2001.

He was also at this time the Artistic Director of Opus Q East Bay Men's Chorale.

Here is some of his background. He was a singer with the Indianapolis Men's Chorus in 1991 and he has also been a member of VOICES of Kentuckiana and the Denver Gay Men's Chorus, where he served as baritone section leader and Assistant Director.

During his musical studies, he has had the opportunity to perform under conductors and composers like James Mulholland, Joseph Jennings, Alice Parker, Margaret Willis (founder, Chicago Symphony Chorus), Michael Hayden (founder, Indianapolis Men's Chorus) and Sue Coffee (founder, Sound Circle). He had many years of experience instructing young people in instrumental and vocal music, theater, and movement. His musical inspiration and hero is Leonard Bernstein and he likes to have a Bernstein piece performed in every concert.

The first concert that LGCSF sang in with J.R. as AD was as guests on the Opus Q winter concert "Let Music Live!" which was performed at the University Lutheran Chapel in Berkeley. This concert was also the first time that Stephanie Smith performed as our accompanist. As always whenever there is a change in the leadership of the chorus there is a change in the membership as well but as some singers left we were happy to have new singers join us. One thing that I have noticed about new members coming into LGCSF is that from the start they either get what we are about and stay or they don't and they leave. At this point with J.R. we were about 30 strong.

On December 24, 2001, LGCSF was a guest on the SFGMC's Home for the Holiday performances at the Castro Theatre. This was the first time for us to be on this program.

Our first program in 2002 with J.R. was "Afterglow - a Castro Cabaret" and was held at Cafe du Nord for two nights in February. Opus Q was our guest on this show. Following this in March was our first full concert on our own under the direction of J.R. called "The Promise of Living." This was followed by our appearance in the 24th Annual Pride Concert along with SFGMC and the SF Lesbian/Gay Freedom Band. Also appearing as special guests were Sharon Gless and Sir Ian McKellen.

This was our last concert with J.R. as our AD and I am not sure of all the reasons why he left after such a short time but one guess is that he wanted to be the full time AD of Opus Q as well as to finish his Masters degree at UC Berkeley. I will have more detailed posts about these concerts when I get back to writing about them in the future.

Next week I will be writing about our next AD, Stephanie Smith and the impact she had on LGCSF.

Cheers in harmony, Michael Lucero, storyteller and historian

Artistic Director Michael Carlson - Late 1998 - September, 2001

Our next Artistic Director, Michael Carlson, came to the Chorus in late 1998. He came to San Francisco from Reno, Nevada, where he had been Director of Music for the Roman Catholic Diocese there. He had received a wealth of choral experience the University of Nevada Las Vegas and and University of Nevada Reno. In Las Vegas, Michael was the first associate conductor of UNLV's Varsity Men's Glee Club. He had studied with the great choral conductor, Robert Shaw. He is also a trained lyric baritone and continues to perform musical theater and operatic roles.

Michael at this time was the manager of a new boutique hotel in the Tenderloin and through his contacts in the business community we were able to have gigs in the community such as for the LGBT group from Pacific Telesis at one of their events and to sing at the Academy of Friends event in 1999 and 2000 where we also got to watch the Academy Awards in style.

His first concert directing us was "A Family Album - the 21st Annual Pride Concert" in June, 1999. This was also the introduction to us of the wonderful June Bonacich who was accompanist for us at this time. The chorus was at 38 strong then and I noticed that Deb Cohler, Yolanda DeByle, Joan Goldman and Linda Rodriguey were in the alto section. And we continue to love them for who they are and what they contribute to the chorus.

This concert featured the Bearatones, a male quintet accompanied by Thaddeus Pinkston. Also there were Voices, the East Bay Lesbian Ensemble, Out on a Clef, a female quartet in which June Bonacich was the baritone, the GAPA Chorus and the S. F. Lesbian/Gay Freedom Band. It was a great evening for all of us as we got be with all of these Bay Area musical friends to present our music to our wonderful audience.

The year of 2000 was a big one for us because we were going to GALA Festival in July in San Jose, and we performed in the Pride Concert as usual in June, and we had a concert called "Across the Ponds" which featured Schola Cantorosa, Gay Men's Chorus of Hamburg, Germany, and VOICES: Lesbian Choral Ensemble. We did this on July 20, two days before GALA Festival began on July 22. We hosted the German men in our homes and had social time with them as well as rehearsing with them. Schola Cantorosa is a show chorus and their show was called "Dressed to Kill." From the program they say "Enjoy the culmination of artwork, fabulous music, spectacular choreography, funky costumes and enter the world of stage!!!" They were unlike anything we or our audience had seen and they brought the house down then and also at the GALA Festival.

Michael's last concert with us was on September 8, 2001, at the Second Annual Pride Concert of the Oakland East Bay Gay Men's Chorus which was called "Building a World Together." We were guests on the program along with Opus - East Bay Men's Chorale, Out on a Clef, SDK with Thaddeus Pinkston on piano, and the Silicon Valley Gay Men's Chorus. At this point Michael had become Artistic Director of Oakland East Bay Gay Men's Chorus. The last song we sang with him was "The Long Day Closes."

Next week I will be writing about our next AD, J. R. Foust.

Cheers and love, Michael Lucero

Bill Ganz, Acting Director, fall of 1998

Hello to my faithful readers.

Happy May to all of you. Since Trente Morant, our previous AD had stepped down the chorus once again turned to Bill Ganz to be our Acting Director for the fall of 1998. As you may recall from a previous entry, Bill had been our Interim Director in 1985 as the chorus went through some changes.

I would like to give you some background on Bill about what he had been doing at that time. He had directed the UC Men's Chorale and the Cal Jazz Choir at UC Berkeley for eight years. He had also served as Associate Director of UC Choral Ensembles. In addition to his duties at UC Berkeley, he had served as conductor of the award-winning Cable Car Chorus, which is a barbershop quartet.

On November 6 & 7, 1998, Bill led us in our fall concert Classical Music for Cowards. At this point, we were at 32 singers with good representation in all four sections. This concert brought us back to what our first AD, Robin Kay, loved, classical music. But this was Bill's take on the repertoire and he wanted to make it fun for us to learn and sing and to bring that sense of fun to our audience. Bill told us at our first rehearsal for this concert that we should not be afraid of classical music and it turned out that he was right. From what I remember, Bill really got us to blend and to listen to each other and that was a valuable lesson we all learned.

Joining us in this concert was the Oberon Quartet, two violinists, a violist and a cellist. They played the overture to the evening, the Brandenburg Concerto No. 3 by J. S. Bach. We sang music by G. F. Handel, five pieces from Schubert's "Mass in G," the Kyrie, the Gloria, the Sanctus, the Benedictus and the Agnus Dei. We also sang a couple of fugues - "The Heart of the Fugue" and "Geographical Fugue." For something a little lighter there was a soprano and alto quintet who performed "Hail Holy Queen" from the movie "Sister Act." We ended the evening with "Amazing Grace" which had been arranged by Sky Evergreen.

One thing I found funny in the program was we had a Movement Coordinator, Alena Cawthorne, and that Scenic Ambiance was provided by our Production Committee. That's it for this week. Next time I will be writing about our newest AD, Michael Carlson.

Cheers, love and song, Michael Lucero

Artistic Director Trente Morant - 1997-1998

Hello all of my faithful readers, I know you are out there from the responses I have gotten from our wonderful Board president, Rachel Pokorny. I have also heard on Facebook from a former singer and tenor, Tim O'Bayley who now lives in Palm Springs, and from the young women from USF who have been at several rehearsals who told me that they enjoy reading about the history of our chorus and gay choruses that they have read about on their own.

I would like to say a few more things about Pat Parr before moving on to the next Artistic Director. The Five Years of Madness concert that I wrote about last week was to have been on May 1 and 2, 1992. If you know your history from that time, that was when the Rodney King verdict was given to the police officers who beat him. April 30, our dress rehearsal at First Congregational Church, was the night of the Rodney King riots. We had to cancel our May 1 concert and we had to honor the people who had tickets for that show so our May 2 concert was a more than full house and due to the emotions of that time we gave a hell of a performance. This is one thing I will always remember about Pat and how he was able to get all of us through that time and that night.

And one more thing - at the 19th Annual Pride Concert, which was Pat's last time with us at the podium, as I was reading through the program, the San Francisco Gay Men's Chorus sang their traditional Irish Blessing to him as a "Tribute to Pat Parr in Loving Appreciation for his Selfless Dedication and Uncompromising Artistry in the Choral Arts." This concert was also a tribute to Sky Evergreen, a jazz pianist and cabaret performer in the City in the 1980s. He wrote the arrangements for the songs we sang that night, "Lover Come Back To Me," "For All We Know," and "How Long Has This Been Going On." The chorus always appreciated his gift of music that he gave to us.

Now onto my memories about our next Artistic Director, Trente Morant. He was the first African American AD for the chorus. I remember the first time I met him was when I was on the Artistic Advisory Committee and we had our first meeting with him. He has an impressive background in music. He toured the country for five years as Performer- Lecturer specializing in music from the Harlem Renaissance. He had also served as Musical Director for many theaters in the New York area for productions of "West Side Story," "Candide," "On the Town," "Pirates of Penzance," "Pippin," "Chicago" and others. He also served as Artistic Director of the Oakland Youth Chorus and had conducted in both the Monterey and San Francisco Jazz Festivals. He also performed in a concert version of "Porgy and Bess" with Michael Morgan and the East Bay Symphony.

Trente was with the chorus as AD for a year and led us in three concerts. The chorus was at about 45 strong at this time. The first was called "Love Is In The Air" and we sang music in a variety of styles that all had in some way to do with love. There were songs like "Unchained Melody," I Got Rhythm," "Don't Get Around Much Anymore," "Getting Married Today," "Let It Be Me," and "Ain't Misbehavin'." We also sang a song written by Sky Evergreen called "I Open My Heart" which had become a signature song for us. One of the fun highlights was a soprano and alto quintet singing "The Telephone Hour" from "Bye Bye Birdie" - "did you hear about Kim?, did she really get pinned?" Trente wrote some additional lyrics for "I Want to Be Happy" and made the song a lot gayer.

As you can see Trente brought a lot of music to us from his background in theater. Trente was also a very flamboyant personality and when it came to concert nights we never knew what he would be wearing. Our second concert with him was called "Spice It Up" and we shared the stage at the Cowell Theater with Jill Togawa of Purple Moon Dance Project, Jackeline Rago of Crosspulse. Again Trente brought us a wide variety of music to perform by ourselves and with our special guests. There was a lot of rhythm and movement woven through the songs. We sang "I've Got Plenty of Nothing" from "Porgy and Bess", two songs by Sweet Honey in the Rock, "Oughta Be a Woman" and "Breaths", a couple of spirituals, "I've Been 'Buked" and "Hold On" which we also have sung recently. We sang a "Gloria" in the traditional manner which was written and arranged by Trente. We also performed two excerpts from "Spiritual Procession" by Jackeline Rago, "Sangueos," and "Calypso" and ended the show with "Under the Full Moonlight" and "Afro Blue" which was written by Oscar Peterson and arranged by Trente.

The third concert with Trente was the 20th Annual Pride Concert - High on Pride - 20 Years Singing Proud. Our special guests were Qwire - Canberra, Australia's Gay and Lesbian Chorus, SFGMC and San Francisco Lesbian/Gay Freedom Band. We were hosts to the chorus from Canberra and we had a rehearsal together and social time with them in the days before the concert. It was fun and inspiring to meet these singers from down under. They had also been to Portland to sing with the Portland Lesbian and Gay Chorus. Some of the music we sang was "Tuxedo Junction" arranged by Trente, "Sentimental Journey," "I Open My Heart" and we ended with a piece by Trente called "Take Off," which we did that night. Trente really showed and helped us how to be able to move and sing at the same time and to trust and believe in ourselves that we could do and sing anything and above all to have fun.

If you would like to see Trente perform, he will be doing a show at the Society Cabaret located in the Harvey Milk Center, 50 Scott Street, on May 17 at 8:00 pm. The show is called "Get on Your Mark, Get Set, Sing." I am sure this will be a wonderful evening of his music.

Next week I will be writing about our interim director, Bill Ganz.

Cheers, love, song, Michael Lucero

Hello to all my faithful readers. This week I will be writing about my memories of our Artistic Director, Pat Parr, from 1992 through 1997.

But first I would like to go back to 1988 and our spring concert "A Touch of Classics." In the program notes, Pat tells of what he would like to have the chorus perform and his answer was "Gabriel Faure's Requiem" which we sang in this concert. We also performed outside of San Francisco for the first time in Berkeley. This was an example of what we would learn was how Pat thought outside of the box.

By 1992, Pat had over the past couple of years had established that we would do a big production show in spring, the Pride concert in June and a more typical classical style concert in the fall. Our big spring concert in 1992 was called "Five Years of Madness." In the program notes, Pat wrote "Tonight's concert is a compilation of some of my favorites from our past 'production' concerts. While it is great to do Brahms and Bernstein, it is equally exciting to get on stage and put on a 'show.' Many Lesbians and Gay Men in the legitimate theatre (and on screen) never have a chance to sing a love song to or about the person of their dreams. The five productions represented tonight have allowed us not only to camp it up and laugh, but also to share some of our deeper emotions." The picture of the chorus on stairs was taken at the 1992 GALA Choruses Festival in Denver. Don't we look fabulous.

Some of the madness that we presented onstage was to bring what we did backstage onto the stage. There were panels located on the stage behind which we did quick costume changes in preparation for the next songs. The shows we sang music from were "The Lesbian/Gay Chorus Rides Again," "The LGCSF Goes to the Movies," The LGCSF Goes to Broadway," "Radio Daze," and "Bobby Sox to Beatles." As you can imagine, each of these shows required different sets and costumes and of course all of the music for these shows was memorized. There was lots of hard work but it all paid off for us and for our audiences. For this concert, we had 76 members and Pat worked with Gregg Tallman as stage director and Gene Russo as choreographer. Pat's dedication to the chorus and his vision for it is what motivated us as singers to give our all to be the best we could be.

In 1994 and 1995 we had season brochures and the fact that we were able to do this was in large part due to the vision of Pat and our Board of Directors. In 1994, the chorus received the San Francisco Chamber of Commerce Arts Excellence Award. 1995 was our Crystal Anniversary year and it was called "A Season of Stars." We also had a Community Advisory Board up until 1996 and among the people on this board were a number of financial angels that helped the chorus behind the scenes.

In April of 1994, we travelled to Seattle as guests of the Seattle Lesbian and Gay Chorus to sing in their concert called "Boys and Girls Together." The Vancouver Lesbian and Gay Chorus were also on the concert. This was a great time for us to be able to meet and perform with these other wonderful singers. Also in March 1994 we recorded and released our first CD "Together in Harmony" featuring music that we had performed with Pat up to that point. One of the attachments is a copy of the order form for the CD we used. As you can see, 1994 was a busy year for us.

Also during these years, we were the producer of the Pride Concert so this meant arranging to have guest performers like the SFGMC and the Freedom Band, the Golden Gate Men's Chorus, Voices Lesbian Ensemble and other groups to share the stage. This also meant many meetings with representatives from all of these groups to have all of their program information and whatever staging needs might be needed. During this time, I was a member of the Production Committee. Pat always had big ideas especially for the production shows and we had to somehow rein him in and say this is our budget and we have to stick to it. I remember at that time all of the chorus committees worked closely together and there were monthly committee chair meetings to keep abreast of what we were all doing. Pat insisted that all of this coordination was happening to make things go as smoothly as possible as concert dates approached.

The big production concert of 1996 was a "Tribute to the Music of Elton John." Our accompanist, Dwight Okamura, was a big Elton fan and he really showed his piano chops during the concert, especially on "Funeral for a Friend/Love Lies Bleeding" from "Goodbye Yellow Brick Road," which opened the second half of the show. We had lots of fun at our weekend retreat decorating our big Elton glasses, and working on our costumes as well as the choreography and music for the show.

In 1997, we did a switch in our former concert order. Pat had always wanted to conduct "Carmina Burana" and the opportunity came up in conjunction with the Peninsula Ballet. We did two shows, one at the Palace of Fine Arts Theatre and at a theatre in Los Altos. The 1997 Pride Concert was Pat's last time conducting us and we gave the songs we sang and gave our all for him. It was a great sendoff for him but also a sad time for us. But we moved on and I will be writing about our next Artistic Director, Trente Morant, next week. See you then.

In harmony and love, Michael Lucero

As I continue the History Corner and writing about the Artistic Directors that I have sung with, I share my memories of the first five years with Pat Parr. After an artistic director search through early 1987, Pat was chosen by vote to be our new AD. As stated in his biography in the 9th Annual Pride Concert program, which was his first conducting the chorus, he came to LGCSF with a wide variety of musical experience. He was a Summa Cum Laude graduate of Oklahoma City University. Pat moved to San Francisco in 1976 and had been musical director of shows in SF, Berkeley, Santa Clara and Yosemite National Park. In 1980 he was accompanist for the San Francisco Girls Chorus and in 1982 became accompanist for the Contra Costa Chorale. He also sang with the Dick Kramer Gay Men's Chorale prior to becoming our AD.

I received a response from a former tenor in the chorus, Tim O'Bayley, saying that he had read my recent blog about Matt O'Grady and how much he enjoyed it as it brought back memories. Tim also said he was wondering what I would be writing about Pat since Tim joined the chorus in 190. As the chorus got to know him and Pat began to know the chorus through our first rehearsals, it was obvious that he was a good fit for us. With his blonde good looks and outgoing and welcoming personality, soon half of the men of the chorus had fallen in love with him.

As Pat met with the Board of Directors and the various committees of the chorus, he began to lay out what he wanted from the chorus regarding the types of concerts he envisioned us performing. He wanted to do a "stand and sing" style concert, which were mostly in the classical tradition but also to perform music by gay and lesbian composers. He also wanted us to do big shows with us in costumes and performing some sort of "choralography." And he wanted us to produce the Pride Concerts and also to sing in holiday concerts.

One thing that I remember about the first Pride Concert that Pat conducted was that was the first time we sang "Hand in Hand" by a member of the chorus, Jesse Kane. We sang this as the finale to the concert. In August, there was a review of this concert in The Advocate, and it said in part that "the surprises of the show were the Lesbian/Gay Chorus of San Francisco and its pops offshoot Menage, both under Pat's direction. Under the leadership of Parr, the Lesbian/Gay Chorus has discovered a new fullness and balance that previous concerts had not revealed. The group's singing of Jesse Kane's "Hand in Hand" provided one of the most moving moments in choral singing I've seen. On the last line, "We're hand in hand reaching out for one another, hand in hand," ASL interpreter Stefan Lazar stood still and sang while the chorus sang and signed the words." To me that was the signal that Pat would be taking us on a great and wonderful journey of really finding out who we were as singers and interpreters of the music we sang.

Our first big show was LGCSF Rides Again, a country western music themed show. We featured four country music dance groups from around the Bay Area and they were all big hits. Next for us in 1987, we were honored, along with the SFGMC, to be invited by Joan Baez to sing in her Christmas concert held at the Warfield Theatre. This was also broadcast live on KQED on that night.

In 1988, we followed the pattern of concerts that Pat had designed. Our spring concert was a classical one, in June was the Pride Concert, our fall concert was our big production show. By the time of the fall show, we were at 50 strong and growing. Also that year we were invited to participate in a fundraising show for the AIDS Emergency Fund at the Palace of Fine Arts Theatre called "In Memory of Friends and in Support of Those Living with AIDS."

In 1989, again we followed the above pattern of concerts. This year we also went to Seattle to perform over the course of a week in July at the GALA Choruses Festival along with 47 other choruses from the U.S. and Canada. This was an eye opening experience for us to know that there are all these other talented lesbian and gay choruses out there to learn from and share our love of music and to perform in front of our peers. This was held at the University of Washington and all choruses stayed in the dorms for the week. That of course led to lots of fun as we got to know the singers from other choruses who were staying just down the hall or a floor above or below us.

So next week I will be writing Part 2 of the Pat Parr years 1992-1997.

Love, in harmony, Michael Lucero