Maple City Barbershop performs at Elderwood, Archie Bunker, and “Colors of Winter”
By Chuck Wiser I write the words to share what my eyes see and my heart feels
The Genesee Valley Chorus (GVC) would like to reach out to the Wellsville, NY area and express our gratitude for your continued support and especially for your attendance at our Winter concert presented to a capacity audience Sunday, December 3rd. Shown below are images of the chorus in performance mode and the audience in rapt viewing mode.
Pictured are the Genesee Valley Chorus singers and The Grace United Church audience.
This time of year is always filled with the emotions that cover the whole gamut. From the depths of sorrow and pain remembering lost ones that you will be without for the first time this year, to the joy of seeing the face of a youngster seeing their first Christmas at a “rememberful” age. One of the most obvious displays of the joy of this celebration is the playing or singing and sharing of Christmas or holiday music. From even the youngest of voices of school age children to the oldest imaginable, music compositions centuries old are still the “fan favorites.”
I have had the luxury, and blessing, of being able to perform with several different musical groups over the years. I will mention a couple of them, with the subliminal suggestion that others join these groups so they too can join in, and experience, the wonderful feeling that spreads throughout your body as you softly and reverently sing “Silent Night” or mirthful feeling as you belt out a cheerful rendition of Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer. The two “formal” organizations that I perform with have slightly different venues albeit both with the same motivation.
Sharing the music of the season via the Genesee Valley Chorus (GVC) is primarily aimed at the mobile public able to visit the establishment wherein the music generates.
The other musical organization, with whom I perform is the Maple City Barbershop Chorus, based in Hornell, NY, whose musical mission of this season is directed more toward performing for listeners whose housing is now more typically in some fashion of an “assisted living facility” such as Elderwood in Hornell, NY, or The Manor in Wellsville, NY.
Pictured here is a mid-sized group of the Maple City singers performing recently at Elderwood. My personal preference between those two diverse outlets is the performance at the Assisted Living facilities. The residents are normally gathered in a large open area such as their dining hall and the performers are at the same ground floor level, mere feet away. Our performances include the age-old seasonal songs and as such need very little sight reading so the singers can spend most of their singing time not only watching the director for their cues, but also gazing into the eyes, and seeing the joy on the faces of the audience members. It is especially gratifying to see the lips of those in the audience as they shape the words of the tunes that are so familiar to them. We invite them to sing along if the “spirit moves them.”
As the song lyric says… “🎶🎶🎶Tis the season to be jolly 🎶🎶🎶
Keeping on with the theme of sharing the message of joyous seasonal presentations, it is a pleasure to also share this poster featuring another holiday performance by the “Arts” group as noted.
Now a few Wramblings:
My wife is a big fan of the re-runs of the “family comedy” venue of shows, one of which is “All In The Family” featuring Archie Bunker. If I should happen to “hit the sack” whilst that particular program is still on, I’m forced to watch along with her as it is impossible to get to sleep. The other night as I watched the main character Archie, and his wife Edith, my observation made me realize how “visual” that show is in one particular area. If you’ve ever seen an episode, and think about it, I think you’ll agree that the facial expressions that those actors go through in any, and all, conversations is mind boggling. When that show was on decades ago it was never as apparent to me, but now it is the one thing that stands out even further than the “red-neck” characterization of Archie.
My mother used to admonish me frequently when eating some of the typical Christmas season “hard candies” regarding the possibility of breaking a tooth by biting the hard candies. Little did I know that eating a Jellybean could pose the same risk. I guess it’s a little, but not too personal, to admit wearing dentures. I was born with a hereditary gene of soft enameled teeth and have been a denture wearer since the age of 17 years. Wednesday night whilst eating a Jellybean (my favorite flavor licorice, as if that would matter), I commenced chewing the piece of candy.
About two chews in it felt like there was a harder piece of the confection as I couldn’t bite through it. Luckily, I guess, I spit it into my hand instead of swallowing it and discovered a small hard object about a quarter inch square. Upon inspection it looked like a tooth, so feeling across my teeth I discovered that there was a gap where a tooth should have been. I was baffled to think that a chewy Jellybean could be so dangerous. I didn’t think my super-gluing expertise would suffice so I made the trip to Aspen Dental in Olean and left the injured apparatus in their care. Undoubtedly it will require a whole new plate and now I guess “all I want for Christmas is my own tooth back.”
My intention upon contemplating this week’s writing was to include one of my earlier poems, one of which became a published song, Co-written with Dave Dunbar. It was our my second such. As coincidence would have it Craig Braack posted a picture yesterday titled the “Colors of Winter”. I guess the recent cold spell triggered the same feelings and inspiration in both of us.
If you have comments, questions, or a topic that you would like to look into or write about please feel free to reach out to me at im.wiserdad@gmail.com.
As always I thank you for reading, and especially to those who have taken the time to reach out to me with your comments.
