This year Chicago Chorale celebrates its 20th Anniversary. In honor of this momentous occasion, some of our singers have agreed to share their experience of singing with Chorale. This is a reflection by member Sophie Littleton, who has been with the group for 20 years:
Early in April, when I was asked if I would write a reflection on my years singing with Chicago Chorale, I did not know that I was being given an opportunity to honor my mother. But, during the first 2 weeks in April, at the age of 95, she went from home to hospital to hospice, and now on to whatever that next state is. It is a state that we often sing about in sacred music.
My mother was English and was raised in the Anglican church. Naturally, when she came to the United States and began to raise her family she put her children in the choir at the local Episcopalian church. I’ve now sung in choirs almost continuously from the age of 6. I sang in choirs at the University of Chicago, in the Grant Park Chorus, and other groups around the city. I met our Artistic Director, Bruce Tammen, while singing in a small chanting service. Bruce introduced me to so many opportunities: Motet Choir, Collegium Musicum, and a group singing Medieval chant and performing liturgical drama. But when I moved from Hyde Park to the suburbs I stopped singing. I was busy with family life, a new neighborhood, and earning a degree. Then, just as I was beginning to realize how deeply I missed it, I learned Bruce was starting up Chicago Chorale, and I auditioned. That was 20 years ago.
Singing is a practice. We do it regularly, with attention – attention to something we can’t really see or touch. It’s mysterious. It all comes down to the breath in our body. Other practices have come later in life, like meditation and yoga, and psychotherapy. They too, all come down to the breath in our bodies; that mysterious thing which left my mother two weeks ago.
Sacred music is a literature across so many centuries and in so many languages, all to express something we can’t really see or touch. When we sing sacred works these are the words that are in our mouths and on our tongues. They have been on my tongue for so many years, over and over. Sometimes I believe them, and sometimes I don’t. But they have always been on my tongue and in my mouth. Like a practice.
Each concert season, during preparation, or in performance, there comes a sort of timeless moment. I become newly aware of what I am doing, of what is happening. It is a sort of union of breath and body, intention and word, and all of our individuality falls away in the sound. Such a moment can be breath-taking. Yet at that moment, I need all the breath I can get!
For our upcoming concert we are working on a piece, “God is Seen”. The text arouses strong memories for me. “Search hills and valleys through, There He’s found”. It reminds me of moments when this greater awareness has come to me in the natural world, say, working in the garden when the wind comes up. We all have such moments, but it is easy to lose them through inattention. When we sing we join with others across the ages - composers, poets, musicians, and audiences - all striving to bring attention to what is vital; that thing that we know, but cannot quite see or touch.