In my twelve years on the Sonoma City Council, I spent two Wednesday nights a month singing praises and damning failures. Now my Wednesday nights are spent just singing.
Vox Populi, a new Sonoma rock ‘n’ roll chorus, is the brainchild of Mark Dennis, my yoga teacher of four years, a local artist, talented musician and my friend. For years Mark has had the fantasy of forming such a chorus, and several months ago, he finally did. About 30 of us have been singing together – Beatles, Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young, Van Morrison, Leonard Cohen – all arranged by Mark, who commands the group with great aplomb and humor. If instead of saying, “Let’s begin,” he said, “Down Dog,” we’d drop to all fours and dutifully point our tailbones to the ceiling. Like any choirmaster worth his salt, Mark is the boss – benevolent but relentless, he impels us to perfection.
Many of you may have seen the recent documentary “Young at Heart” about a rock ‘n’ roll chorus of senior citizens, average age 80. It’s a well-made and quite moving film, and leaves no doubt that singing as a group has not only provided companionship and stimulation, but has actually extended and enhanced each group member’s life enormously.
Vox Populi is a mixed-age chorus, but I’d say most members are old enough to already know many words to the songs we sing. It’s an odd thing about getting older, the body changes, but for most of us the memories and mind stay sharp. So singing songs I first heard forty years ago feels absolutely natural; these tunes are in our blood, and singing them together in Mark’s five-part harmony feels just great.
From time to time I stop singing and simply listen. We’re getting pretty good, despite the on-and-off attendance and regular appearance of new faces. In fact, I’d say that on occasion we sound sublime, and in some magical way, when it happens we all feel it. There’s a moment’s pause, our eyes connect, and we just know something extraordinary has occurred. It’s nothing any one of us could do alone; it takes a village to make choral music.
It’s delightful to discover that someone you know, but slightly or solely in another context, has a lovely singing voice. The gentleman who made copies for you, a local architect, a masseuse, a hospice nurse, a therapist, a teacher; all of a sudden politics and points of view, attitudes and incomes become irrelevant. It is a simply joyful exercise of humanity-in-common, doing something people have been enjoying forever.
The musicality is glorious, yet the laughs and camaraderie are even better. There is so much in life we let divide us from each other – opinions, after all, are a dime a dozen. In reality, we all share the special gift of being human and a primordial inheritance of establishing connection that predates points of view. Singing uses neural pathways that are not the same as those used in speech; this is why people who speak with a stutter can sing flawlessly. The flow of song excites an ancient sensory network, one embedded deeply at the core of our human experience.
Mark tells us we will be singing in the Plaza at 12:30 on the Fourth of July. Not for money, by the way, just for love.
