LGCSF History Corner: 1982 Part 1

Happy February to all my faithful readers. This week I will be writing about the first half of 1982 for the San Francisco Lesbian and Gay Men's Community Chorus. We were still under the umbrella of the Golden Gate Performing Arts and they produced a spring season brochure which laid out what the two San Francisco choruses would be presenting in the first half of 1982.

SFGMC put on four productions between March and May. The first was "With a Song in My Heart" and featured the vocal soloists of the chorus. The second was "Fabulous Follies of 1982" which was a program featuring guest artists and they had two perforances and was promoted as a benefit for SFGMC. Their third was "Rites of Spring" and was a departure as it was mostly a dance concert and presented the debut of the Falcon Dance Theatre. This was also presented on two nights. The fourth was "From Ops to Pops" and there were also two performances, one in San Francisco and the second in Palo Alto at Stanford University. From the paperwork of GGPA regarding this season and the post concert breakdowns, of the SFGMC concerts that were two nights the ticket sales were poor and they had half empty performance halls.

Our chorus presented two concerts and appeared in the 4th Annual Gay Musical Celebration. First up for us was our spring concert "Romance ,n Rhythm" held on March 27 at the First Unitarian Church. There were 97 of us who sang this concert. We performed "Messa di Gloria" by Puccini. Next the Chamber Chorus sang a piece by Palestrina. Then Gary Miller, director of the New York City Gay Men's Chorus, was here as a guest conductor to conduct the chorus singing Benjamin Britten's "Hymn to St. Cecilia." Next on the program the Vocal Minority sang "Fascinating Rhythm," "If It's Magic" by Stevie Wonder, and a tribute to Louis Armstrong - "Hello Dolly," "Basin Street Blues," and "When the Saints Go Marching In."

The full chorus was back to sing the final four songs of the evening. They were "All the Things You Are" by Jerome Kern, "Song to Celia" by P.D.Q. Bach, "I Am the Monarch of the Sea" by Gilbert & Sullivan and finished with "The Rhythm of Life" by Cy Coleman. For this concert and the following one we reached out to women's organizations to encourage them to buy tickets and that was successful.

The next concert was "Love Songs" and featured our two small groups, the Vocal Minority and the Chamber Chorus. They put on two shows at Albion Hall on May 16.

The final concert was the Gay Musical Celebration held on June 25 at the Civic Auditorium. This concert brought back the SF Gay Freedom Day Marching Band and Twirling Corps to perform with the two choruses. Also on the program were the San Francisco Tap Troupe. SFGMC performed the "Coronation Scene from Boris Godumov" by Modest Musorgskii and accompanied by the Bay Area Women's Quartet. The two choruses, the Tap Troupe and the 1982 Gay Olympics Color Guard performed "San Francisco Medley Revisited" with Robin Kay conducting and two pianists our Bill Ganz and SFGMC's Andy Pesce.

I will be writing about the second half of 1982 next week which has some interesting new things for the chorus so stay tuned.

As always we are in harmony, Michael Lucero

"Life without music would be a mistake."