Quite an Opportunity to Let Their Voices Be Heard

The daunting reality sank in when we received the list of what we would need to perform at Walt Disney Concert Hall: our black folders, our vestments, our music arranged in order.

And then there was the note about the cough drops.

Bring them if we must, our choirmaster wrote, but, "Unwrap prior to going onstage, or during applause only."

Reading those words, several of us flashed on the same horrifying possibility: surreptitiously unwrapping a lozenge, cellophane crackling during a pause in the Bach orchestral piece, esteemed white-tied musicians and the entire 2,265-seat sold-out audience ever so politely frowning.

Our choir was accustomed to the forgiving stone walls of our Gothic-style church in Pasadena. But we had been invited to sing with the Los Angeles Philharmonic for two holiday concerts at Disney Hall, the Frank Gehry landmark acclaimed for having some of the finest acoustics in the world.

So we headed downtown with trepidation and plenty of unwrapped lozenges in our vestment pockets. We wore low-heeled, soft-soled shoes. Our choirmaster showed us how to cough without coughing -- mouths closed, an exercise akin to choking.

We rehearsed, again and again and again.

"Every note can be scrutinized. You can't hide behind your instrument," L.A. Philharmonic spokesman Adam Crane said of the hall.

"Every note has to sound completely perfect, because the audience can hear it. There is no better discipline."

This would make a better story if we were a small rural choir thrust upon the concert stage. But, in all candor, our parish, All Saints Episcopal Church, is large and established and has committed considerable funds to its music.

James Walker, our choirmaster and music director, has devoted 14 years to building up two strong adult ensembles, the Canterbury and Coventry choirs. Together, we are now 100 strong.

We are expected to be well rehearsed yet agile enough to sight-read. On Sundays, we sing at least two anthems, frequently a cappella, and lead the congregation in seven or eight hymns. The pace is fierce. And though we are mostly volunteers, squeezing in rehearsals between jobs and families, many of us grew up with music.

My maternal grandparents, mother, aunts and two sisters all sang in Episcopal choirs. At 7, I was instructed to memorize "Silent Night" and dispatched down the aisle with the rest of the children's choir, all in puffy, oversized white surplices. I sang through high school. So I wasn't a novice, even though I'd let decades go by before impulsively auditioning for the Canterbury choir five years ago.