About a month after finishing a very successful inaugural season for the Concert Singers of Cary, I received a phone call from Kaye Struffolino who was then working in the administrative office of the North Carolina Symphony. Kaye has been and still is a tour de force in Cary, having served the community on boards, commissions, and committees for close to four decades. There is a park in Cary that bears her name and her positive influence in the evolution of Cary is well known. You can read of her many accomplishments here. Kay’s reason for calling was to extend an invitation from Gerhardt Zimmerman, then music director of the North Carolina Symphony. “Are you interested in having the Concert Singers perform the finale of Beethoven’s Symphony #9 the following June (1993) with the orchestra at the annual Summerfest outdoor series at Regency Park?” Was I interested? Of course I was interested! Kay suggested that I discuss it with our board and get back to her in a week or so. I thanked her profusely and said I would respond soon. There was no question in my mind that the Board would accept but wanted to ensure that it was their decision to do so.

The opportunity to collaborate with the state symphony was not in any way on our radar, but the benefits were immeasurable. Advantages included great visibility to attract new singers and sponsors, the opportunity to perform works that we could never produce on our own, as well as singing under local and touring orchestral conductors, a great learning experience for the singers. We had spent the previous two years planning our first concerts and developing a vision of who we wanted to be. I thought about collaborating with an orchestra at some point but felt that it would be years away and assumed that if it did happen it would be a smaller ensemble. 

Working with a group like The North Carolina Symphony really got the attention of town leadership as an opportunity for a Cary musical organization to be involved, giving us a higher level of legitimacy. It supported the Summerfest Series, the Concert Singers and other local performing arts groups in developing performances in Regency Park, which is now the location of the Koka Booth Amphitheatre. 

Cary made a shrewd investment in the 90’s by buying 8 acres of land in the center of Regency business park with the idea that they would eventually build an outdoor amphitheater there. The thinking, as I was told back then, was that most performances would be held in the evening or on the weekends, and that the parking lots of the business parks would be available to the facility outside of business hours when parking was needed for concert attendees. The current facility named after the former mayor Booth was opened in 2001, but prior to that the outdoor series was held under a portable stage and tent.

The Board of the Concert Singers unanimously accepted the N.C. Symphony’s invitation. My job was to prepare the chorus for Mr. Zimmerman and perform as a member of the chorus, a role that I was pleased to do. On the one hand, it was a great opportunity that came sooner than expected. It was a huge step for us. I had always imagined that when the opportunity came to collaborate with an orchestra, it would be to sing something a bit easier than Beethoven 9. 

Our membership numbers were running in the 80’s which was a bit short for Beethoven 9, even for an outdoor performance with amplification. It was an opportunity to recruit and the publicity of our participation with the orchestra drove our membership numbers over 100. I seem to recall that we performed with about 110 singers, but I don’t have a program to document that. I do know that we accepted a number of fine singers, at least half of which were men.

The remaining piece of the process was making sure that I was prepared to prepare. I sang the 9th twice with the N.Y. Philharmonic as a member of the Westminster Symphonic Choir under conductors Pierre Boulez and Rafael Kubelik. That does not count as a qualification, but I was always a student who bought a small paperback study edition of the full score for most large-scale choral works that we sang and transferred markings into them for safe keeping and potential future use. I was also the beneficiary of what became a 47-year mentorship from Joseph Flummerfelt, Director of Choral Activities at Westminster, and Chorus Master of the N.Y. Philharmonic. Joe always had time for a former student who wanted to learn something new. I worked with him at Westminster that summer, a month after the invitation came. I was there for three weeks to participate in his conducting workshop and sing on a CD that he was making. Joe walked me through the choral Finale of the work. He provided some additional insights into the preparation but confirmed most of the assumptions I had from my score markings and previous performances. 

The rehearsals and performance went extremely well. There was one quirk in the evening. Mr. Zimmerman, who is right-handed, conducted most of the performance with his left hand after leading the rehearsals with his right hand. He told me after the performance that he had strained his right shoulder. It went well except for the orchestra’s transition to the Prestissimo in the final 21 bars. Overall, it was a great evening. Most importantly, we were invited back for Summerfest the following year. The Concert Singers became frequent participants with the North Carolina Symphony at Summerfest, the Pops series at Memorial Auditorium and Meymandi Concert Hall, and other touring productions.

Next up: Chapter 5 – New Collaborations