Hunsicker, Masser, Madrigals

For the last few decades, the Northern Lebanon has had a Senior Choir as well as a choir that is smaller and harder to get into. While under the instruction of Max Hunsicker, this select choir was called the Northern Lites. They sang more challenging music than the concert choir did and were considered the better singers. Well he retired just 4 years ago, and, for the first year, the Northern Lites lived on. However, after that, the new instructor, Molly Masser, added a group referred to as the Madrigal Singers. The Northern Lites still sang the same types of music as before, but the Madrigal group sang just that; madrigals. These are older folk songs from the Renaissance period. During Mrs. Masser's third year of directing the high school, she decided to combine the two group and have one group called the Chamber Choir. This allowed to have the choir assigned as a class for school credit so that we could practice during the day instead of at 6:30 in the morning two days a week like we had been. I loved the change!
Another change that the chamber choir brought was that, since we were one group and had more time to practice, we performed more. Our director considers it "touring", but it is more commonly know (to the students) as getting out of school. We do a Madrigal feast around Thanksgiving time where we all get costumes and sing madrigal songs, as well as acting and performing skits, with many the occasional dance! Before our evening performance, however, we were able to travel to the four elementary schools in our district and sing a few songs for them simply for publicity. Some of the teachers actually came to the dinner theatre!