I was a member of our high school’s elite concert choir. It was recognized for having some really talented vocalists. I wasn’t really one of the outstanding soloist, but I had a solid background from years of singing in the church choir and could sing in tune, and carry the bass harmony parts. I was one of the handful of Sophomore students, chosen to be in the Concert Choir that was made up of junior and senior high school students.
Several times throughout the school year, the concert choir would travel around and perform. It had been on one of our previous choir tours, that we had found ourselves up in the big capital city of Indianapolis on Nov. 22, 1963.
I don’t remember anything about those concerts, but I will always remember that when we arrived at one of the schools ready to give an afternoon concert, we were told by some of the students that were there to greet us, that President Kennedy had been shot.
I didn’t believe them. I figured the big city kids were just trying to put something over on us country bumpkins, but as the day progressed, I kept hearing news of the killing from different sources and I began to think that maybe it had happened. Sometime before we left Indianapolis that the evening, I managed to buy a newspaper and seeing the news in print, erased any doubt in my mind about the event.
Anyway, in 1964 our Concert Choir was again scheduled to tour, this time to give performances at a couple of outlying rural/regional high schools. I didn’t really think too much about the concerts beforehand, except to revel in the prospect of getting out of classes for a day. Because we were to perform in smaller schools in rural sections of Indiana, instead of playing the part of the “country bumpkins” as we did in Indianapolis, we would be the urban sophisticates, and our audience would be the bumpkins.
The photo shows me, the Beatle, in the choir. I had an interesting day ahead of me.
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