Choral Capo Canned
Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites »
Garrin–who was also associate conductor of the CSO Chorus for more than a decade until 1992–was out of town earlier this week and did not respond to messages left on his answering machine. But several of those who worked with him over the years say he was a demanding, at times difficult leader. Observes Scott Director, WCGC’s former executive director: “Richard was artistically gifted; his standard of musical interpretation was the highest.” Sam Heller, another former executive director of the chorus and former chorus board member, thinks that standard may have been part of his undoing: “The fact that Garrin stayed true to classical traditions…and did not do anything too campy diminished the potential audience for the chorus.” Patrick Sinozich, the chorus’s accompanist for the past two and a half years under Garrin, was named acting director while the board conducts a national search for Garrin’s replacement. Sinozich says Garrin had a vision of the Windy City Gay Chorus as “a real elite,” and that he hopes to reach a “more diverse audience” by paying more attention to the “entertainment aspects” of the group’s repertoire.
There’s another factor here: the Chicago Gay Men’s Chorus, a competing choral group that split off from WCGC 11 years ago and has subsequently pursued a much more aggressively entertainment-oriented artistic policy. “There is little that is sacred to us,” says Roger Gumm, vice president of that group’s board of directors. While previous Windy City Gay Chorus programs have included world premieres of “serious” works (such as this past June’s Letters to the Future, a mix of music by Roger Bourland and letters from poets about what life will be like for gays and lesbians in the next century), Chicago Gay Men’s Chorus programs have been filled with Broadway show tunes and pop standards; they’ve even done staged productions of The Mikado and The Pirates of Penzance. “We’ve always kept a choreographer on staff,” says Gumm. The distinct difference in artistic perspectives is also evident in the mottoes of the two organizations. WCGC’s is “in search of musical excellence,” while Chicago Gay Men’s Chorus uses a phrase made famous by pop diva Bette Midler: “Fuck ’em if they can’t take a joke.” Though it too has seen a slight drop-off in audience, the Chicago Gay Men’s Chorus, which operates on an annual budget of $100,000, is in the black, according to Gumm. “We’ve had to work like the devil to stay that way,” he adds. The group is currently exploring new ways of reaching its target audience, including direct mail and an increased emphasis on season subscriptions.
