Editor's Note: This is part of the News Bulletin's special coverage, "100 years of hometown pride."
Please see the insert, with the same title, in the Dec. 19-22 Weekend Edition for more stories about North Okaloosa County's centennial celebrations.
CRESTVIEW — The Crestview High School chorus will leave town for spring competitions and performances during the second half of the group's 70th anniversary.
But it's local performances that bring the greatest rewards, choral music director Kevin Lusk said.
"When we sing in the community, the response is, ‘Wow, these are great kids; we just hear about the bad kids," he said. "We say, ‘Hey, here are kids who care about you and care about the town.’ We belong to the community and we like to go out there and perform.”
EARLY DAYS AND EVOLUTION
Betty Curenton, who attended CHS in the early 1950s, fondly recalls the school's glee club, which formed in 1945. “It was a good time,” she said. “We’d practice just about every day … I was just today humming a tune, ‘Yankee Doodle went to town… That was in our music book."
Lusk, who has directed the chorus since 1995, said the program has evolved. Now, "it benefits the kids by giving them opportunities to grow and perform as vocalists, and to travel,” he said.
The chorus attends regional, national and international competitions, and music festivals, offering experiences otherwise unavailable to students from a rural community. CHS chorus students have performed in Carnegie Hall, at the Statue of Liberty, the U.S. Capitol, the Grand Ole Opry, St. George Cathedral in London, Casa Loma Castle in Toronto, and at Disney World, among other venues.
The program prepares students, regardless of their singing goals, Lusk said. “We have kids who will go on and sing in church choirs and community choirs, but we have kids who have gone on to Broadway and the theme parks in Orlando,” he said. “We have everything from ‘Hey, I’ll use this in my church singing’ to those who make it a profession.”
TEACHERS
Shirley Cadle is among 20 teachers who've trained voices since the CHS choral music program's inception.
“I remember just having the most talented and outgoing students," said Cadle who helmed the program from 1980 to 1994. "We were like a family.”
Crestview Mayor David Cadle, her husband, directed the Big Red Machine more than 25 years. The couple frequently collaborated on spring stage musicals, with band members forming a pit orchestra while the chorus performed Broadway songs. “It was really rewarding,” Mayor Cadle said.
Shirley Cadle said one of the biggest accolades of her career came from two of choral music’s biggest names. “We were at a competition at Disney,” she said. “The judges were (renowned music arranger) Norman Luboff and (award-winning choirmaster) Frank Pooler. Normal Luboff made a comment after we performed a chorus line-type show: He said he didn’t think he was going to get a performance. We got a 99 from him, and I cherish that.”
But her biggest reward was building a small program into the community’s premiere choral group. “When I first started the program, I had 13 students,” she said. “When I left, I had 180.”
TODAY
The CHS chorus’ popularity was evident at the Dec. 15 Christmas concert in the school's Pearl Tyner Auditorium. For the finale, following a tradition begun by Lusk, former members were invited to join the massed chorus for Handel’s “Hallelujah Chorus.”
More than 25 alumni squeezed onto the risers, adding their voices to the 120 already assembled as many audience members rose to their feet, paying the traditional respect that King George II purportedly showed the piece at its 1743 London premiere.
After performances at local retirement homes and the Crestview Public Library’s Noel Night, chorus members headed home, concluding the first half of their 70th year. The second half includes a spring concert, usually in May; representing Crestview at the Mississippi Show Choir Competition in Poplarville, and the Southern Showcase near Auburn, Ala.; and regional and state competitions.
“You have (school) groups that never get a whole lot of recognition, and then you have groups like the band and chorus that are very visible to the community,” Lusk said.
“We’re happily one of those that people recognize and appreciate.”
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CRESTVIEW’S CHORUS
Crestview High School's chorus comprises these choirs:
Chanticleer: An elite show choir of vocalists who perform 20 or more times during each school year
Destiny: Female vocalists who sing and dance locally and nationally
Chorale: The 50 or more members of this choir must maintain a 2.0 grade point average and master basic musicianship
Men’s and Women’s Choirs: All choral music students start their vocal training in these choirs before being selected for the show choirs or chorale
Source: Crestview High School
WANT TO HEAR MORE?
Crestview radio station WAAZ/WJSB, 104.7 FM and 1050 AM, will broadcast highlights of the Crestview High School chorus and band’s Christmas concerts on Dec.25.
The chorus concert will air at 10:06 a.m.; the band will follow at 11:06 a.m.
This article originally appeared on Crestview News Bulletin: Crestview High chorus celebrates 70th anniversary