Singing Outside the Mold

I was extremely active in my high school’s choir. I spent more time, and certainly got more joy out of it, than I did in most of my classes. Not that I was a fantastic singer, but I found happiness in the group’s sound.

Coming to Grinnell, I assumed I would leave that world behind. I knew I would have a work-study job, I knew I wanted to concentrate on building friendships more than anything, and most of all, I was terrified of the work load I had heard college brought with it. So I assumed that whatever time was not spent in the dishroom or making friends to last a lifetime would be spent studying.

Silly me — I thought I would be OK with that sacrifice.

Instead, I regretted not trying out for the Grinnell Singers horribly. It was painful how much I missed the camaraderie of a choir, and the satisfaction that came of being part of a wall of sound.

I was right, however, that my time would be precious. I had very few free nights, and even if I did try out for Singers later on, I knew that it would require more time than I could give. On a whim, second semester of my first year, I left dinner Wednesday night with a couple of friends and walked with them toward Bucksbaum Center for the Arts. That night I attended my first YGB rehearsal.

YGB, or Young, Gifted, and Black Gospel Choir, is now one of my favorite activities. You may think, when hearing the name of this choir, that there is a certain type of person who is a member. But I promise you, Grinnell is a place where we fight every social construct created.

I am Christian, so for me there is meaning in the music that we sing. But the two girls I went with that first night are both Jewish. Other members of the choir are professed atheists or agnostics. Similarly, I am caucasian, so there is another criterion I might not seem to fit. We also have several members who practice with us who live in the town of Grinnell, and are not exactly “young.”

The common factor in all of us? We love to sing. Without fail, there are smiles on all of our faces. We sing, laugh, dance, and tour together. Once more, I am a member of a wall of sound that thrills me to the core.

This wall also spreads God’s word and joy to communities across the country. I said that every member of the choir smiles and laughs, but that is nothing to the expressions that I see on the faces of those we sing for. You can see that our music reaches the congregations and schools we sing to on tour. This is an awesome thing, whether you believe in God or not. Changing someone’s life while singing and dancing is without a doubt one of the best ways you can spend your time, and I have never once regretted walking into that rehearsal last year.

Karin Bursch ’12 is undecided about her major and from Iowa City, IA.