Publication Date: Wednesday, December 15, 2004
Our Town: Joy to the World
Our Town: Joy to the World
(December 15, 2004) by Don Kazak
Bill Liberatore, sitting at the piano, begins playing a rousing, swinging version of "Jingle Bells," singing softly over the notes, while 150 students begin moving as one, dipping and stepping.
The students are mimicking Gay Richard, a former Gunn High School parent who comes back every year to choreograph the Gunn Choir's big show.
Liberatore stops playing and 150 students come to jerky stops. They are supposed to sing "He's Dashing!" as a response to "Dashing Through the Snow."
"It has to be 100 times louder," Liberatore tells his students. He turns back to the piano: "Five-six-seven-eight. Dashing through the snow ...." "HE'S DASHING!"
Welcome to rehearsal for "ScroogeMart: A Uniquely American Christmas Carol," the show the students, along with 50 teachers and staff, will bring to the bright stage lights of Spangenberg Theatre tonight and tomorrow night.
The show is full of Christmas music, ensemble dance moves and, as is the case with these shows, a lot of light-hearted fun.
Liberatore started doing the shows "on the big stage," as he puts it, in 1997 as an annual fund-raiser for the Gunn Choir's more serious music and tours.
Liberatore, a Palo Alto native -- he attended former Cubberley High School and graduated from Paly -- began teaching at Gunn in 1989 and took over the Gunn Choir in 1990 when it had 14 girls. It now numbers about 150, roughly 100 girls and 50 boys.
Nancy Hersage writes the scripts for the big shows. Liberatore does the music.
"What we do is very unique and very strange," he says, laughing.
The kids love it.
Matt Simons, 17, a junior, is in his second show. "Mr. Liberatore has such a fun attitude about it," he says.
"The whole point is to have fun," said Emma Gilman, 16, a junior in her third show. "It's pretty much the best part of choir year."
"He likes to have fun, but part of it is to be focused because thousands of people will come to see it and you want to have a good show," Simons adds.
The seriousness comes through later in the rehearsal when Liberatore runs through the schedule for the coming week, including weekend rehearsals, before opening night.
He tells them how important it is to work on the different songs and dance moves during weekend rehearsals.
"When I look at your number on Tuesday, if it's a mess it's not in the show," he says. "It's not me being mean."
The students listen quietly.
The Gunn shows revived a tradition that predated Liberatore. "I came into a school which had a long tradition of teachers and staff performing together," Liberartore explained earlier. "I resurrected the idea."
The students obviously get a kick out of the singing and dancing. While Richard puts them through their dance steps during rehearsal, the students are sometimes off a beat, each watching her. But they can sing. This is, after all, the Gunn Choir.
"The choreography makes it special," Liberatore said.
Susan Ellis designs the costumes, which the parents of the performers sew.
"The teachers are wild about doing it," Liberatore said. "Fifty is the fewest we've had."
While it's fun, it's also a "massive project," Liberatore said, referring to the 150 choir members, 50 teachers, the band, the costumes, the choreography, and all the different songs and numbers.
Work on this show started right after the choir's Oct. 28 fall concert. "It takes five, six weeks," Liberatore said, to put the show together. "It's a zany thing, but we don't want to spend too much time on it."
At one point during rehearsal last week, Richard was running the boys through a dance number while Liberatore was in the band room, working with the girls singing "Joy to the World." He first does the alto parts, then the soprano parts.
Liberatore stands at the partially covered piano, hunched over, playing. Sometimes he just carries the tune with his right hand while his left hand taps out the beat on the piano top.
"Up a tone, here," he says.
The girls are intent, singing softly, getting it right.
Weekly Senior Staff Writer Don Kazak can be e-mailed at dkazak@paweekly.com.
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