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SATURDAY DECEMBER 24 | SUNDAY DECEMBER 25 2016
DailyNorthShore.com
SPORTS
New Trier’s Isabelle Sennett stars in three sports. P19
SUNDAY BREAKFAST Noshing with St. Nick. P26
NO. 220 | A JWC MEDIA PUBLICATION
NEWS
SOCIAL SCENE
The Woman’s Board of the Chicago Horticultural Society held the 11th annual All Aboard! gala. P16 FOLLOW US:
Renaissance teens
Rauner tax freeze scares LFHS North Shore Madrigals’ officials holiday spirit BY STEVE SADIN DAILYNORTHSHORE.COM
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orth Shore officials are not thrilled with Gov. Bruce Rauner’s proposal for a property tax freeze, worrying it will force them to make cuts at the local level. The governor recently made the freeze one of two conditions for a budget deal with leaders of the Illinois General Assembly for the fiscal year, which started July 1. The state has been without an official spending plan since then. When Rauner and legislative leaders were unable to formulate a budget in June, they agreed to a stopgap measure for the remainder of the year to keep the state operating, according to the Chicago Tribune. Rauner, a Republican, Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan (D-Chicago) and state Senate President John Cullerton (D-Chicago) have been unable to reconcile their differences since. Initially refusing another temporary agreement, Rauner said last Continued on PG 10
strong after 20 concerts BY STEVE SADIN DAILYNORTHSHORE.COM
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he Lake Forest High School Madrigal Singers spreads holiday spirit throughout the community – a lot of it. In just three weeks, the 34-member a cappella ensemble of student-led vocal musicians gives 20 Christmas concerts. Dressed in Renaissance-era costumes, the singers performed at country club Christmas parties; monthly Rotary Club meetings; senior centers, and Westmoreland Nursing Home’s hospice care facility. “We perform for the super, super wealthy at their country clubs and for people who are in hospice (care) at a nursing home,” said Will Johnson, a senior and one of the group’s three student leaders who has been a member for four years. As they have in the past, the singers go into the hospice portion of the nursing home knowing they could be giving a terminally ill patient the last Christmas activity they will experience. “Last year they sang for a person who died a few hours later,” said Tim Haskett, the director of choral activities at the school. “It’s such a rewarding experience for those people and their families.” For Jonathon Panos, a senior and another of the student
Lake Forest High School junior Henry Lunn and senior Gracie Stockton performing for the city’s Rotary Club. PHOTO BY JOEL LERNER.
leaders, the time spent at Westmoreland is a highlight of the three-week concert series. He described it as a special spirit of giving. “Words cannot describe the feeling of bringing happiness to a patient in hospice by singing a cappella pieces, or how the happiness of a patient can be seen by the joyful tears streaming down the patient’s face while the Madrigals choir is singing,” said Panos. The emotion is not only evident from the patient but from
his or her family members who share the experience too, according to Sarah Curran, another senior and student leader who is in her second year with the singers. “We were one of the last living people to see this man,” Curran said of a patient listening to them last year at Westmoreland. “It was so special to see his wife in the room and the love they had between them.” Not anyone can be part of the Madrigal Singers. Haskett, who
has been in charge of the group for 30 years, said the students audition, and 17 boys and another 17 girls are chosen. He said the group has been part of the school’s culture for more than 40 years. He picks the three leaders who conduct the group when they perform. “It’s a very student-run group,” said Haskett. “I rehearse them but the three leaders do all the conducting. They bob their heads up and down setting the pace while everyone sings.”
Conducting is one of the challenges for Panos, Curran and Johnson as they use their heads, faces and the hand not joined with their partner to communicate as they sing with the other members of the group. “Throughout a piece, a student leader will subtly lower or raise one of their hands in order to communicate to the rest of the group to either crescendo or decrescendo, or whether a specific Continued on PG 10
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