take note.
Seelig conducting the choir at Davies Symphony Hall
One Big Night In July, a rare musical collaboration entitled Final Words celebrates the San Francisco Gay Men’s Chorus and the retirement of its groundbreaking artistic director.
AFTER MORE THAN 11 YEARS leading the San Francisco Gay Men’s Chorus (SFGMC) to new heights as artistic director, Tim Seelig is retiring in July. But in keeping with the chorus’ tradition of always going big, he’s not leaving without conducting one last epic concert — this time bringing in the San Francisco Symphony and the Oakland Interfaith Gospel Choir to join with the chorus at Davies Symphony Hall on July 13. “It’s going to be big,” Seelig says, laughing, then adds that the idea came to fruition after the symphony’s Jeffrey Jordan and SFGMC’s (www.sfgmc.org) Chris Verdugo resumed pandemic-delayed plans to work together and decided that the time was right to focus on honoring Seelig’s service to the gay community. They asked him, “How would you feel about the San Francisco Symphony presenting the chorus for your final concert? Of course, I fell to the floor. For the first time in my life I was speechless.” 40 july/august 2022 marin living.
Seelig’s long road to this night began when he was living in Dallas and came out at age 35 after being married and having two kids. It was 1987 and he had no idea that there was such a thing as a gay men’s chorus, but soon discovered that the Turtle Creek Chorale was looking for a conductor. “I auditioned for the job and started with a small, dysfunctional, codependent and bankrupt chorus. We were a perfect match,” he says. After 20 years there, Seelig stepped down and, as fate would have it, began flying out to serve as an SFGMC guest conductor for a ’60s-themed show at Davies Symphony Hall featuring Joan Baez. Soon after, he was offered the job full time. “I didn’t know if I had it in me to climb one more hill,” says Seelig, but in the end “a job as the artistic director of the SFGMC — the grandfather of the movement — was just too intriguing to me.” The SFGMC set the tone for that movement (that now includes hundreds of gay choruses across the nation) in 1978
Photo by Gooch
By Daniel Jewett
