Coming Home For the Coronet Club, convention week is a flurry of final rehearsals, welcoming competing quartets, a powerhouse show, celebrating newly-crowned queens and memories to last until next year. BY MAGGIE RYAN GREATER HARRISBURG CHORUS, REGION #19 PHOTOS BY CLAIRE GARDINER
The end of an era: Sweet Adelines’ longest-active champion quartet, “The Buzz,” (2005) retire on a high note in their final Coronet Club performance.
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right lights, vivid gowns and the crowns – oh, those crowns – set the Coronet Club Show apart from every other event at Sweet Adelines International’s annual convention. But the show is more than the exclamation point for a week of fierce competition. It’s a homecoming and a celebration of the best among us, on a grand, yet intimate, scale. It begins months ahead, just like our own chapter shows. A theme is developed, music approved and choreography mapped out. Sheet music and learning tracks are mailed worldwide. It turns out a good portion of our international quartet champions don’t read music. And when they get together for that once-a-year performance, they need some work. What, like us? Yes, just like us. “I’m going to need five times more tenor here and a lot less lead. You don’t have the melody here, leads!” designated director Kerry Denino (Spotlight, 2006)* barks at the first rehearsal. Kerry is guiding the Queens through their first shot at the wildly intricate Daft Punk, arranged, according to the sheet music, “by many, many people.” A sly smile plays on her lips as she surveys her seated singers. “I’m gonna need more tenor or I’ll have to add some leads.” “What?!” comes an amused, indignant and high-pitched cry.
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Liz Hardcastle (Ambiance, 1987), Coronet Club show emcee for the past 20 years, passes the podium to new emcee, Nikki Blackmer (Frenzy, 2017) The tenor section sits up straighter and gives each other the sideeye. Add leads. As if. At its core, the Coronet Club is a gathering of women for whom music is the native tongue, the first language, the common thread. Soon the rhythms emerge, like the shared beat of a collective heart. At the back of the small, packed ballroom Molly Plummer (Maxx Factor, 2011) puts the front row through its paces. They’re backing into each other and getting the giggles. It’s a little rough, but it’s only Tuesday. They’re pros. They’ll pull it off. A few hours earlier, the Coronet Club greeted the 2018 competitors at its annual reception. Quartets line up in their matching walk-around outfits and wait to be announced as they enter the ballroom. They are met by a queen who will introduce them around. Out in the hallway, eyes are wide, especially among first-timers. Their heroes are just inside that door. “I was so excited,” says Melynnie Williams (Zing! 2010) of her first reception. “There were all the beautiful crowns and beautiful women and they are so receptive and loving. You just can’t wait to be one of them.” The wonder of this collection of queens never goes away, even when you have two crowns to choose from. “I walked in the first
