The weekend

Circus nephew Dennis had an art opening at the Saint Louis Art Museum.

Voice student Tatum was Jane Banks in Mary Poppins Jr. at Immaculate Conception in Dardenne Prairie:

Webster University held the 2024 Commencement exercises. Here I am with two of my graduating voice students:

I send Al Bastin and Isaiah Henry forth into the next part of their journey. Somehow I did not get a photo with Dom DeCicco.

I sang a duet at church with Will Borland. Our selection was Hale & Wilder’s “Now sing we joyfully unto God.”

I gardened and dealt with an allergy attack.

And I saw the aurora borealis!

Final editorial

Graduation day at SBU in 1983.

My senior year of college was 1982-83. For much of that school year, I wrote an editorial column for the Southwest Baptist University Omnibus, the school newspaper,

I have been posting each of these columns, scanned from the original Omnibus newspaper, on the 41st anniversary of their initial publication. I’ll resume with the Fall 1982 columns in Fall 2024.

Here is my May 13, 1983 editorial commentary.

By the way, the Jeff Carter of 2023-24 is a vastly different, much more nuanced (he thinks) Jeff Carter than the one of 1982-83. But he’s still sentimental and searching for answers.

Commencement 2024

Webster University’s 2024 Commencement weekend by the numbers:

Thanks to my colleague Nina Ferrigno and to Webster photographers for some of these photos that capture the day:

Somehow Nina caught me pouring at two different stations, and two different kinds of wine.

Saturday was a good day to be a Gorlok.

Juries

End-of-semester juries took place this week. As usual, I memorialized with my students each jury’s conclusion!

With the conclusion of the school year, I’m saying ‘so long’ to five of my voice students. Dom and Al and Isaiah are graduating. Makari and Mason are not returning to Webster next year. I’ll miss each and every one!

Pop Carter

I’m continuing the weekly exercise, intending to keep this up for 52 weeks, as I recount a wee piece of the story of my life.

This week’s prompt continues the stories of grandparents. I’m featuring one a month.

Vincent O. “Pop” Carter was born in 1910, and died in 1985. He was one of three children, along with his sister Elsie and his brother Robert.

Pop had a gold tooth, thanks to a firecracker mishap in his childhood. He smoked a pipe and cigars until his heart problems required him to forego tobacco fairly late in his life. He had heart issues, including several heart attacks. To my knowledge, he never did have any stents or surgical intervention.

Pop carpooled five days a week from De Soto, Missouri to downtown Saint Louis, where he worked in the ladies shoe division of International Shoe Co. As best I know, he was a draftsman, turning design into reality. He retired in 1975 on a company pension.

Pop was a Mason. He was a deacon at First Baptist Church, De Soto. At some point, as I recall, he served on the De Soto School Board. He was an honest man. His favorite word was “kindly,” as in “you take this screwdriver and kindly use it.” “Kindly” was a catch-all adverb for Pop.

He often had a short fuse. My sisters recall being shushed when he was feeling anxious or his angina was acting up.

Pop did not complete high school. My recollection is that he began working after eighth grade.

Pop’s been gone nearly forty years. I remember him fondly, but not as specifically as I might wish. I have a few of his smoking pipes, and his pocket watch, which I have kept in good shape and which still works.

Pop died in his sleep in the wee hours of November 18, 1985. He is buried in between his parents, and his wife’s parents, in a cemetery at the end of Main Street in De Soto.

Elgar

The North American branch of the Edward Elgar Society met in Saint Louis this weekend for a conference and concert featuring Elgar’s cello concerto, performed by Yo-Yo Ma and the Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra.

I’ve been a member of this society for a couple of decades now, if not more.

I was unable to attend the conference and concert, since the events fell on the last weekend before juries and I was up to my earlobes in Webster voice lessons and concerts.

But a couple of months ago I received an invitation to present a lecture at the conference, and I cleared out a few hours on Saturday afternoon to talk about favorite Elgar choral works.

Revisiting these works in an academic way has been a delight. I listen to Elgar regularly, but taking the deep dive necessary to discuss them with erudition in a room full of Elgarians meant study and focus.

The works I discussed were

  • “Ave verum corpus”
  • “The Dance” from “From the Bavarian Highlands”
  • “Go, song of mine”
  • “Give unto the Lord”

And I used a Ball State University Chamber Singers 2004 recording to illustrate the latter work.

Here I am eleven years ago at the Elgar Birthplace Museum outside of Worcester, England:

At the Elgar Birthplace Museum outside of Worcester.

Here’s a lovely rendition of “Go, song of mine”:

Concert weekend

Concert weekend!

Three of them at Webster University this weekend.

Classes ended Friday. I’m spending the weekend primarily at the Webster studio teaching lessons to make up for the misses I’ve had this semester with an occasional sick day and three different NASM accreditation visits.

And I’m attending concerts.

Juries begin Monday.