The Flash Mob That Almost Wasn't (And Then Was)

Today was the big Hallelujah Chorus Sing-In at the Scottsdale Fashion Mall.

Our first inkling that this was going to be HUGE was the traffic getting to the mall.  Of course, that could just have been normal hilarity that happens three days before Christmas. I wouldn't know.  I avoid malls as much as possible, especially at Christmastime.  The absolute paucity of parking spaces might also have been normal for this time of year, but I suspected not.  After ten minutes or more searching, we finally parked on the very top of the garage, way back in a corner.  I'm not even sure it was a legitimate parking space, but we didn't get a ticket.  We had left an hour before the thing was to start, which should have been plenty of time, even allowing for the traffic.  But it was close.  We got into the mall at about ten to twelve, and we got near the Food Court by five of, only to find that we were too late.

It had already happened.

We were heartbroken.

We learned later that mall authorities, concerned about the size of the crowd and probably worried about repeating the problems they had yesterday in California (see the update to the first post of this blog), asked for the singing to happen early.  So they had started at 11:45, and it was already over by the time we got inside.

But all was not lost.  There were hundreds and hundreds of people gathered, and they were not to be denied.  People like us, who had come planning to sing at noon, weren't about to leave just like that.  Somebody was talking on a bullhorn--we learned later that he was telling people that the whole thing was over and that the crowd should disperse--but we could neither hear nor understand him.  Sue said, "We should just start singing."  "I'm a conductor," I said--the one and only time that this has seemed like a useful skill!  "I could get this thing going, but we need to be closer."  By this point, to try to see better, we had moved to the very top level of the mall and were standing at one end of it.  I figured if we could get more to the middle and start singing, people would join in.

As we made our way over there, the singing began--someone had obviously had the same idea.  And so, for about five glorious minutes, Scottsdale Fashion Mall reverberated to the sound of the Hallelujah Chorus in what probably was more like a flash mob.  This second, spontaneous time wasn't planned.  It felt a little more rebellious, somehow, because it wasn't really supposed to happen.

I imagine people have lots of reasons for going to an event like this.  For some, it's a response to the commercialism of Christmas to sing that great music in the middle of a shopping mall. For others, singing of the eternal reign of the King of Kings is a religious moment that might restore a little of the meaning to Christmas.  Still others like the sheer massive sound that so many people can make in a reverberant space.  It's all terrific.

Me?  I was overcome and could barely sing.  We were standing among people who weren't singing, which made it even more special, somehow.  Sue was in great voice.  So was Miriam.  Elizabeth sallied forth in spite of a cold.  I sang about every third phrase of the bass part, but we managed to contribute mightily at our end of the balcony.  It was just as thrilling as I'd hoped it would be, despite the rocky start.

We saw lots of people we know there, including a former student of mine, Ken Owen, who was back in town to visit his in-laws.  I haven't seen him in a couple of years, so it was especially nice to find him there along with his wife Angie and their three children, Thomas (age 5), Suzette (age 3, I think), and David (age 7 months and very robust!).  I had never met Suzette and David.  I still think of Thomas as the first "grandchild" of the choral department at ASU:  Ken was the first of my ASU students to have a child.

Singers, students, family, music -- what could be better?  So even though it had been announced on the news in advance and was hardly a surprise, and even though so many people showed up that it had to happen early to keep from being dangerous, it's all good.  And I got to sing it after all.

Here's a video of the first time (the one we missed).  I'll keep checking to see if any further videos are posted (especially of the second, unofficial time).  But this gives you the idea.

Scottsdale Mall Hallelujah Flash Mob, 12/22/2010

Here, courtesy of our friend Jane Little, is a photo of us.  This was taken before the spontaneous sing-along.  We're hiding our disappointment rather well, I think.  (Left to right, Elizabeth, Me, Miriam, Sue)

UPDATE:  Click here for a news clip on the event.

FURTHER UPDATE:  Here's a video of the time we got to sing.  You'll hear how it started in low and started to grow... (I hope you get the Dr. Seuss reference.)

Merry Christmas one and all, and keep on singing.

(Coming soon:  yesterday's bean soup...a success!)

Flash Mobs, Random Acts of Culture, Etc.

It started, so far as I know, with a bunch of people dancing to "Do-Re-Mi" from The Sound of Music (the recording by Julie Andrews, of course) in a train station in Antwerp.  If you haven't seen that, it's worth tracking down on YouTube.  It's fantastic.  Then a cell phone company organized something similar in a train station in England (for a commercial, I think).  It was only a matter of time before someone figured out how to make such unexpected outbursts of performance work with music.

This past October, the Opera Company of Philadelphia landed on just the thing:  sing the Hallelujah Chorus from Handel's Messiah in the middle of a department store.  And not just any department store:  this was the old Wanamaker's (now it's Macy's) where there is a monster theater organ.  The organist launched into the opening ritornello, but that wasn't unusual: organ music plays quite often in the store.  But then the singers--hundreds of them--joined in, to the surprise and delight of the shoppers. People looked on in amazement, and plenty starting singing along.  The expressions on the faces are priceless. The video of the event went viral on YouTube.  You can find that one, too.

I'm a cynic in many ways.  I figured by the second or third time I saw this, I'd think it was old hat.  No such luck.  Each time somebody sends me the link (and I've gotten it at least a half-dozen times), I watch and I'm thrilled.   There was a similarly unannounced sing-along of the Hallelujah Chorus more recently at a food court in a mall (in Canada, I think), and people have been sending me the link to that YouTube video as well.  That one starts with one singer, who looks like she's talking on her cell phone, launching into the theme.  Then another guy takes it up, and then one posing as a janitor does it, and so on, until there's a whole gang of people singing--including some who just showed up for a burger and fries. Still not old hat.  Still thrilling.

So perhaps you can imagine my delight when it got noised about that folks were going to attempt to have a "spontaneous" sing-along of the Hallelujah Chorus here in the Valley of the Sun.  It happens at the Scottsdale Fashion Center food court this Wednesday (12/22) at high noon.  I suspect that every available choral singer for miles around will be there (the hope is that we will exceed the 650 reported to have taken part in Philadelphia).  I can't wait.

My enthusiasm dimmed a little when I heard an NPR story this afternoon about such things happening all over the place.  They interviewed a lady from Kansas City who had just organized one there.  I was a bit disappointed that Phoenix was just a little behind the curve; that we'd be just one more flash mob, part of a trend (but not a trendsetter).  I'm guessing that nobody at the mall on Wednesday will really be surprised by the outburst, and the surprise, after all, has been a big part of the fun.

But my disappointment, if that's what it was, was short-lived.  When you think about it, even briefly, isn't it pretty fabulous that a huge number of singers (I will report later how many) all show up at the same time to sing what is arguably the most famous piece of music in the western world?  And that even people who don't know it's going to happen are moved and join in?  I mean, how cool is that?  Pretty cool, actually, and most of the time conducting choral music doesn't seem like the coolest thing a person could do (it's what I do).

So for one brief shining moment this Wednesday, we won't be either ahead of the curve or behind it.  We'll just be cool.  And that's pretty cool, if you ask me.

UPDATE, 12/21:  Even something like a flash mob can backfire. Here's news from Sacramento this morning:

LA Times Story

Comments about the stories are all over the place, but are mostly dominated (it seems to me) by grouches. Here's one example:

McClatchy Story


(Scroll to the bottom for the readers' reactions.)

The same story is posted here, but again note readers' comments at the bottom.

I stand by my original sentiment. You just have to see the reactions on people's faces to realize that this is not some inconvenience. It's a pretty cool way to share music, and it emphasizes, it seems to me, that we have more in common than we have differences.