Christmas Charisma

Your local Christmas curmudgeon got her veneer cracked the other day. Donna Chaney invited me to a Women's City Club luncheon, and I don't like to miss a chance to spend time with a good friend like Donna. Nor do I like to miss a chance to visit the historic Blinn House, the Club's home at the edge of the Fuller Theological Seminary campus.

So I expect and receive a nice meal, a cup of coffee and the company of smart, entrepreneurial women. We're munching away and having a proper chat when in come these adorable kids in their charming costumes and I think, "Ah, well, there goes the conversation."

Pitch pipe gives a quiet note and BAM! These junior musical geniuses sing out Christmas carols old and new in such glorious, four-part harmonies that I actually put down my fork and shut up to listen.

I agreed with the woman next to me that they had to be college kids because they were too good to be any younger. Wrong. They're the Crescenta Valley High School Charismatics Chamber Choir, and they are super.

Of course even talented high school kids are not going to sing with that kind of precision without a lot (a lot!) of rehearsal. Wrangling that is their conductor, Mr. Shannon W. Mack. If you want to talk to him about having these charismatic cherubs serenade your Christmas soiree, contact him at smack@gusd.net.