The Garden

On March 16th, President Dickerson, the first counselor in our Stake Presidency, caught us at church and asked if Rob and I would be willing to meet with a member of the Stake Presidency that evening at 7:00.  We had a few ideas of what they might want with us--maybe a new calling or an invitation to speak in Stake Conference.  We were wrong!

We walked in at 7:00 and President Dickerson asked us to wait in the chapel.  When we walked in, there were about 50 people sitting there.  My first feeling was of relief...at least it wasn't a calling and it didn't look like we were being asked to speak either.  As we looked around at the specific people that were gathered there, it was immediately obvious to me that this group had been picked because of their singing abilities.

Sure enough, President Dickerson went up to the pulpit and invited all of us to come and sit in the choir chairs.  He told us that each of us had been chosen and called to participate in a musical production called the Garden written by Michael McLean.  The Garden is an allegorical oratorio, which means it's a symbolic story told through music.  They said they had tried to choose either a husband or a wife and not take both from the same family because they knew it would be a considerable time commitment.  Since both Robert and I were chosen, I was flattered that they felt they needed both of us enough to ask us both to participate.  Ellen and Garth Walker were in charge, and Ellen was the choir director.  I met Ellen shortly after we moved here to Bridger Valley when we were in the Ten Virgins program together, but I had never been in a choir which she directed until now.  She's a really good director!

We learned that there were 7 solo "characters" in the production, 5 of which were male (4 tenors and 1 bass), and 2 of which were female (one soprano and one alto).  Garth and Ellen told us they hadn't chosen the soloists yet but that they were not having auditions for the parts, they were just going to choose who the Spirit directed them to choose.  We also learned that we were to perform this program on Easter Sunday, which was 5 weeks away! Since we only were able to have practices once a week (Sunday nights from 7:00-9:00), that meant all we had were 4 practices to get everything down and ready to perform! Whoa.  That's not a lot of practices for a program that is about 150 pages long.

That weekend was the Stake temple day, which we attended, and then we went to Seagull Book to see if we could find a copy of the music from The Garden to start learning it.  They didn't have it there, but we found it on Amazon and just paid for it and downloaded it on our drive home.  It is good music, although not easy music to learn.  I was excited to be a part of it.  I knew Rob would get a solo part, because his voice is so beautiful and distinctive, and they needed 5 male soloists.  I didn't really think I would get one because there were only 2 girl soloists and I knew that there were plenty of wonderful female singers among the ladies there that first night. 

So the following Sunday (the 23rd) we show up at 7:00, having dropped our children off at Grandma and Papa's house--they are so wonderful to babysit our kids so often!  Ellen immediately informed us that both of us had solo parts: I was the Seedling and Rob was the Gardener.  I was excited (and nervous) to have a solo, but as I looked through the music, our score was A LOT bigger and more involved than the choral score.  I was nervous because I knew we had to learn all that in a short amount of time.

I punched holes in our music and put them into binders with tabs for each song.  It was quite the process, but very worth it! The organization helped a ton when the director would call out the next song. 

The basic story of the Garden is this: It takes place in the Garden of Gethsemane.  There are four soloist characters who are elements of the Garden that represent us here on earth.  There is a Seedling (soprano), who cannot grow; a Barren Tree (alto) who bears no fruit; a Ram (tenor) who is caught in a thicket and feels trapped; and a Millstone (bass) who cannot feel anything and feels dead.  Each of the soloists has their own song to describe their problem and how they feel hopeless.  After their songs, the choir sings a song called A Snake Lies in the Grass, about Satan and how he rejoices to hear the hopeless songs of the Garden.  Then in comes the Gardener, who represents a prophet.  He comes to till the garden and help the elements.  But the Landlord, who represents Satan, thinks the Garden is his and doesn't want to see the Gardener there and tries to kick him out.  The Gardener and the Landlord have a cool duet where the Landlord is quick and angry and the Gardener is calm and steady.  The culmination of the program is the song called Not My Will, which is sung by the character of The Man, representing Jesus Christ.  The song shows his suffering in the Garden, the tauntings of Satan and the helplessness of the Gardener and the other elements of the Garden who wish they could help.  It is a very powerful song.  After the suffering is done and three days have passed, the four elements discover that they are saved from their afflictions--the Seedling can grow, the Ram is free, the Barren Tree has fruit, and the Millstone can feel that he's been reborn.  Hope has returned to the Garden and the world. 

The soloists were:
The Man: Bryan Hamblin
The Gardener: Robert Henderson
The Landlord: Jesse Willie
The Seedling: Melanie Henderson
The Barren Tree: Audrey Kemp
The Ram: Thayne Peterson
The Millstone: David Taylor

That week we practiced our solos with Cherilyn Peterson, wife of Thayne Peterson, the soloist who played the Ram.  Kaye Wilson was the accompanist for the entire program.  Kaye is the best! She is the Primary President in our ward, she is Hallie's piano teacher and she is our accompanist of choice anytime we are asked to sing because she is the BEST! However, Kaye was busy during the first few weeks of the Garden practice because she was also the accompanist for the Lyman High School's musical which was being performed at the time.  So Cherilyn offered to help the soloists with any extra practice we needed.

All the soloists chosen were good, but the one that stands out above the rest is Jesse Willie, the guy who played the Landlord (Satan).  His part was very different from the rest of our parts, obviously.  He had to be compelling but angry, and he did such a fantastic job!! I also enjoyed getting to know the other "elements" soloists (the Barren Tree, the Ram, and the Millstone), since we all sat together and had to spend a lot of time practicing together.  I already knew Audrey from the Ten Virgins, but the others I hadn't met.  Dave Taylor also has a beautiful deep bass voice which I love! He was so self conscious because he isn't that great at reading music, but he performed so well.  All the soloists were perfectly chosen, and their voices matched their characters so well! I wouldn't have wanted to be Ellen and Garth with the job to have to choose who got the solos, but man they did a great job!

We ended up coming to practice an hour early every Sunday so that we could get our coordination on our solo parts down.  There are a lot of songs where we four elements and the Gardener sing together or we sing different melodies at the same time, etc.  Robert especially had a lot of music to practice, since he has a solo part in more than half of the songs in the entire program.  He is the first soloist that opens the program, and he is basically the star of the show!! We put in a lot of time and energy and effort into practicing this production.  It was a lot of work, but so worth it! 

The week before the performance, I had been having issues with my throat all week, it was sore and hurt to swallow.  I took lots of Vitamin C and tried to drink lots of milk and honey to soothe it, but mostly I prayed!! I tried to take it easy on my voice, and Heavenly Father blessed me that although my throat hurt, I was still able to sing without a problem.  I KNOW PRAYER WORKS!!

The night before we were to perform, we had a dress rehearsal.  Some of our family members who had come to visit for Easter decided to attend the dress rehearsal because the actual performance was Sunday evening at 7:00 and they had to be home on Monday, so they couldn't stay late enough to see the show.  Shannon, the Martins, Grandma Henderson, and Randy and Serena came to the dress rehearsal, planning to go home the next day.  The Copelans and the Binghams did have to go home, but the Martins and Grandma Henderson liked it so much they decided to stay so they could watch it again for the true performance the next night. 

The Seedling and the Gardener.

Finally performance night came! We had a pretty good turnout, about 650 or 700 people came to see the show.  Since it was Easter Sunday and Spring Break, I wasn't sure how many people would be there, but it turned out pretty great! They had all the chairs still set up from Stake Conference earlier in the day, and they still had the camera system set up so those far in the back could see and hear as well.  They even had a feed of video and audio going into the Relief Society room for anyone that needed to take a noisy child out.  My poor mother-in-law had to take my noisy child out once or twice.  Thankfully, both Shaelyn and Evie slept through most of the performance, so Rob's parents (who were sitting with our kids) could listen.  The performance went so well, I thought it was a miracle! None of our practices had gone half that smoothly, even our dress rehearsal.

The Spirit was so strong, by the end, I was crying so hard I couldn't sing! Thankfully, all my solo parts were over by that point.  It is impossible to convey the spirit and message of this fantastic program through text, but it made such an impact on me that I need to write about it so I can remember this feeling! I feel so lucky and so blessed to have been a part of this program.  Its message truly sank deep into my soul and I have a renewed and deepened love of our Savior and his essential role in the eternal Plan of our Father.  None of us could EVER make it without Him.  I can't think of a better way to celebrate Easter Sunday than with this amazing program! What a blessing!