The Roger Wagner Chorale

 

"It was one of my greatest thrills singing at the Hollywood Bowl in the forties."

 "Roger Wagner came to Franklin High School in the late forties and heard my voice. He told me to show up at a the St. Joseph's church once a week for his new chorus. Los Angeles schools wanted him to set up choirs in each of the high schools."
   We are again at Table Five in the Encinitas Senior Center. Lunch is served at about eleven o'clock and I arrive early. I have decided to write Barbara's story, especially since she looks as attractive as her relative, Katherine Parr, the six wife of Henry the Eighth. The subject today is Barbara's childhood. She wishes to share her story for her seven kids and seventeen grandchildren. 
   "My cousin, a McGee paid for my three years of singing lessons. My dear Mom took a great interest in me. The lover of her life, another cousin, married her best girl friend so her husband and my Dad did not quite live up to her expectations."
   "Wagner removed the best singers from several high schools and so began his much heralded singing group, the Roger Wagner Chorale  We performed not only at the Hollywood Bowl, but also the Los Angeles Philharmonic Auditorium downtown."
    "Did you drive a car for the practices, Barbara?"
   "No, I either took the street cars or the buses from my home in Highland Park for practices or the location of our performances. My Mom made my clothes using a Singer Sewing machine. She never had to scold me. Her look was enough!
   "We sang on radio shows and did work for the studios, like  MGM and Twentieth Century Fox. We sang off stage in a sound room. We dubbed the voices of the man actors.  I had to join a union but forgot the name of it."
    "It probably was SAG, Barbara."
   "That is correct George. I forgot what we got paid, but it was a union wage,  higher than when we dimply performed. We had one singer with a phenomenal voice. Her name was Marne and when Roger needed a solo, he chose her. 
At that point, we were interrupted by my next story. It was Horst Cahn, the only living survivor from 4000 from a  German extermination camp at Auschwitz. "George, I need to look at your paper before you publish. I was not proud of the numbers on my arm. And you wrote my left when it was my right."  
   " I apologize. I will also show you proofs before going to the publisher." Barbara gets up and walks over to Table Six to talk to another couple.
   "I want to tell you something. I tried to kill myself. Here, look at my arm. Six buddies came to my rescue and tied a rope over my wounds until the blood stopped running. Do you know that all six died later. I still feel guilty that I survived but not them."
    He displayed the scar on his wrist. Barbara returns to her seat next to mine. "I want to tell you something else, "We were on a death march at the end of the war. It took me and another to hold our buddy up. If he had fallen, a German soldier would have shot him. I will never forget his words. 'Hitler will die before me!'"
   "We huddled inside a farm house. Some farmers told us Hitler had died. One minutes later, I turned to my friend, he smiled and closed his eyes. Later that evening he died. 
 It was now eleven o'clock. Play the song Hallelujah Barbara. Even with her backache, she rose and not only played that song, but Ave Maria and a host of others. She, like myself, got our nourishment from music. Now the lunch was brought and we all dug in.