Who has made a big impact on your life? If you had asked me that question a week ago, Doctor Robert Isgro of Geneseo, New York would probably not have been one of the first people I thought of. But when I learned earlier this week that Doctor Isgro had died, I knew that I had to make the trip to Geneseo for the funeral to honor him and his impact on my life.
Doctor Isgro, “Doc” as he was affectionately called by the many decades of Geneseo Chamber Singers, was the sun that gave the Chamber Singers life. He wasn’t the first director, but his long tenure as conductor shaped the Geneseo Chamber Singers into a high-quality college choir. Yet he did so much more than lead college students in making beautiful music. Doc shaped men and women. Doc helped us become who we were meant to be.
That’s a bold statement, I know. But when you spend an hour and a half together four days a week for several years, you become a family. In that way, Doc was Papa to the Chamber Singers. We knew when he was pleased. We knew when he was angry. We knew when he was discouraged. He knew when to be serious with us and when to joke. What a playful, devious smile he had! He always encouraged us to be our best, not just sing our best.
One of the practices that Doc had built into Chamber Singers culture was a fall retreat at a local camp. Honestly, that was brilliant. People who spend a weekend living together develop a relationship that can’t be replicated in a classroom, or in this case, a choir room. Retreat was the time we really got to know each other and welcome in new members. We did a lot of singing, but we also just enjoyed each other. We had fun. We hung out. We became family. That relationship translated into the musical unity of the choir and helped us blend more beautifully. I was never as close to Doc as some of my classmates, but it was at one of these retreats that I realized that not one singer was invisible to Doc. He knew each of us, even if we didn’t speak individually on a regular basis.
It was a sunshiny day, and we were enjoying some downtime outside when one of the girls I was hanging out with got stung by a bee. That small problem became a crisis when she told us she was allergic to bee stings! There was some commotion and activity to care for her and get her what she needed. I don’t remember all that was done, but I knew that my part was to stay with her while others did the running. I sat in the grass with her head in my lap just offering her comfort. It was the best I could do in the crisis. I didn’t think it was a big deal, and I might not have remembered it at all if Doc had not commended me for it later. To me it was a small thing. But his words made me feel like it was an important thing because he noticed it. I knew that in the commotion, he saw me. I wasn’t just another singer. I was Cathy Giordano.
I know that my experience is one of many over the decades that Doc conducted Chamber Singers. Everybody has a Doc story! Or ten. A favorite Doc memory for me was in Boston. We had traveled there for a competition and had the opportunity to do some touring as well. Because Chamber Singers memorized many pieces of music we could sing as a choir anywhere. The choir that year simply loved singing together and really enjoyed several of the pieces we had learned.
We were in a restaurant for dinner and sang while we waited for the food. At one point, Doc told us that a father had come to him in the restaurant and told him that his little girl was really enjoying the choir and asked if we would sing for her. His daughter was deaf but could see the joy on our faces. So, Doc told us about it and we began to sing a piece based on a William Blake poem, “Little Lamb, Who made thee? Dost thou know Who made thee?” It was a sweet moment. However, what happened the next day etched it in my memory forever.
Doc arranged for us to sing in the choir loft at the Old North Church! Yes, THE Old North Church in Boston! How exciting! We filed upstairs to the historic balcony and sang a few pieces. Not for an audience. Just for the joy of it. Our collective choir voice bounced off the angled peaks of the church’s ceiling. Then as we prepared to sing the next piece Doc said, “Now, I want you to sing this for the little girl you sang for last night.” We began to sing “Little Lamb, Who made thee…” I don’t know how many of us were blubbering before we reached the end, but I know I wasn’t the only one!
So many memorable moments with Doc! So many hours of diligence and discouragement as we labored together to create something special for those who would hear us. So many hundreds, of young lives shaped through their own hours with Doc. He is gone now, but his legacy lives on, not just in the many who sang with him, but in the current Geneseo Chamber Singers.
Doctor Isgro and his wife did not have children. The Chamber Singers were their children. I don’t know all the details, others do. But I do know that Doc was able to pass on the Chamber Singers to one of his “sons”. Doctor Gerard Floriano, Gerry to me and my choirmates, graduated with me in 1984. He went on to study conducting and now conducts the Geneseo Chamber Singers. (He used to conduct with his Walkman headphones on. None of us knew what he was hearing, but he sure enjoyed conducting it!)
Remember I said that Doc did more than lead college students in making beautiful music; he shaped men and women? Gerry is one of those who was close to Doc and has been deeply shaped by him. The Gerry I knew always had a heart to be a person of character and I am confident that he is shaping the character of his students just as Doc did, helping them to make beautiful music and shaping them into the men and women they are meant to be. What a tribute to Doc!
What Doc never knew, and what I never realized, is just how much he was shaping me. In 1983 Doc arranged for the first ever Geneseo Chamber Singers reunion. Singers from all decades convened in Geneseo to hear the current choir (of which Gerry and I were members in 1983) and to sing with each other and Doc again. That reunion has taken place every five years since, and I have only missed one. It’s Doc’s influence that has drawn us all back to Geneseo and the choir room, and it is his memory, his influence in each of our lives that will keep drawing us back.
Thanks for the memories and the music, Doc! You are an important part of who I have become, and I am so grateful.
And to you, Dear Friend, who has God used to shape you and who might He be using you to shape? Your life really does make a difference!