Harmony for the Holidays – The Music of Modern Men

We waste endless amounts of time denying our desires, our vulnerabilities, and ourselves. When we grow old, we want to be younger; after we overindulge, we crave a slim, lithe figure; and during our formative years, many of us wish to be straight.

But nature is undeniable. Truth penetrates our consciousness like the perfect tune, swelling to a crescendo of realization and satisfaction. You can’t refrain from dancing to the beat, humming with the melody, and echoing the lyrics that speak directly and urgently to your soul.

Being gay is the ultimate playlist, and the song must go on.

“You get a feeling from music,” declares Dr. Stan Hill, artistic director of Modern Men, a Palm Springs based LGBTQ+ chorus brimming with transcendence. “My whole thing – my raison d’être, I guess, if you want to call it that, is to try and nurture that and let that come out so people go away feeling wonderful, feeling uplifted, feeling inspired. I think music does that better than anything else.”

Dr. Hill not only speaks with boundless enthusiasm, but he also speaks from experience.

“I’ve been a singer since I was eight years old on television,” he narrates. “It was called Faith of our Children and a different movie star would teach a Sunday school class.”

Basking in the memories that reverberate in his brilliant mind, Hill continues, “Roy Rogers was one of them, Dale Evans was another one. So we had all of these people that taught the Sunday school class and then there was this choir and I was a member of the choir… Because I was the soloist, they put a black velvet bib on me. So my head floated above the chorus.”

Despite the pious perspective of the program, young Stan took every opportunity to revel in rebelliousness.

“We were wild and crazy young kids,” recounts Hill. “We had the run of the entire NBC Studios and, you may not remember this, but there was a show by Groucho Marx called You Bet Your Life. That studio was right next door. So we would go playing around and pretend we were Groucho Marx and the bird comes down and tells you what the word of the day was and all of that. It was kind of fun.”

Punctuating his reminiscences with a timestamp, Dr. Hill narrates, “This was in ’52, this was before the freeway.”

It’s now 70 years later, but Stan Hill hasn’t slowed down a bit. He still relishes the chance to pretend and to play, pivoting his energy from the small screen to the bigtime. After leading the San Francisco Gay Men’s Chorus for over a decade, he spent another 12 years as the director of the Twin Cities Gay Men’s Chorus. From there, Dr. Hill moved to Palm Springs and moved audiences with his unique approach to arrangement and camaraderie.

“The thing that is impressive about this particular chorus, Modern Men, is with the exception of the accompanist and I, it is entirely volunteer. Every single person on every committee and on the board are all volunteers. And what that does, it engenders a whole new level of commitment and dedication to the organization.”

That passion is on full display at this year’s holiday concert, a celestial celebration that is truly out of this world.

“The theme of the show is Stars,” explains Hill. “I wanted music that either mentioned stars or was evocative of stars, all the way from Broadway, from Les Miserables, one of the major songs that is sung by Javert is called Stars. So, I’ve commissioned some music, especially from our wonderful in-house composer, Bob Seeley, to do medleys of songs with stars. A lot of them are holiday related. I think that’s wonderful.”

Drilling into the details of the program, Dr. Hill orchestrates a blend of excitement and restraint.

“One of the favorite pieces of the chorus, which I think you’ll love, is called Night of Silent, Silent Night. So, it’s a mashup where two songs, completely different songs, are sung at exactly the same time… We have one of the world’s greatest ASL interpreters in Tom McGillis. He was the ASL interpreter for the New York City Gay Men’s Chorus for many, many years. He’s moved to the desert, and he’s now joined us and we love him for that. But the last verse of Silent Night will be done in utter and complete silence. The only thing you’ll hear is the rustle of the guys’ tuxedo jackets as they move to interpret ASL, interpret Silent Night, in complete silence.”

Overcome with the power of his own vision as it takes shape, Hill utters an exclamatory whisper. “I’m getting chills.”

Eager to share the spotlight, Dr. Hill beams as he sings the praises of his esteemed ensemble.

“I’ll tell you; these guys sing like you can’t believe. They’re just incredible singers. What we are doing is lifting people up. We’re full of affirmation. Our music is positive. We always move them in some way. There is always going to be an emotional 11 o’clock moment where we just hit them right between the eyes with something very poignant and then we end up with just having fun and every single concert, our members file out and they make a reception line, and they say thank you to every single person who came to their concert. That’s how personal it is with Modern Men.”

But every experience, no matter how intimate, ripples profoundly through our surroundings, and Stan Hill is proud to conduct these shockwaves of inclusivity.

“Sometimes we think of our community as a specific group of people with the wall around us. I see community as an opportunity to bring in and include and really lift up every single person. Our audience is probably 60/40 gay/straight, with 60% gay, but we have a lot of straight people, and I consider that part of our community too… The more we reach out, the more we become one in ideas and positive reflection of ourselves, I think we embrace a larger and larger and larger community.”

From the macro to the micro, Hill hones in on the magic of music.

“Singing is directly connected to your psyche. Your whole personality is exposed when you sing. My job as an artistic director is to select repertoire, which allows their inner voice, the person that no one else sees, the person they know to be themselves, it gives them a chance to express themselves in ways that are not available to everybody. If they are convincing enough in that, it rubs off on the audience… They go away with a whole new appreciation for the organization and for the guys in it. There is a wonderful saying that you may not remember the specific song we sang, but you’ll never forget how you felt when you heard it.”

There is strength in sound, there is empowerment in empathy, and there is wonder in the wintry whimsy of Modern Men’s holiday show. Enjoy it with someone you love.

www.modernmen.org