I just read Charlotte Hagemeister’s obituary today. She passed away the day before yesterday at the age of 101. What a doll this woman was. So who’s Charlotte Hagemeister?

We do a lot of performing in the area. We sing for banquets, concerts, holiday parties, singing telegrams, you name it. And as a result, the guys and I receive a lot of nice comments from folks about how special the occasion was and how our singing touched their lives. It’s great stuff and we certainly feed off of that.

And then there are women like Charlotte. Her family hired us to sing at her 100th birthday party on Sunday, October 23, 2004. When we knocked on the front door of her old house near Heritage Hill, we were greeted by one of dozens of family members there. And by opening their door, they also opened their arms and their hearts.

We sang for Charlotte and for all her children and grandchildren, and her face lit up. She had been blind for some time, but that just seems to have heightened her sense of hearing, and we could tell by looking at her that she could “see” us in her mind.

The guys and I talk about her from time to time. We recall the stories she told us about the old Hagemeister Field, where the Packers used to play. And the room in her house that was decorated to look like a cabin room on a boat; it was pretty cool. She told us of her music studies at Lawrence University, and it was like rubbing elbows with a fellow musician. And of course at a gathering like this, they didn’t let us leave without eating.

We were only booked to be there for about 10 minutes or so, but it was more like an hour. And in that hour, Charlotte managed to touch our hearts, and teach us have a great appreciation for the simple things in life.

As a quartet, we don’t often get the chance to have an afternoon like this; but this is definitely one day and one special woman that we’ll remember forever.

At the end of rehearsal last night, Scott told us he had this great word document he want to share, being stored on his new 1GB memory stick (all the more reason he has a lock on the historian/librarian/geek of the year award). So Brian brings up the document on his laptop and the laughs ensued. Do a search sometime on Google on the following name phrase and you’ll understand. Say it fast and without thinking too hard and you might surprise yourself!

Makollig Jezvahted and Levdaroum DeBahzted

It’s pretty hard to describe what happens at a GQ4 rehearsal. Most of it, taken out of context means absolutely nothing and makes little sense. But when GQ4 gets together, in the context of songs and our particular mood for the evening, let’s say anything can happen.

Anyway, Scott was apparently making a mouth-shape that wasn’t quite right for the sound we were going for. Kelly, being “the ear” and “the eyes”, noticed what Scott was doing and asked, “how do you sing with that face?”

Without needing to hear Scott sing, you too might wonder how he sings with that face!

We continued singing and tried wrapping up with “Thank You Dear Lord for Music”. It’s such a nice song, with cool chords and “rings” as only barbershop can. Well, we could tell it was getting late.

Mc Creamy started singing, then phonetically clustered some sounds together that sounded like, well, if you can imagine a bagpipe that produces vocalizations, you’ve got a pretty good idea. It was only a couple word sounds, but after 2-3/4 hours of being together, this was enough for us to enter a state of sillyness that we usually cannot escape. We know! We’ve been to this state quite often!

We sort of regained our composure and got started again, sounding pretty good, all things considered… then for some reason Scott and Chris looked at each other - right at the end of the song, too! Let’s just say it didn’t end well. It was definitely funny, as when Scott loses it, it’s usually enough to take 1 or 2 of us with him.

I looked over and said, “I guess you can’t sing with that face.”

Well, that’s my story, and I’m sticking to it

Brian - Tenor - GQ4

what a great time we had singing for the people at the Meyer Theatre. Singing before in the theatre and the balcony and after in the lobby was awesome. The patrons for this once a month free show given by the Allouez Village Band were treated to a wide variety of entertainment from the MC to the radio announcer to the Andrew Sisters, Abbott and Costello, the band, and our barbershop songs.

lookin forward to our next outing and ringing more chords for our enjoyment and maybe yours!

kelly