The Pitch Pipe - January 2009 - (Page 6) 2008 Lifetime Achievement Award By Maggie Ryan, Greater Harrisburg Chorus, Region 19 You know those people who fill a room? The ones who make your head turn and your voice lower so you can breathlessly pick up the golden nuggets of wisdom they might utter? Right next to them, probably feeding them all her best material, is Marge Bailey. Without a lot of flash and glitter, but with unmatched heart and integrity, Marge has supported and enhanced Sweet Adelines International for more than 30 years. And she’s done it so well, that she is the 2008 Lifetime Achievement Award recipient. Ask Marge to list what she’s done in Sweet Adelines, and she’ll ask you how long a day you have. It would take more than the standard 24 hours. In the broadest of terms, Marge is an arranger, coach, judge and mentor. But look closer, and you find that she doesn’t simply inhabit these roles, she defines them: former coordinator of the International Music Arrangers Program, past international president (19951996), certified international faculty, certified music judge, former judge specialist in music, past chair of the Education Director Committee (EDC), and certified music arranger, to name a few. That’s leaving out countless years on every chapter, regional and international committee that has shaped Sweet Adelines’ peerless educational status. The woman truly has done it all. “I learned how to knit, did it for awhile, and put it down,” Marge said. “I tried cross-stitching, and put it down. Female barbershop music is the one thing I’ve worked on all my adult life and I never get bored with it. There is always so much more to learn.” It is that insatiable appetite for knowledge and improvement that set Marge apart early. She was a little too eager for her first chapter, and they let her know. “They literally kicked me out of the chorus,” she says with a laugh. It was an inauspicious beginning that led to great things. International sent its president, Nancy Coates, to calm everyone down and Nancy saw what needed to happen. Start your own chapter, she said. So Marge did, founding the Farmington Valley Chapter in Region 1. “I did everything in that chapter from arranger to president, but never, ever costume chair,” she said. “No way they’d let me do that. Or makeup.” The more she did, the more she wanted to do, and Marge rose quickly in the administrative and musical ranks. An accountant by training and profession, her first regional role was treasurer. Meanwhile, the former music minor and gospel pianist was learning to arrange barbershop music. The chorus became her crash-test dummies. “I’m so grateful to have had a director (Barbara West) who wanted her own arranger and a chorus that put up with it,” she said. “I would bring in a piece of music and we’d sing it and find something wrong and I’d rearrange it and we’d try it again. I would go to the library, write out the changes, make a few copies, and we would cut them apart and Scotch-tape them onto the music and try them again.” Somehow, Marge’s trial-and-error method took hold. Pretty soon, she was involved with Region 1’s arranging program, regional board and faculty. It wasn’t long before International, specifically the legendary leader, Bev Sellers, came calling. “She was the total, absolute mentor that anyone ever had,” Marge said. “In those days, she saw every piece of correspondence that went through International –every bit of it– and I would get copies of some of it with a note from her across the top, ‘Marge, this is interesting,’ or ‘Marge, take a look at this.’ Anything she thought might interest me; she thought to include me in the discussion.” It wasn’t long before another Bev –then-International president Bev Miller– appointed Marge to her favorite Sweet Adelines panel, the Educational Direction Committee. “If there is any place (you can make an impact) as a Sweet Adeline, 6 January 2009
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