Memorials

You know someone has to have been important when the city police suspend parking violations downtown on the day of his memorial.

Davis has these weird parking rules and I hate them. Like many towns, there are areas where you can only park for 2 hours, but in Davis, after 2 hours you can't repark your car in the same block. You can't just move your car two slots down, you have to go to a whole different block. This does great things for the other city policy of encouraging promotion of local business. There is no on-street parking where you can have lunch and then wander the shops without moving your car at least once. There is no time limit long enough to permit you to see a movie, unless you go to the parking garage. I almost never go downtown any more, and the parking regulations are a big part of that.

Of course the plan is to encourage less car and more bike, but there are some of us who can't ride a bike (any more) and have to drive. And besides--how much big stuff can you carry on a bike anyway?

So when I heard that the city had suspended ticketing for parking on the day of Dick Brunelle's memorial because (a) so many people were expected to attend the service, which were being held in the church in the middle of the downtown area, and (b) the service and the reception afterwards would certainly exceed two hours, I realized (even if I hadn't before) the unofficial honor that was being bestowed on this man by the city of Davis and the acknowledgement of his importance to the community.

I decided I wanted to be sure to get both a parking place and a seat in the church, so I headed downtown around 2 for the 4 p.m. service. I had some meatballs to drop off at the parish hall and stuck around to help set up the food tables, since I had time to kill.

One woman, whom I hadn't seen in, like. forever and she hugged me and said "It's been so long since I've seen you!" I told her that I thought both of us would say that many, many times before the end of the event!

There was a neat display of pictures and memorabilia and I got a bit of a clutch in my stomach when I saw this collection:

This is a collage of the jazz choir's first trip to a competition in New Orleans. I took most of these photos and the picture at the lower left is one of my very favorite pictures of David, singing on the streets of the French Quarter with his friend Jeff and one of the street performers who live in New Orleans. Since this was also the 13th anniversary of David's death, the picture hit me more than it might have ordinarily.

Ned was running around the place with videographer Tom Estes, trying to set up a video/audio feed from the church to the hall to take care of the people who couldn't get into the church. Watching how hard he was working, I just had this wave of pride wash over me. If you need someone to set up a sound and/or video system for you, Ned's your guy.

Around 3 p.m., I went over to the church and found myself a nice little corner of the back pew and set myself up there. I was going to read my book, but Paul's old boss, Bob Bowen, came in and sat with me and we had a nice visit. As people began to arrive at the church, I realized that probably everybody I had ever met, or at least had ever met when our kids were in school in Davis, was at this event. I sat with Bob and his wife, with Mike Gerrell, who ran the Vets when our kids first started working there and who has been their friend for decades, and with Libbie and Dave Burmester, the founder of Acme Theatre Company and our kids' high school English teacher. In front of me was Gary Matteson from the Davis Comic Opera Company, whose members were scattered all around the church. There were friends from PTA and other community groups I've worked with over the years. My Scrabble buddy Joan and her husband waved as they passed by. Two women I worked with at Women's Health were there. The psychiatrist's wife gave me a hug as she came into the church. Some kids who had been in the jazz choir with David (and possibly Tom) said hello. We were all older, many of us fatter and greyer, but we were all there to celebrate Dick's life.

It was the sort of gathering Walt would have just eaten up and I knew it was killing him to miss it.

I made a very short (2+ minutes) video, but as a video it's terrible because I'm not bold (or rude) enough to elbow my way into where I can get the best shot. What I wanted wasn't really the video anyway, but the audio and there is an excerpt from one hymn where they combined anybody in the audience who had ever sung the song in choir with Dick. There were Madrigals in their madrigal garb, and church choir members in robes, and then people who got up out of the audience to join their voices with the rest. It was amazing. There is also the finale, "When the Saints Go Marching In," which was accompanied Dick's two sons and his grandson and Mark Inouye, first chair trumpet with the San Francisco Symphony, who is also a Davis High graduate. There isn't much to see in the video, but the music is glorious.

The ceremony itself was a nice mix of music and memories. Seven people gave reminiscences, his cousin who remembered when Dick lived in a hotel with his mother, at age 5, and tried to teach himself piano and drove people so crazy they had to limit him to only 2 hrs a day at the piano. He also talked about when Dick learned that if he played music in the barn in the morning when he was milking the cows, they would come in on their own and he wouldn't have to chase them. Another friend talked about the antics that went on when he and Dick had been in a band together in college. Another guy talked about Dick's military career, Stephen Peithman talked about Dick's history with the Davis Comic Opera (even including reference to me, when he talked about our award-winning musical, The Pirates of the Casablanca). Judy Gabor read one of the letters she wrote to him from time to time. His grandson read some collective memories from the family and his daughter-in-law, clearly overwhelmed at having to speak to such a huge group, gave a very heartfelt speech about how much he welcomed her into the family.

After all the concerns about having enough food, vs. having too much food, it seemed that there was just enough, as I figured there would be. And people had such a good time reconnecting again.

I invited Ned and Marta to go to dinner with me, but they had other plans, so I took my self back to Osaka Sushi for the traditional "memorial day" dinner. In recent years Walt and I have gotten away from having macaroni and cheese on David's anniversary, and going out for dinner instead.

Somehow it wasn't the same, going out alone.

Move Over, Herman

According to a list of angel names from various religions "Herman" is the angel who leads the heavenly choir.

I suppose Herman has been doing this job for a very long time now. Since the start of eternity (does "eternity" have a beginning?) I'm sure he's very happy to hear that he can take some time off and turn the baton over to Dick.

Tom Estes, the videographer of all things Davis theatre, updated his Facebook profile this morning with the simple statement, "Tom Estes is wishing he hadn't opened facebook this morning." When someone asked why, he explained that he had seen the message from Dick's wife, Edelgard, that Dick died on May 3 at 8:30 p.m. I like to think that he's having a reunion with Paul and Dave and all of his former students who have gone before him.

I wrote an entry about Dick in 2007 and rather than write something new, I want to print it again here. It was called simply

MR. BRUNELLE

Once upon a time in a little town in the central valley of California there was a quiet little unassuming man who taught music in the town's only high school. He was the original absent-minded professor and nobody, to look at him, would ever think that he was anybody special.

His name was Richard Brunelle, and he changed the lives of hundreds of young people in this town.

A few months ago, Walt and I attended an event for the 25th anniversary of the Davis School Arts Foundation, of which I was an early member. Dick and his wife also attended the event, at which members of the Davis High School Madrigal choir performed.

Dick founded the award-winning Madrigal choir and yet one of the main the organizers of the event, who was new to arts at the high school had no idea that he had been involved. Someone from our era got up and introduced Dick, who made some speech about how he had never watched the new madrigal choir rehearse and how he hoped someone would invite him.

He retired several years ago after a long and illustrious career and seemed to vanish into obscurity, revered by all of us who had the privilege of being part of the "Brunelle era," and unknown by the many of the people who are carrying on the traditions that he established.

(Dick taught at the high school so long that at the start of one year he thought one of the kids in one of his classes looked familiar. "I think I taught your brother," he said to the kid. "No, Mr. Brunelle," said the kid. "It was my father.")

In truth, I didn't know Dick all that well. Perhaps I had a more intimate relationship with him than some parents, only because he was also a performer with the Davis Comic Opera Company and so I occasionally saw him socially outside of school events, but we really were not friends at all, so I can't sit here and list all of his achievements or talk about the highlights of his career.

But I'm thinking fondly about Dick today because I just watched a videotape of the 1988 high school Pops Concert. The annual Pops Concert was the high point of the school's musical year, when all the performing groups (and he led most of them) got together and put on a huge show, much of which the kids directed and choreographed themselves.

This particular year, David and Tom were both members of the high school Jazz Choir (Paul had also been part of the Jazz Choir and Marta had sung with the Madrigals; Jeri played with the jazz band, which was led by a different teacher) and it was always fun, at those concerts, to watch the affection between students and teacher at the conclusion.

We had one of our most memorable experiences with Dick, when the Jazz Choir went to New Orleans to compete in a competition at Tulane University (we won). I talked about that trip here and posted my favorite picture from that time.

(I've thought about this guy a lot since Katrina and wondered whatever happened to him.)

I wrote a little about our trips to Disneyland with the Jazz choir too, when Paul and his best friend Kag did their famous duet.

We always tried to go along on Jazz Choir trips because we loved hanging out with the kids and loved watching them perform. (We also went as chaperones on marching band trips when Jeri played clarinet in the marching band, in the years before anybody was part of the jazz choir).

I rarely see Dick these days. Our paths rarely cross, but occasionally I see him walking around town, usually with someone helping him. He has had health problems and now leans heavily on a cane. I spoke with him once when he passed by the dog park, and he couldn't remember my name (not surprising, I suppose, given the thousands of people he has interacted with over the years).

It saddens me to know that the kids in the music program now have no idea that they are living a legacy that this special man created. And it makes me so very happy to know that our kids were the beneficiaries of his passion for music.

---

In May of 2007, the Davis High Madrigal alumni, which Dick started, had a 40th anniversary -- held at the 40th instead of 50th, due to Dick's declining physical and mental health.

There were members from the entire 40 year history of the Mads, some of whom had flown in from Europe to participate. The music was glorious. Dick was not well enough to give a speech, but his wife read a speech for him.

This was my favorite photo from that event:

Dick is greeting the baby of a former Madrigal singer, who is dressed in a costume to match her father's.

For those who are interested, I spent today collecting the messages posted to Facebook and made this page.