I Was a Teenage Foot (Fall 1992)

What good is this blog if it doesn’t give some of us old-timers a chance to reminisce about the good old days, right?  So I did a little digging through old floppy disks and time-travelled back to the fall of 1992 which was the first semester of 16 Feet (and Swarthmore) for several of us.  At the time, I was keeping a daily journal (something I sadly don’t do anymore) and thought I might share this first series of Foot-related entries to spark some old memories.  Reflections/observations to follow....

September 5, 1992

This afternoon, Derek, Chris, and I went over to Lang to audition for "Sixteen Feet," (the male a-cappella octet), and Chris auditioned for the college orchestra.  He made 2nd chair violin!  I hope I got into Sixteen Feet; they were very impressed by my range, my volume, and my ability to harmonize along with them in the couple of songs that we did.  They wrote, "Jove is God" down on their audition sheet, so I take that as a good sign.

September 6, 1992

I went back to Lang to audition for "Mixed Company."  They were nice, and I sang well.

....After that, we watched the "Saturday Night Live" episode from last night that Kristin and I taped on my VCR.  It was pretty funny.  While we were watching, Bill (Hennelotter?), the Big Toe from "Sixteen Feet" came by to tell me that I had been accepted into both Sixteen Feet AND Mixed Company, but I told him that I would rather be in Sixteen Feet.  YAAAY!

September 8, 1992

...And tonight, after dinner, we had the first-ever meeting of the 1992-93 Sixteen Feet!  We, the feet, met in Bill (the Big Toe)'s room in Parrish, talked, discussed rehearsals, etc., and listened to some possible musical selections.  Should be fun!!!

September 10, 1992

We got pizza for dinner (the Pizza dude was kind of late, though), and then I went to our first real "16 Feet" rehearsal.  We learned the National Anthem, "Sh-Boom," and part of "Ride the Chariot" and "Foot Jive."  It was cool.

September 24, 1992

...Then I went to 16 Feet rehearsal after dinner, and found out that we're probably going to perform next Friday for an Astronomy convention!  It should be a neat "practice performance" for us, if we pull it off okay.  I was pumped.

September 28, 1992

...I went to 16 Feet tonight, and although we didn't sound wonderful (we tape-recorded ourselves, and some parts were rather scary)... I think we're psyched for our gig on Friday for the Astronomers' convention.  At the end, we went and sang in the stairwell of Parrish west, and it sounded GREAT!

October 2, 1992

After supper, Sixteen Feet sang at an Astronomy Dinner in Sharples.  The audience wasn't the largest or the most appreciative, but we sounded okay.

[...]

Reflections/Observations:

1) I used way too many exclamation points in my writing.  Phfft, what a freshman.

2) I think it’s hilarious that I am so enthusiastic about how great we are sounding... up until the day of our actual first concert, at which point I concede that we “sounded okay.”

3) But seriously, though, I have to give Bill (and Gael and Jorge) a lot of credit for whipping us into shape quickly.  During our first rehearsal, we worked on FOUR songs (which is insane) and less than four weeks after our first meeting all together, we were performing for an audience!!  Even if it was only “okay,” I am actually retrospectively impressed by our work ethic (or foolishness).  Our next concerts were November 13th (at Mephisto’s) and 14th (at the Intercultural Center) so we didn’t waste any time.

Anyone else care to share memories (documented or undocumented) of their first weeks as a Foot?  =)