Congratulations to the Golf Capital Chorus for bringing joyful entertainment to our area as well as contributing financially to many charities for 30 years.

Although I am no longer a member, I'm nonetheless proud to have been one of the founding members and its first musical director back in 1980. I had an office on the second floor of the Razook Building in Pinehurst when Conrad Vogler came to see if I could assist him in starting a barbershop chorus. At that time I had just sung with a quartet in "The Music Man" with the Pinehurst Dinner Theatre (a role repeated by the same quartet in "The Music Man" performed by the Sandhills Little Theatre in 1989).

I called the other quartet members, Richard Finch, Rich DeJerf and Perry Payne, and we all met with Connie Vogler at the Pinehurst County Club to form plans to start what became the Golf Capital Chorus. Since I had sung with Fred Waring and his Pennsylvanians and had directed both college glee clubs and a church choir, Connie asked if I would be the first musical director. I agreed to do so for the first six months while a permanent director was found. Two years and two directors later, I was permanently replaced.

The Pine Crest Inn provided us rehearsal space in its extra dining room. In those early days we usually had a beer break in the middle of rehearsals, and some of us would linger over a beer afterward, singing in quartets.

Those beer-drinking rehearsals are a long past part of the history of the Golf Capital Chorus, which now practices at 7 p.m. every Monday at the Community Presbyterian Church in Pinehurst.

Jim Dawson

Pinehurst