May 15, 1996|By Stephanie Shapiro | Stephanie Shapiro,SUN STAFF
Most high school teachers slip through history's hands like so much sand. Others become the butt of eternal running gags. Not Richard A. Disharoon, Pikesville High School's beloved choral music teacher since 1964.
Like the passionately dedicated Mr. Holland of recent movie fame, this teacher commands love and respect from students who graduated as long as 30 years ago. He is, in the words of one former student, a "once-in-a-lifetime kind of teacher," who has made a lasting impression on their lives.
It is never easy to fully thank a teacher for such a lifelong gift. But last night, the 40 members of Pikesville High's Alumni Choir did, in a brilliant coup eerily reminiscent of the climactic moment in "Mr. Holland's Opus."
Until the finale, all went according to plan at the high school's fifth-annual Alumni and Concert Choir benefit performance.
Under Dr. Disharoon's meticulous direction, former students now in their 30s and 40s belted medleys from "Little Shop of Horrors," "Les Miserables," "Phantom of the Opera" and other crowd pleasers.
As usual, "Doc" was in control of the show. Then, he lost it.
At the concert's conclusion, he expected the choir to sing its signature piece, "Hallelujah, Amen!" from Handel's "Judas Maccabaeus," which celebrates Hanukkah and honors Pikesville High's predominantly Jewish population.
Suddenly, choir member Larry Waranch, class of '69, seized the microphone to announce a little change in the program. Instead of "Hallelujah, Amen!" the choir sang a song its director had never heard before. It was a magnificent "thank you" to Doc, sung for the first time in public. It was called "You Are the Reason for the Song," a simple, schmaltzy tune that shot straight to Dr. Disharoon's heart. And it was written by someone who represented a part of his life that he could never retrieve.
The choir members were crying even before they began singing. But their voices soared past the tears: "You made music a part of our lives, our comfort, our joy, our inspiration."
Their secret
On a recent Monday night, Pikesville High Alumni Choir members enter their old music room for a concert rehearsal. Their beards, cellular phones, Doc Martens and gray streaks give these Baby Boomers away. Meanwhile, they're doing their best not to give away the secret of the new song they have surreptitiously rehearsed with Mary Ellen Cohn, festival director of the Maryland Music Educators Association and a good friend of Doc's.
Dr. Disharoon, 55, is ready for a hard night's work. He looks snazzier than his early yearbook shots, which show him wearing nerdy black glasses, dark suits and a goofy grin.
Today, a frozen wave of salt-and-pepper hair shoots over his forehead. He wears wire-rimmed glasses, a cool tie and blue, white, tan plaid pants.
"Chop, chop, chop!" he shouts. Doctors, lawyers, business men and women, homemakers, line up to karate chop one another's back to loosen up their voices. They chatter, giggle, pass knowing looks.
They launch into madrigals, Broadway hits and a piece called "Inscription of Hope," which sets the words of Jews hiding from the Nazis in Cologne, Germany, to music.
Doc smiles knowingly when choir members get it right. He gently taunts when they get it wrong: "You were late, gentlemen, you were late!"
"I'm waiting for you to back off, altos!"
"It was so gorgeous and then you sang the wrong notes, screwballs!"
The alumni choir is not just a chance for members to sing, but a chance to return to their antic high school selves.
Occasional scoldings from their teacher only make the experience more real. When Doc draws down his mouth and peers over his frames in disapproval, it feels fabulous, like old times, "like home," says choir member Brian Blitz, an attorney who graduated in 1971.
His sense of nostalgia is shared by all the members of the alumni choir. Most had lost touch with Dr. Disharoon after they %o graduated. But after years of thinking about his music teacher, ,, Larry Waranch, now an attorney, called him in 1990.
"I've been waiting 20 years for this phone call," Doc told Waranch.
The call led to an emotional reunion of 150 concert choir members. They feted Doc and then put him to work as they sang for hours. The alumni choir was born.
"Not only is it like being in high school again, I sit in the same seat I sat in in high school," says Robbin Bord, class of '71. "It's a very strange feeling."
Bord is still a second soprano and her choir neighbor is still Susan Scherr.
Last night, Bord sang selections from "Beauty and the Beast," next to her son Josh, a member of Doc's concert choir who graduates in June, and her daughter Jana, a freshman concert choir member.
The concert raises scholarship money for Pikesville students seeking to further their music education. To date, the Richard A. Disharoon Alumni Choir Scholarship has raised $12,000.
'An inspiration'
