Hi Friend, What a wonderful and thoughtful gesture! We've known each other for some time but this is a side of you of which I was unaware! You said, however, that your "parents made no important contributions to society..." I think you are partially wrong or perhaps too modest. You did mention that "They provided for [you], and they taught [you] lasting values." As I approach my twilight years, I like to believe that my single most important contribution to society is having raised four wonderful (in my eyes) daughters who are productive citizens and who, in turn, are teaching their children lasting values that will contribute favorably to society for years to come. Further, in all my many years, the most rewarding experience of my life, other than the family, was in the teaching of others, and knowing that some of these would, in turn, teach a future generation. I know that teaching is your profession and in that you are contributing greatly and your parents continue contributing through you. I do wish that I could be there for the performance but you are aware of my situation. Please let me know if and when a CD is released. Warm Regard, Jim | -----Original Message----- | From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] | On Behalf Of Cliff Lamere | Sent: Sunday, April 15, 2007 4:06 PM | To: [email protected] | Subject: [NYCOLUMB] A Memorial to my Parents | | A genealogist's perspective: | | My mother, Ethel Carter, was born 1912 in Valatie, Columbia Co., NY. My | father, William Lamere, was born 1911 in Tupper Lake, NY but came to | Kinderhook village to live with his brother Fred. Ethel and William | lived less than two miles apart. They married 1934 in Valatie where | three of their four children were born. | | I got interested in my family's genealogy about two or three years | before my mother died in 1999. I audiotaped her relating stories about | all of the relatives she could recall. In 2000, I put my genealogy | website online (Albany & Eastern New York Genealogy). Over time I | learned how difficult it was to find even the slightest reference to | some of the people who lived in the past. About 2004, I commissioned a | Requiem for chorus and orchestra to be composed to honor my parents, but | also to make sure that their names have a chance of being remembered in | the future. | | "For Us the Living: Requiem in Memory of William and Ethel Lamere" was | composed by Alfred V. Fedak and will be performed April 22, 2007 at 7 | p.m. at the Union College Memorial Chapel in Schenectady, NY. There | will be advertising and perhaps an article or review in some local | newspapers. I requested that their names be part of the title so that, | hopefully, a distant greatgrandchild of my parents will locate some of | this information on the internet decades from now. I requested that the | requiem be beautiful rather than modern. That will make it more likely | that the composition may be performed in the future and that its name | may appear on a CD or in a music publisher's catalog. | | I was told that what I have done is unusual because ordinary people | don't have music composed for ordinary parents. It is true that my | parents made no important contributions to society, but they struggled | to raise a family during the Great Depression and World War II. They | provided for me, and they taught me lasting values. I love and miss | them, and I want them to be remembered. Somehow my interest in | genealogy, my interest in helping people (my website) and my interest in | music all led to this single act. | | Before commissioning the Requiem, I tried to get the Saint-Saëns | Requiem, my favorite choral work, performed in their honor. However, | the orchestra for that piece was too large. Rand Reeves, conductor of | the Burnt Hills Oratorio Society, and Alfred Fedak, composer of the | memorial to my parents, were able to reduce the the number of | instruments in the orchestra, making it possible for that requiem to | also be performed at the concert. | | It is not my intention to advertise the concert here, but I thought that | this genealogical act might be of interest to some members of the | mailing list. | | Cliff Lamere | | | | | | ------------------------------- | To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to NYCOLUMB- | [email protected] with the word 'unsubscribe' without the quotes in the | subject and the body of the message