About The Chorale

 Mission Statement: 

Arizona Women In Tune is committed to enhanced lesbian visibility, celebrations of the contributions of women in music, and the passionate pursuit of artistic excellence.

 Vision Statement: 

Primary Activity.

 

The primary activity of Arizona Women in Tune is to rehearse and perform vocal music as a women's chorale.

Lesbian-identified Organization.

 

Arizona Women in Tune is a lesbian-identified organization. Singing membership is limited to self-identified lesbians and lesbian-friendly women. Non-singing membership is limited to any persons supportive of the organization's mission.

Lesbian Visibility.

 

Arizona Women in Tune is committed to lesbian visibility. We believe that increased awareness of lesbian creative activity will benefit the lives of all lesbians and promote tolerance of, and lessen discrimination toward, lesbians and other women.

Respect of Individual "Outness".

 

While Arizona Women in Tune is committed to lesbian visibility, and we celebrate the opportunity each of us has for increased "outness," we are sensitive to each individual's life situations, which may limit their ability to perform during media-covered performances or participate in some organizational activities. When events are scheduled, every attempt is made to inform members of possible media coverage. We trust that each member will make the appropriate decision about her participation in media-covered performances.

Diversity.

 

Arizona Women in Tune respects and celebrates diversity of lesbian experience along socio-economic, cultural, ethnic, racial and educational dimensions. In addition, we strive to maintain a membership diverse in age and physical ability. We strive to educate the public and our membership on all issues regarding diversity, and work toward the elimination of prejudice and discrimination based on gender, race, class, sexual orientation, religion, age and physical ability.

Women's Work.

 

Arizona Women in Tune encourages, supports and promotes women's endeavors whenever possible.

Herstory:

Like So Many Lesbians, We Started Out With A Different Name.

In 1993, Sandra McCullough started a common interest group for singing members of the Lesbian Resource Project in Tempe, Arizona. Sandi's dream was to start a lesbian counterpart to Phoenix's Grand Canyon Men's Chorale, which was three years old at the time. I attended the first meeting, and there wasn't a lesbian in the bunch who had any experience starting or leading a choir. But it was a time of great dreams at the Lesbian Resource Project, which had just received its first grant and would have a very successful, if brief, life providing services to Valley lesbians — everything from low-cost mammograms to automotive maintenance workshops. In just a few months, our first volunteer conductor appeared. She taught elementary school music, and she shepherded us through our first public performance, at the Arizona Central Pride Festival in June, 1993. We used music books that her school choir had discarded. I remember singing, "Our Call Is For Freedom, Our Song Is A Song Of Peace," and I remember one woman whispering to me, before we went on stage, "I am definitely going to vomit." But we sang out as lustily as we could in 115-degree heat. Pride, and the stifling air under that tent, flushed our faces. Nobody vomited, and the ancient queen that ran the festival stage, a Stonewall veteran, beamed at us "girls" and told me, "The dykes were there from the beginning of the movement, you know."

I won't mention our first conductor's name; she wasn't "out" at work, and shortly after the Pride performance, she took a job in another state. She wasn't the only one in the closet; we took our first publicity photos next to a block wall, and the women who couldn't afford to be photographed stretched their hands through holes in the wall, so their hands were caught on film, but nothing else. I smiled and waved to the camera, and so did Sandi and a few others, our backs to the wall. I don't know if the women behind the wall were smiling, but they waved.

We were a choir with twelve legs and twenty hands. Before we went on stage, we wanted a name. No real inspiration came, and we were under a deadline, and someone suggested TLC. It was a code word for "the lesbian community" (there were bumper stickers in the 70s), but nobody remembered that after our first discussion. The Twelve Leg Chorus, the Ten Lesbian Chorus, The Lesbian Chorus, and a few sexually explicit origins for the acronym all competed until we stuck to TLC and swore that it meant "anything you wanted it to." Some years later, we modified the name to TLC Chorale, mostly to distinguish us from a mainstream pop group of a similar name.

TLC was not a very good name. First, all the queries about what it meant got really old after a while. Second, I think the women who were involved in that first, fateful, rushed conversation about a name (and how we needed one RIGHT NOW) knew that we didn't really put our best creative and unified energy into the task. We also couldn't see, at that point, what we would become, and I think we outgrew that name, even as we eventually outgrew the small rehearsal venue the Lesbian Resource Project could provide.

In contrast, Arizona Women in Tune is a wonderful name, born out of several discussions about our vision, during a time of great change for the choir. There is nothing rushed or slap-dash about that name, and it has served us for three years now. I think it will serve many more. - Dawn Bates