Elvis Drummer had been named after the one and only Elvis Presley, the king of rock ‘n’ roll. So, he had always considered himself a born musician. Even if there was not a musician in his family, his last name fit the persona. Some people were meant to be doctors or teachers. He knew he was meant to perform on the stage. This is why he joined the Head of the Class Middle School Choir in his hometown of Hoboken, New Jersey. It wasn’t exactly rock ‘n’ roll, but it was a beginning. Everyone had to start somewhere. He was going to start as a tenor in the choir.
“This year, we’re combining singing with ballet in the annual Christmas concert,” choirmaster Forte Piper announced at the first chorus practice. “The Hallelujah Chorus meets The Nutcracker. It’s never been done before, and we have to break new ground. I love to go watch the ballet, and I have a million ideas.”
As Elvis processed what Mr. Piper explained to the class, his stomach twisted in knots. This is not exactly what he was expecting. He figured that maybe once or twice Elvis Presley had this dilemma, so he was willing to do whatever he had to do to take the stage. Although he did wonder what the girls in his class would think of him dancing the ballet.
Mr. Piper was famous for popping candy canes into the mouths of students if they were caught talking in the middle of choir practice. He kept a handful of candy canes with him at all times, ready for anyone babbling. Elvis made extra sure to keep his mouth shut, except when singing. He needed to win over Mr. Piper if he was going to have a music career.
In case Mr. Piper needed to pull someone off stage, he was also known to use a shepherd’s crook, which looked like a huge red and white candy cane. Elvis was sure he would never have to use it to pull him from the spotlight, only everyone else.
“Candy canes are the only way to keep you quiet!” Mr. Piper said, as he shoved one into Elvis’ mouth. “Do you notice how the rest of the seventh-grade students are listening? Use your tenor solo voice when asked.”
“But I didn’t say anything!” 13-year-old Elvis blurted out at Mr. Piper with the candy cane under his tongue. Elvis pulled the piece of candy out of his mouth and threw it in the trash.
“You most certainly did just say something!” Mr. Piper said. Then, he shoved another candy cane in Elvis’ mouth. Elvis threw the second candy cane in the trash again and wondered what he had got himself into.
“Maybe we could sing ‘Blue Christmas’ as a choir,” Elvis suggested. “Without adding any ballet. It’s a classic!”
When Elvis had auditioned for the choir, Mr. Piper picked him as a soloist. So, Elvis figured using his beautiful voice was his best defense. Elvis looked at his friend Griff Gig, who was also picked as a soloist, and sat a few seats away from him. Elvis shrugged his shoulders and shook his head.
His other friends Amanda Sonatina and Vicki Viola sat a few seats over from Griff in the soprano and alto section. Having the most beautiful voices, Amanda and Vicki were also chosen as soloists. Elvis had always had a crush on Amanda. He definitely wanted to make himself look good to her. Mr. Piper better not screw up his reputation.
“I have no idea how to dance the ballet!” sixth grade lead tenor Griff Gig argued. Mr. Piper promptly popped a candy cane in his mouth, too. “We’re all going to look like fools!”
“I love the ballet!” seventh grade solo soprano Amanda whispered to sixth grade Vicki.
“You can’t dance any better than I can dance!” solo alto Vicki responded. “This is supposed to be choir!”
Both girls got candy canes popped into their mouths before they could say anything else, kind or otherwise. Elvis sat there in silence, thinking that if Amanda liked the ballet, then he was at least going to have to try to like it, too.
“I even got my own leotard for the rehearsal,” Mr. Piper said, dressed in a red and white striped outfit as a gag. “The boys in the choir will wear leotards, and the girls will wear tutus.”
Elvis sat in stupendous fright at the thought of the entire school seeing them embarrass themselves. There had to be a way for the choir to make it through the performance without humiliating themselves.
“We start our first vocal ballet practice tomorrow!” Mr. Piper said. “Come prepared with your own leotard or tutu.”
Then, the bell rang, ending the most dreadful choir practice that Elvis could imagine.
“We’ve got to come up with a plan,” Elvis told the other choir members on the way out of the door. He covered his mouth with his hand so Mr. Piper could not hear him.
“Yeah, we’re not letting Mr. Piper do this,” Griff agreed. “He’s bored, and he’s a nutcracker.”
“I think we should go along with his practice until the performance night,” Amanda suggested. “Then, we’ll have to figure out what we are actually going to perform instead.”
“He’s going to suspend us if we don’t do what he says,” Vicki warned. “My parents will be so angry.”
“Okay, so the plan is to do what he says until December 14, the night before the performance,” Elvis said. “Then, we take over at show time!”
“The trick is to get him into the closet,” Griff said. “And keep him there! I could go missing, and he comes to look for me, but then we get stuck in the closet.”
Elvis considered the consequences of such actions, like expulsion from school or juvenile court, but at this rate, something drastic had to be done. They just could not get caught.
“We could just sing the same old songs that we performed last year,” Amanda said. “No one will notice. Well, my mom might notice, but that’s about it.”
“I’m willing to perform one of Elvis Presley’s Christmas songs as a solo,” Elvis suggested. “I know all of them by heart!”
He was secretly hoping to impress Amanda, so that he could ask her to the spring school dance. Something good had to come out of this choir practice that had gone bad.
“I’d love to hear you sing a solo,” Amanda said to Elvis with a smile. Elvis thought her chances of saying “yes” to his invitation to the spring dance increased by the minute.
“By the time Mr. Piper gets out of the closet, the night will mostly be over,” Vicki said. “We’ll have saved our reputations.”
The four soloists passed word of their plan to the rest of the chorus members and for the next few weeks endured practice. Elvis made the most of it and tried to learn as much about music as he could. He didn’t know a lot of music theory, so anything he could learn was a plus. His favorite thing to discuss was which key made his voice sound the best.
Although Elvis didn’t like Mr. Piper’s staging of the ballet, the students seemed to be improving at following his directions. Most of the choir members moved in the correct form, even if some of them got confused at times. Elvis wanted to put his whole heart and soul into singing, not the ballet. It felt like a distraction from the original intention of the choir.
“Pirouette!” Mr. Piper said to the students. “If I can do it, you can do it, too! On your toes everybody!”
“This is a nightmare!” Griff mumbled to Elvis. “We should’ve signed up for band or orchestra.”
“Don’t worry,” Elvis whispered to Griff. “We’re about to take over the performance! You can go missing and keep Mr. Piper in the closet. I’ll take the stage and sing!”
When performance night finally arrived, Mr. Piper could not find Griff anywhere.
“I think Griff is changing his clothes in the closet,” Elvis said to Mr. Piper.
“Griff! Get out here now!” Mr. Piper called as he ran to the closet in search of him. As he stepped inside the closet, the door shut on him with the help of Elvis.
“Wait! Let me out,” Mr. Piper called, as he banged on the door. “The parents will get me fired! They will act like I was asleep on the job.”
Elvis imagined Mr. Piper slumped down on the floor next to Griff in the dark. He ran to take the stage and shine in front of Amanda.
“Everybody quick! Change back into your regular clothes,” Elvis said to the choir members. The chorus ran to the bathrooms and shed their leotards and tutus for their formal black performance outfits. Then, the choir took the stage on the rafters, just like last year, and every other year before that.
Before the pianist started the introduction to Mr. Piper’s first scheduled number, Elvis interrupted him in hopes that he knew how to improvise “Blue Christmas.”
“Mr. Piper has gone missing with one of our soloists,” Elvis explained to the crowd at the microphone on stage. “We sing on! We’ll start with my rendition of ‘Blue Christmas.’”
The pianist quickly flipped through his book of songs and found the proper sheet music. Elvis felt relieved that the pianist went along with his plan. He glanced at Amanda who gazed in his direction. Elvis sang and moved his hips with a twist.
In front of his parents and peers, Elvis crooned a heart-wrenching version of the classic. His voice sounded like velvet in the face of what would have been a sandpaper type of night. He was sure that he had impressed Amanda. No one else in choir could sing like him.
After his solo, Elvis slipped back into the chorus, and the group performed one holiday standard after another. Everyone seemed to be enjoying the evening, including Elvis’ parents who sat in the second row. Mr. and Mrs. Drummer recorded every second of the evening for home videos. Then, all of a sudden, the lights in the auditorium went out. Everyone was left in the dark, wondering what happened, including Elvis.
Elvis remembered how the closet had the circuit breaker box for the electricity in it. He couldn’t believe that he had overlooked this piece of information. Mr. Piper must have flipped the switches, and now Elvis had a major predicament. The parents in the audience started to whisper among themselves. Elvis feared they were in a lot of trouble.
“Maybe I should let Mr. Piper out,” Amanda whispered to Vicki. “Everyone just keep singing until I get him out of the closet.”
“It will be hard for him to do much damage now because the night is almost over,” Vicki said. “Might as well go and get him!”
As Amanda slipped off the stage, with the rest of the choir singing “I saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus” in the dark, she quickly kissed Elvis on the cheek. He felt warm all over.
Minutes later, in the middle of “Santa Baby,” the lights flashed back on in the auditorium. Everyone clapped in the audience. Then, Mr. Piper took the stage in his leotard in a tizzy. He looked at the choir in silence. Griff stood next to him with a phony smile. Elvis looked at his shoes and thought of how nice it would be to sing Elvis Presley’s standard “Blue Suede Shoes” at the spring concert.
Seeing Mr. Piper in his leotard, the audience laughed as though it was a joke. And so it was, but it was also the best choral performance in the history of Head of the Class Middle School, and it didn’t involve one bit of ballet dancing for the choir. Elvis thought his class members must have been inspired to perform well in spite of the threat of dancing the ballet.
“We are doing the finale as practiced,” Mr. Piper instructed his students in a firm voice. “There’s no time to change into your leotards and tutus. So, you’ll do the finale with the ballet moves in your regular clothes.”
The entire choir sighed at Mr. Piper’s instructions. Elvis’ body cringed down to his little toes, but he had no choice. The plan had been somewhat successful, but somewhat not. He had to make the best of Mr. Piper’s crazy ideas.
Along with the other students in the choir, Elvis lived through what felt like an out-of-body experience, performing The Hallelujah Chorus with dance moves from The Nutcracker. He tried not to look at Amanda. He felt so humiliated after his gorgeous solo, and she had even kissed him when no one was looking. Mr. Piper ruining the finale was not in Elvis’ plan.
When the performance was over, Elvis looked at his parents for some relief. To his surprise, the crowd went wild with cheers. Everyone in the audience stood to their feet with a standing ovation. Elvis was shocked. Of course, he thought that they must have been clapping for his “Blue Christmas” solo and not Mr. Piper’s choreography.
“Merry Christmas!” Mr. Piper bowed in his leotard. He threw candy canes to the crowd.
“Next year, we’ll be doing an entire ballet with our singing,” Mr. Piper said to the audience. “You just wait!”
“I’m going out for the basketball team, and so is everyone else,” Griff said.
“Oh, we’ll come up with another plan before then,” Elvis said to Griff. “You can’t quit! I have to do another solo and get my career going.”
“Maybe we could just take a field trip to the New York City Ballet instead,” Mr. Piper said, as Elvis pulled his teacher off the stage with his own candy cane shepherd’s crook. “I’ll buy the tickets!”
Elvis considered taking Mr. Piper up on the offer. He could sit next to Amanda at the New York City Ballet and hold hands. As long as he didn’t have to dance in a leotard. He just wanted to sing, sing, sing!
Copyright 2021 Jennifer Waters
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