FEATURES | By Robin Gerber

More Than Music

The Moon Valley Choir’s Joyful Sounds

In the empty Ojai storefront abandoned by Dekor Home Furnishings, the Moon Valley Choir is preparing to rehearse. The space is a large, lofted, cement-floored room. White walls shine from rows of spotlights, an open staircase tucked to one side.

It’s Monday and the troupe of 20 women, mid-30s to less than 50 years old, are dressed for the chilly morning in earthy, easy clothes. Loose pants, cable knit sweaters, overalls, bandanas, sandals and boots. Call it Boho, that just rolled-out-of-bed, throw-my-hair-into-a-loose-bun-didn’t-bother-to-brush-it look. Less than a week from their biggest performance to date, there is a buzz of expectation in the room.

Choir director Rachel Kolar, tall and graceful, sinks to the floor to warm up by caressing notes from her Monolina, a box-shaped kind of flat harp that’s often used for sound massage and meditation. She leans over the Shruti, an instrument from India that works on a system of bellows which produce mesmerizing drawn-out tones. 

Rachel’s seven-year-old daughter wanders and stops, watching for a moment before searching for other amusements. The women shut off cell phones, have quiet chats and begin to form a semi-circle around Rachel. Drums, a djembe and cajón, along with various percussion instruments, are scattered behind the group.

There’s camaraderie in the room and a sense of fun. But when the choir begins to warm up their voices, as their vocal ranges weave and separate through their songs, there is magic. They watch Rachel’s arms guide the notes up and down, long and short. There are lots of smiles and nods to each other as they lift their voices to the rafters. They are serious about what they are creating and enjoying every minute of it.

The choir had its beginning in the magical alchemy of the Ojai Valley. When I ask Rachel how she became director, she laughs and tells me, “I don’t really know.” Rachel sang in the Los Angeles Ladies choir years ago and in a touring band for eight years called “He’s My Brother, She’s My Sister.” She had also run a theater company, but she had not told anyone in Ojai, where she’s lived for 14 years, that she wanted to start a choir. “It was small-town telephone,” Rachel says. “First one, then another, then another woman asked me if I was starting a choir. Finally, after the fifth time, I just said yes.” 

Rachel invited the first woman who asked her about the choir to join, and then some local musicians: Sophie Holt, Rebecca Comerford, Erin Yee, and Marty Privett. Rachel calls the process of building the choir “intuitive & emotional,” listening to her “inner voice” to determine if someone should join. The women call it a “psychic lottery.”  

Besides choosing the singers, Rachel chooses the mostly original songs and venues for performances. “My role is choir director, holding that container, that space. It’s amazing energy with all these women and needs a lot of humor which so helps to hold it together.”

Although Rachel wrote many of the original songs for the upcoming performance, she explains that, “the songs became animated through the choir.” She points to the song “Trust,” with its poetic lyrics about working through despair. “Trust…Open to the sorrow, Love into the pain, Too late now to turn away so …Trust.” Rachel says, “I wasn’t sure we could write songs as a group, but it worked with ‘Trust.” Going forward, Rachel sees a lot of songs written through collective synergy with her choir sisters.

Marleen Seegers, who sings melody, is from Holland where she grew up singing and playing a few instruments. But she dropped music for years in favor of academics, despite her love of it. “As soon as I sang in harmony with others,” Marleen says, “I was always in joy. I was looking for that when I arrived in Ojai, bucouldn’t find choirs that I felt aligned with. They were classical, too serious, so I gave up.” And then, on a special retreat, Marleen felt a strong calling to music. A friend who was already part of the Moon Valley Choir introduced her to Rachel. “I travel a lot, but the choir gives me community. Singing together creates an unspoken bond. You show your inner self to everybody.”

On the night of the Moon Valley performance, 150 chairs fill the former retail space. A counter near the door serves as a bar where Maeve McAuliffe, part of the choir and co-owner of Rory’s restaurant, helps serve drinks. Seats fill fast, and a group of about seven children of choir members jump onto the lower part of the staircase, pushing eager faces against the rungs.

Peace is the concert’s theme. The choir considered: what would make this concert different? What was the signature of it? What would you want more than anything? Their collective answer was peace.

Rachel places her instruments on the floor, and the choir files in, each woman holding a candle, dressed in black and white and stepping with purpose into a semi-circle. Each has her own story. Their lives are full with jobs, partners and children, but the choir is their sacred space. For some, it is the best thing they have done for themselves in years. They are ready to give their music to the community.

This is Moon Valley’s most ambitious concert to date, with new songs in a new space. Rachel says, “Vibration and music exist in nature’s time, and have an archetypal quality.” As the first notes rise in the packed room, there is a feeling of being transported. The powerful, unyielding words of “Trust” with its mantra-like repetition break people open. More than a few are in tears. The rest of the concert touches on forgiveness, duality, reality, fun, pain and love for ourselves and the world. It is an invitation to deep introspection wrapped in sumptuous, ethereal sound.

Moon Valley is delivering more than a show. They are reaching for our hearts as they expose their own. They hope to heal and have brought that mission outside their concerts. One of their community projects is to sing to those who are dying, a beautiful act of compassion they plan to continue, suggested by Amber Deylon.

Amber is a choir member who says she lost her voice when her mother died in 2019. An exuberant singer with a star-touched smile, she became a death midwife and grief guide because she had gone through a lot of death in her life. She created a program called “Grieve and Breathe.” The choir embraced the idea of singing to those who are going through their last passage, enlarging its power and reach. Amber describes the choir as “the best healing for me. I showed up with an open heart and mind,  and now it’s my sisterhood. We’re one big sweet family.” 

The concert ends with the Beatles, “Across the Universe.” The music grows more powerful as Moon Valley sings “Jai Guru Deva Om” (Glory to the Shining Remover of Darkness) and the audience joins in. The room vibrates with exuberance as we share not only the music, but the choir’s joy, love and peace.

(The Moon Valley Choir will host a two-day campout Oct. 5-6, in partnership with Tierra Sol and Topa Institute, check the website for more information, TierraSolOjai.com)