When I first arrive to the practice of the a cappella group Stella, the seven women sit around a graciously sized kitchen table at one of the member’s homes amid glasses of red wine.
“Do you have any ideas of what to work on?” asks Alison Jones, the petite brunette who helps write some of the group’s original songs.
Julie Woodmansee, pretty with her long hair, interjects. “I just got robbed today. And my kid discovered it. But I’m going to be cheery.” She smiles, but a furtive dart of the eyes lets on that it will be hard. Three hours earlier, one of her children called her with the bad news of a broken window and missing property.
Then, with little transition, the members break out into the most beautiful, angelic version of “Happy Birthday” I have ever heard. Woodmansee joins in, her brow gradually losing its furrow. The song swirls in the direction of one of the members who’s having a, ahem, BIG birthday – one that she prefers not be mentioned in print.
Beyond belief
The Chapel Hill and Durham-based music group (ranging in age from mid-40s to early-50s) has been together for 10 years – and more amazingly, with no one person in charge.
They’re friends. They tell each other personal details about their lives, sometimes in the time when they eat a meal together before practice, sometimes during an annual retreat to Kerr Lake, near Townsville. They celebrate accomplishments. And they give a bit of leeway for life, through the years supporting each other through divorce, second marriages, the deaths of parents – you name it.
And they are gaining quite a following here. They’ve performed at The Mansion, The ArtsCenter and for the late Tim Kimrey, who was at one time a promoter of house concerts. Their albums are now available at Flyleaf Books. The group adopts and modifies songs in a myriad of styles, ranging from folk to gospel to R&B. They do some original works too, notably tackling a song called “Teenage Girls,” which member Marya McNeish wrote about how, when she was a teenager, a 15-year-old friend died in a hiking accident at a summer camp they both attended in Colorado.
“Periodically, when we are in a happy and reflective mood, we sit back and think this thing is really almost beyond belief,” says Mooney.
Lunch implications
Members are hesitant to disclose many specifics on the disagreements they have overcome to get this far. And if they do, it’s whispered off the record.
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