Washington Festival Chorale to ‘Sing For the Cure’
Choir members Becky Long, left, and Maureen Breitigan rehearse “Sing For the Cure: A Proclamation of Hope,” which the Washington Festival Chorale will perform at 4 p.m. Oct. 18 at Trinity High School. Both women are breast cancer survivors.
Maureen Breitigan, left, and Becky Long, members of the Washington Festival Chorale, both have reasons to smile. They are breast cancer survivors.
Maureen Breitigan and Becky Long admit that “Sing For the Cure: A Proclamation of Hope” is an emotional piece that may produce its share of tears.
But they won’t be among those shedding them.
As breast cancer survivors, they both draw strength from the words in the piece, and they are eager to perform it with the Washington Festival Chorale at 4 p.m. Oct. 18 at Trinity High School.
“It doesn’t make me teary-eyed,” Breitigan said. “I’m ready to sing. I’m a fighter. I feel like I won.”
Ditto for Long.
“I feel a lot of this is being empowering to me,” Long said. “I battled through this. I know what the songs are saying.”
“Sing For the Cure” follows the journey of a cancer survivor. There are 12 movements in the piece, with each exploring different phases and feelings a breast cancer patient experiences, beginning with the diagnosis.
“It’s a powerful piece,” said Nancy Verderber, a member of the chorale and Relay for Life specialist with the American Cancer Society, Washington County unit. “The piece is very challenging. There will be a lot of crying.”
Proceeds from the concert will benefit Making Strides Against Breast Cancer (see related story), which will be held Saturday at Consol Energy Park.
Long first heard “Sing For the Cure” 13 years ago when she watched her oldest sister perform it with a choir in Somerset County. Her sister was undergoing chemotherapy for breast cancer, and the treatment left her so weak that she had to sit throughout the concert.
“The concert was really moving for me and my family,” Long said. “It was the last time I saw her sing. A year later, she was gone.”
And 10 years after that, in February 2012, Long was diagnosed with breast cancer. She was 50 years old.
“I’m a survivor and a fighter,” Long said. “I had faith I was going to get through it.”
Long noticed a lump in her inner/upper chest during a self-examination, and even though she had been getting annual mammograms, Long was told that because of its location, the tumor would not have shown up on a routine mammogram until it was much larger. So when she told her doctor about the lump, he ordered an ultrasound.
“The doctor pretty much told me, ‘You saved your life,” said Long, who underwent a lumpectomy, followed by chemotherapy and radiation.
“Battling cancer makes you tougher physically and emotionally,” she said.
Breitigan agrees.
“I feel like I’m a survivor,” Breitigan said. “I feel stronger because I survived it. It’s made me a stronger person.”
The 63-year-old was first diagnosed with breast can in February 2010 when a mammogram showed a lump. Breitigan had radiation and chemotherapy.
“It was just routine,” Breitigan said. “The doctor said ‘Here’s the scrip. Go get a mammogram.’ I thought it was some benign thing because it doesn’t run in my family. That’s why I was shocked. When they tell you that you have it, you say, ‘No, I don’t. You’ve got to be wrong.'”
Breitigan was doing fine until February 2012, when the cancer returned.
“When it came back the second time, it made me more upset,” Breitigan said.
So, she opted for a double mastectomy. “I think I beat it this time,” she said.
“Sing For the Cure” has been a cathartic experience for both Breitigan and Long, and each has one song that tugs at their hearts.
For Long, it’s “The Girl in the Mirror,” which is about losing a sister to breast cancer.
For Breitigan, it’s “One Voice,” the final song that proclaims hope.
“It’s a beautiful, powerful song,” Breitigan said. “It’s a great way to end the concert.”
Narrators will provide short readings before each song to give the audience some insight to the messages in them. Among the other songs are “Borrowed Time,” which is about facing diagnosis; “The Promise Lives On,” a spouse’s perspective; “Come to Me, Mother,” a child’s perspective; “Livin’ Out Loud Blues,” taking control; and “Groundless Ground,” pursuing a cure.
“I think we sound good,” Long said. “It’s really come together. I like that we’re getting a lot of emotion that we’re going for, and it’s powerful.”
Tickets are $15 each and can be purchased from chorale members, at Citizens Library and at the door. To reserve a ticket, call 724-745-0821.