Who’s That New Face In The Music Department?

You may have seen her dancing around in the chorus room or strolling through the halls: it’s Hanover’s new chorus/Footnotes/music theory teacher, Mrs. Jennifer Chambers! A high energy teacher with a deep-rooted love of music and education, Mrs. Chambers graduated from Hanover in the class of 1998, and I had the pleasure of interviewing her about her job here at Hanover and her memories as an alumni.

Mrs. Chambers explained that Hanover provides a lot of support for the teachers, and that there’s a wonderful work environment full of super, highly motivated students. Due to the recent renovations at Hanover, it’s a greatly improved building to work in, and Mrs. Chambers enjoys the familiarity of having gone to school here.

Mrs. Chambers almost didn’t apply for the job at HHS because she said she had taken chorus with Mrs. Woods and to her, it seemed a daunting and overwhelming job to follow “a phenomenal music teacher.” It was Jeanne Chambers (our choral accompanist, who bears no relation to the new teacher) who convinced Mrs. Chambers to apply for what is essentially her dream job. She’s able to do choral work, teach theory and work with talented, dedicated students in an amazing program and school. She told me that at most of her previous teaching jobs, she had to rebuild failing music programs from the ground up, so it’s been amazing for her to come into a program that is already well established.

Her feelings about her new job are appropriate to the task. She says, “I had two choices; either I could be terrified or I could just jump in and be excited. Luckily, it’s the latter. I’m not quivering under a table, but it’s humbling and really exciting.”

Mrs. Chambers has fond memories of being a part of the first trip The HHS Footnotes took to Joigny with Mrs. Woods in 1998. During her student years, she was very involved in HHS music, and enjoyed the choral concerts, being able to work with Mrs. Woods, and doing the musicals. She also spoke about the “friendliness of the music department peer group,” which is still reflected today just outside the music office.

As a teacher, she is able to see the school and the music program new perspective. She notes that the music program’s growth is significant and “a credit to Jane Woods”.

She told me it isn’t weird to be back, but different and very humbling to return to Hanover as staff. As a former student of Mrs. Woods, Mrs. Chambers wants to give her students what what Mrs. Woods brought to the table in this rigorous but nurturing program.

Mrs. Chambers wants to say how honored and privileged she is that Hanover has given her the opportunity to fill this position, because she’s not going to take this for granted. Mrs. Chambers hates the phrase “big shoes to fill”; she prefers to say that she has different sized shoes to fill in new and creative ways. However, she wants to keep this valuable program that Mrs. Woods has created intact. She wants Mrs. Woods to be able to come to a concert and know that the program isn’t going to backslide, and will even get better in her absence; in general, she says “I want to make her proud!”

She’s really happy to be here, and to have the gift of working with Patty Armstrong in the music office, who we can all agree is amazing and essential to the function of the music department. She also loves having talented rehearsal pianists, and all the other features HHS has to help the staff and students succeed.

“I better not mess up, Alexandra!” she says with an excited and eager twinkle in her eye. She’s had a lot of fun  in her first few weeks at Hanover. Even beyond that, she’s excited! She looks forward to working with the Footnotes and their choreographer, Denise Frawley, as well as with Mr. Haehnel on the musical. We can’t wait to see what she brings to the table!