Altadena Community Church burned down by the Eaton Fire in Altadena on Thursday, January 9, 2025.
(
Christina House
/
Los Angeles Times via Getty Images
)
Topline:
The Altadena Community Church was lost in the Eaton Fire. The place of worship was also the rehearsal space for the Pasadena Chorale. The choir director also lost his home.
Why it matters: Despite the devastation, the choir gathered to sing together just days later. They rehearsed to offer each other solace and maintain normalcy amidst all the destruction.
The backstory: Founded in 2009, the Pasadena Chorale is a community choir that’s grown from a smaller group to a force of around one hundred people.
Read on... for more on the choir's decision to keep rehearsing.
The email came while the fires were still burning across Los Angeles.
It was less than 48 hours since the Eaton fire sparked in the San Gabriel foothills that would burn Altadena Community Church to the ground. It hadn’t even been a day after a photo was sent to the Pasadena Chorale showing the church – its rehearsal space – ablaze.
And choir director Jeffrey Bernstein had lost his own home, too, along with others in the group, made up of musicians, educators, JPL scientists and people of all types that gather every week to sing together. I am one of them. Seeing and reading about the devastation, it seemed impossible to imagine gathering for rehearsal again anytime soon.
But two days after the fire, Bernstein wrote to the group that the upcoming rehearsal would not be canceled on the weekend.
So on the appointed date, we assembled in a new, unfamiliar church in a familiar half-circle around the piano. And before much at all was said about the fires, we began to sing.
A strong community
Founded in 2009, the Pasadena Chorale is a community choir that’s grown from a smaller group to a force of around one hundred people.
Some in the choir have been singing together for years, and others are brand new to the mix. This means the weekly rehearsals have a lovely small-town feel, where people look forward to the 20-minute break so they can catch up with friends or chat with someone they haven't met before. As a newer member of the choir, I've found refuge in a group so at ease in each other's company, and so joyful in its dedication to choral music.
The common ground is a commitment to showing up each Monday night from 7:30 p.m. to 10 p.m., when most are home recovering from the first work day of the week, ready to sit in a folding chair and sing.
" Churches aren't buildings… and choirs aren't buildings. They're groups of people," Bernstein said last Saturday. "Being here today is a very tangible way of remembering that."
The Pasadena Chorale rehearses at a church in La Verne after the Eaton Fire.
(
Libby Rainey
)
Stories of destruction and hope
The smoke was still hanging in the air in many parts of Los Angeles last weekend when the choir assembled for the first time after losing the church. Almost everybody had a story to tell.
Chris Tickner evacuated his home near Eaton Canyon with his wife in terror, only to learn that his home miraculously survived.
Siobhán Dougall and Jen Wang piled their kids into their cars in the middle of the night and fled their home in Monrovia, along with their giant pet tortoise named Strawberry. The next day they heard that their children's school had been lost to the fire.
There were others who didn't come that day at all – some having lost homes or entire neighborhoods. It's these stories that were being shared between songs, in tears and in laughter. Together, people were processing the loss of so many shared spaces.
"We spend so much time in Altadena and so many of the places we love are there. And it's not even like just the places we love. It's the McDonald's where the french fries were always cold. Or the Arco station you always go to right after you dropped off your kids and you're out of gas," Wang said.
"There's this guy on Altadena Drive who always had a sign out for very local honey. I always meant to go and I never did. And I wonder if his bees are okay."
The Pasadena Chorale rehearsed at the Church of the Brethren in La Verne after the Altadena Community Church burned down.
(
Libby Rainey
)
Lessons from music-making
Where the choir will gather in the long-term is still undecided. For now, it's being plotted out rehearsal by rehearsal. The locations for each meeting are reminders of all the landmarks that remain despite the terrible fires: one of last week's meetings was held in the historic First United Methodist Church. This week, the group will gather at the 100-year old Pasadena Playhouse.
For us, rebuilding will also happen through the music itself. To sing in a choir is to sing with one voice – or to try your very best to. To blend in with your fellow singer rather than stand out, trusting that together you can make something deeper and more interesting than one voice alone can.
This idea – that we can do more together than on our own – will be important in the months to come, not just for the choir but for all of Altadena as it faces a long and uncertain recovery.
" I have no doubt that this community is going to come back. And it's going to be pretty special," Tickner said. "But it's going to take time, and we're all going to do it together. And singing in this choir is a part of that."
