An Interview with Justina Golden

A Chat with
Justina Golden

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On Tuesday afternoons, from 12 to 1 p.m., the mellifluous sounds of A Little Lunch Music Women's Chorus are heard around the Northampton Community Music Center. Thirty women gather each week to sing, learn, and laugh about how they can blend their voices to create a powerful sound.

The group is led by conductor Justina Golden, 39, of Easthampton. The former member of the Valley duo Justina & Joyce has been teaching at the Northampton Community Music Center for six years. She also runs the Profound Sound Voice Studio in Florence.

Golden has always loved singing, and says that it all began when she found herself playing "half a million instruments and singing in high school and I had to choose one."

After earning degrees in music at Amherst College and the Yale School of Music, Golden returned to the Valley to pursue her musical interests. She has recorded two CDs and sung contemporary folk music nationally.

After an absence from conducting made her long for the chance to do it again, Golden approached the Center with the idea of forming some choruses because the center didn't have any. Since then, Golden has directed the women's group, Dessert, an audition-only branch of the women's chorus, and a mixed-voice chorus, the Northampton Community Singers, a group that welcomes men's and women's voices of all levels.

Besides conducting, Golden will soon be recording a CD of early music where she will be joined by an eight-voice chorus and singers Dar Williams and Cindy Kallet for Berkshire-based independent label Hilda's Attic.

Q: How did "A Little Lunch Music" get started?

A: The music center had no choruses at all. I conducted a chorus called the Sappho-nics and I had conducted them for about six years and then took a break from it. I really missed conducting and pitched the idea to the center and we began with probably about a dozen people and it stayed that way for a year or two. Suddently, two years ago, it swelled to 30. Everyone is so overcommitted, when is the only time any of us have left? Lunchtime!

Q: How do you choose the music the chorus sings?

A: The songs talk to me. I know that sounds odd. I order a lot of music and then I take it out before the semester and certain songs talk to me and say "sing me." It's really weird. The Community Singers haved developed a bent for groove tunes, such as jazz, folk, blues, and contemporary, so I know if I head in that direction, I'll hit with them. With the Lunch singers you can do a wider variety of songs.

Q: What do you love the most about what you do?

A: Convincing people that they're more, when they think they aren't. It's astonishing to have the opportunity to watch folks light up as the realize that they can do and be so much more than they've settled for. And that's the best part of it. What a job! I sit down and people sing to me all day!

Q: Why do you think music and the arts are important today?

A: I think they are stories which need to be told. There are ways in which we as people are defined by the stories that we tell, and I think by choosing carefully the stories you want to tell you can say to an audience or group of people this is the best we can be or this is the worst that we can be. They are teaching tools, inspirational tools.

Q: What is your favorite type of music?

A: I like music with a groove and music that really grabs my spirit and lifts it. And that's from every conceivable tradition, even the saddest song can do that. I like something that really has something to say which is lifting.

Q: What are your musical influences?

A: Well, my first music influence was Karen Carpenter; I loved her singing. Over the years I've listened to so many different things. I'm a huge Vivaldi fan, I love Bach, I love listening to Chant from around 1200, I find that inspiring. I'm a huge Loreena McKennitt fan.

— Interview by Laurie A. Nivison for The Northampton Hampshire Gazette, (March 26, 2001)

A Chat with Justina Golden

A Chat with
Justina Golden