In the early hours of the school day Monday, Santa Rosa High School choir teacher Marla Tusa had her charges sing in distinct groups — altos, then sopranos, tenors and bass. Among their own, they sounded beautiful, fine tuning their parts for the upcoming William Barclay Memorial Concert this Thursday.

But when Tusa asked them to all rise and sing as one choir, their blended voices echoing off of the 900-empty seats of the Santa Rosa High Auditorium, the sound was deeply moving.

They were singing “The Lord Bless You and Keep You,” a mainstay of Santa Rosa choirs for years, decades even, and a signature piece of the legendary former choir leader Dan Earl. And that is precisely why Tusa was having her students work on that song this week.

At the William Barclay concert Thursday, Earl will return to a spot on stage he graced for decades, to be the special guest conductor and lead not only the Santa Rosa High singers, but those from Montgomery, Piner and Maria Carrillo high schools in what is dubbed the “massed choir” concert finale.

The moment, sure to be poignant, is one of many salutes Tusa and fellow choir directors have planned for Earl, who retired in 2005 after a long and storied career leading students in both song and life.

“I just felt really inspired to make a living dedication to him, to do something big like this for him,” Tusa said.

The massed choir portion of the night has always been central to the William Barclay concert. It’s when students from every high school join together and sing as one. On Thursday, that means about 130 voices singing together.

“So often our schools get together to compete. This is not a competition,” Tusa said. “This is honoring the strength of the music programs and what it does for humans, not just the humans who participate but those of us who get to experience watching these kids have so much joy, and experiencing and living that joy.”

That notion is at the heart of the William Barclay concert that has been held in these parts for decades.

Barclay, the second teacher ever to lead the choral program at Santa Rosa High, died in 1965. A scholarship was created in his name by two former students — Bob Wilson, who went on to become choral director at Piner High and Dick Wees, who followed Barclay at Santa Rosa.

And it’s the concert that funds it. It’s also the concert that has captured the heart of singers and choral leaders for years, in part because of the structure.

The students from Santa Rosa’s public high schools sing to complement to each other. All choir programs sing pieces on their own before coming together in a massed choir finish.

Elsie Allen, which does not have a choir program, sends its robust mariachi band to the performance.

“It’s the one time in the year that the five Santa Rosa City Schools high schools get to perform with each other and for each other,” said Gail Bowers, the veteran choir director at Maria Carrillo High who has been in the district 29 years. “It’s a space that is not competitive but joyful…It’s a chance to just sit down and enjoy each other.”

And the public is encouraged to come and bear witness to that joy.

And what’s more, a guest conductor is invited to come and lead the program. And that includes an all-day event that partners the conductor with each of the choirs to give one-on-one tutorials and performance notes before the big public show in the evening.

This year’s guest conductor? One of the preeminent names in college choral music: Paul Head, director of Choral Studies and Unidel Professor of Music in the University of Delaware.

In November, and under Head’s direction, the Delaware Choral Scholars earned the top overall score at the 56th International Choral Contest of Tolosa, Spain. The Delaware Choral Scholars are currently ranked number one in the world by INTERKULTURE, an organization headquartered in Germany that hosts the World Choir Games.

And Head, who has led the University of Delaware’s internationally-recognized choir program for nearly three decades, was a student of Dan Earl’s at Santa Rosa High before graduating in 1981. He also did his student teaching under Earl and filled in for him in the late 1980s when Earl took a sabbatical.

Head calls Earl’s influence nothing less than foundational.

“He’s been a huge influence on hundreds of kids and many of us think that he is a cornerstone of our careers, if not lives,” he said.

When organizers invited Head, whose services as an instructor and clinician are sought worldwide, to be the guest conductor at the Barclay concert — his first time doing so since 1993 — and noted that this night would also include an homage to Earl, Head made it happen.

“I don’t even know where to begin to tell you my admiration for this guy,” he said. “There is no way I wasn’t going to be there. There was no way I wasn’t going to do this gig.”

So formative was Earl to both his musical and personal development, that Head compared him to his father.

“I had a very strong relationship with my father but I would say in high school Dan was a stronger role model,” Head said. “Dan got it. He got me. Dan spoke a language I understood and he was so deeply impassioned about it. Even if you didn’t get it, you couldn’t not respect it. That is why kept kids saying ‘How high? I’ll do it.’”

An example of that devotion?

In June 2020, just a few months into those painful, confusing and lonely days of the pandemic, it was a rendition of Earl’s staple “The Lord Bless You and Keep You” that brought together 183 of his former students to sing the piece — in beautifully edited unison thanks to a bit of technology and a lot of love.

One hundred and eighty three voices, singing together, tiny faces barely distinguishable on the screen, but with Earl, in the center.

It struck a chord. It’s been watched more than 37,000 times.

And that is the song that Earl, 82, will conduct with the massed choir, on Thursday.

It feels important to note that when Earl speaks of choirs, he says they “share their music,” rather than they sing their music.

And the massed choir, at the conclusion of the night, after all of the schools have performed their sets and they join each other on stage, that is where choral music most comes alive, he said.

“As a conductor, of course you want your kids to sing well, but music sometimes needs to go beyond competition. Even though everybody wants to do their best, it’s not a matter of scoring points,” he said. “It’s a matter of sharing your love for music, your understanding of music, the joy of music. It shows the unity of the art itself. It amplifies the beauty of togetherness — that we can work to be the best that we can be, but we have an opportunity then to share.”

On Monday, as Tusa went over some final instructions to her choir, she invited them to pause and take in the moment. The moment on stage, but also this moment in time.

She reminded them that “The Lord Bless You and Keep You” is a benediction of sorts — a wish of wellbeing. She asked them to remember that, to feel that as they sing.

“It’s a call to closure in a peaceful way,” Tusa, growing emotional, said of the song. “It’s really important what you are saying. It’s really important.”

And with that, Tusa raised her hand and the choir began to sing.

You can reach Staff Columnist Kerry Benefield at 707-526-8671 or kerry.benefield@pressdemocrat.com. On Instagram @kerry.benefield.