Naperville men's choir celebrates founder's life of creativity, connections
When Bonnie Klee Roberts sang, her voice soared high - a dramatic soprano.
But it was the lower tones of men's voices and men's singing she loved - enough to found the Naperville Men's Glee Club in 1988.
Roberts' personality shaped the club's art and its outreach, and she stayed involved until her death Nov. 17, after years of heart disease and kidney failure and a short bout with colon cancer. She was 75.
Roberts was born in Rockford, attended New Trier High School in Winnetka and got a bachelor's degree in music from the University of Illinois. She taught at schools in Boston and San Francisco before returning to the Chicago area and coming to Naperville.
It was late 1987 when she put up posters and reached out to churches seeking singers to start a men's choir similar to a college glee club.
Her husband of 17 years, Fred Roberts, said the 20 or so men who showed up to the first practice in early 1988 happened to be a well-balanced choir, with roughly the same number whose voices fell in first tenor range as in second tenor, first bass and second bass.
One founding member still is involved, Fred Roberts said, and many current singers have been a part of the group for more than a decade.
"She liked to give people opportunities to enjoy themselves and to be together and to develop friendships and fellowship," he said. "She just got joy out of seeing that happening."
Soon after its founding, the glee club was doing more than singing, President Dave Mueller said.
The group became a nonprofit organization, and one of its earliest benefit concerts was called "Voices for Relief." It came after a tornado destroyed Plainfield High School in 1990.
Bonnie Roberts later created the Voices of Hope concert series, in which roughly 80 to 100 community members every few years - all of them affected by cancer - would gather to sing and to forge personal connections.
"It wasn't about Bonnie," Mueller said. "It was about the community and the connections with the community and providing a group of guys someplace they could get together and enjoy music."
With the glee club as her conduit, Roberts also created an Everyday Heroes concert series, launching it after Sept. 11 to thank first responders, as well as a talent showcase series to feature school-based choral groups.
"She'd package her creativeness into concert programming," Mueller said.
Under her direction as founder and artistic director, the Naperville Men's Glee Club sang the national anthem during one Chicago White Sox game a year for 16 seasons straight and performed 28 times for the Naperville Marine Corps Ball. The club also has traveled to destinations including St. Louis, New York City and Washington, D.C. to perform.
Member Tom Harle said Roberts challenged singers to memorize their performance pieces to sing without sheet music.
"She expected a lot out of us, and in many ways, she got what she was asking for," Harle said.
Roberts' family included her children, Gretchen Musa and David Klee, her grandchildren, Michael Musa and Hudson Klee, her father, Paul Traum and his wife, Marilyn. She was preceded in death by her mother, Janice Wolter.
Visitation is 4 to 8 p.m. Friday at Naperville Church of the Brethren, 1020 W. Jefferson Ave., Naperville; and 10 to 11 a.m. Saturday, at the church. A celebration of life ceremony is set for 11 a.m., at the church. Interment will follow at Naperville Cemetery.