Jennifer Leighton

Though Jennifer Leighton has been teaching choir for 21 years, she admits her route there was convoluted and interesting.

“I was just not that interested in music growing up,” Leighton said. “I was more into sports during high school and ran with the jock crowd.”

Leighton grew up in El Dorado Hills, played on the volleyball team and loved swimming. Leighton did take piano lessons as a child but admits she didn’t practice enough to warrant staying with lessons. She has considered taking lessons again, but with a husband and three children and her job, it’s tough to make the time.

Leighton says at some point during high school she found out she enjoyed choir and stuck with it. She attended American River College for two years before attending Whitworth College in Spokane, WA., on a voice scholarship. Still her focus was sports.

During that first year, Leighton’s travels with the volleyball team caused her to miss so much choir practice she had to “work like a dog” to catch up to the other students. In fact, her plan was to teach English and coach. Nevertheless, Leighton noted with pride that she had been at Granite Bay since it opened eleven years ago.

Music, though overshadowed for a timeby other pursuits, was a part of everyday life. Her mother, a piano teacher, always sang around the house. Her father, though not musical, always appreciated the role music played in a well-rounded life.

Leighton now witnesses this everydaywith her students.

“Music is a way for them to express themselves without risk and figure out how to deal with deep feelings,” she said.

Granite Bay High School alums, who often stop by the school, offer another perspective. “I am amazed when a parent comes up and says, ‘I don’t think my child would have made it through high school without the choir.’”

Leighton explained how over the years the study of music has probably changed the least of any subject. She still uses the “stuff she loved from her high school days,” for class work. Still, CDs and iPods have changed the way kids learn their parts. And presentation has changed.

“Now everybody is used to more action and expression,” she said. “Just standing up there and singing doesn’t work anymore.”

When asked why she is being honored, Leighton is modest. Maybe it’s her people skills or organizational flair, plus a willingness to keep learning.

But there’s something else as well.

“I think people respond to the relationship that’s developed between me and my students,” she said. “People can sense it.”

This solid two-way communication is built on mutual respect between teacher and students.

“You can just be so direct with them and they understand you,” she said. And sometimes a student just needs a teacher to believe in them and say they can really sing.”

Moreover, being in tune is what it’s all about according to Leighton.

“You have to be OK with each other to make beautiful music.”