Carol with Alumni

By Jeff McCarthy, Director of Fund Development, Cornell University

Where I work, in the development office at Cornell, we have "other duties as assigned."

In 1997 a few of us were asked to create- for an audience of 150 alumni- a short musical celebration to mark the completion of fundraising for the University's music building.

This type of event was not new to us and usually involved recruiting staff to sing a few after dinner songs around a piano.

It's the stuff we've all seen many times- well meaning amateurs who sing altered lyrics of popular songs to fit the occasion.

The audience is usually polite- so long as it's over quickly and the wine is flowing.

Somehow, for this occasion, we wanted more: after all, Lincoln Hall was Cornell's only music building and it had been a challenge to raise the millions needed for its restoration.

We began to joke that we needed someone with a big, even operatic voice, someone who could float a high A without effort.

We imagined a spoof on the grand lady of opera, a whacky Brunnhilda.

Our lead singer would have a huge voice that could shatter glass but also the comedic skills of a Carol Burnett.

After a few moments of fantasizing in this vein, we sobered up and realized there was no such person within a 200 mile range, let alone in Ithaca, New York.

We sighed and turned to more prosaic planning when suddenly one in our group said "Wait, does anyone know Carol Buckley!"

Well, I didn't know Carol, in fact I had never heard of her but somehow I was enlisted to visit this woman at the Circulation desk of Cornell's Olin Library.

Frankly I was nervous; if this didn't work, we were stuck.

I asked this smiling, unsuspecting soul, if she would consider playing the diva in our musical skit.

She would need to learn three traditional songs but take them up into a stratospheric range.

She would be wearing yellow braids and a Brunhilde helmet.

She would be enveloped in a flowing robe and stuffed with pillows to fit the stereotype of a Wagnerian diva.

She would have to sing with a thick (but decipherable) German accent.

She would dance with a chorus of 12 untrained Walkyries and warriors carrying spears and other implements of war.

And the performance was in two weeks.

I held my breath waiting for her answer: "Cool," she said.

And that was the start of an eight year relationship my division enjoyed with Carol.

The night she performed for the Lincoln Hall event, she brought the house down.

Our alumni and friends roared with laughter at her outrageous but lovely performance and they leapt up in unison when she finished- and clapped and shouted for what seemed like 5 minutes.

The bad news was that Carol had set a new standard for our musical events. Next time, what would we do?

I dreaded that Carol would only do this sort of thing with us once, maybe twice.

Afterall, she was marvelously gifted and clearly would have bigger and better things to do.

But Carol never once turned us down. Her performances for us- I count ten in all- became almost legendary.

Because of Carol, each event became bigger, more elaborate, longer and funnier than the last.

Over the 8 years that followed she played:

• a chirping angel with wings and harp reviewing the lifetime ups and downs of our former chairman of the board
• a statuesque Carmen just flown in from Seville to seranade a lead donor with a wild version of the Habanera
• a large bird plumed in shimmering black and aqua feathers singing for her supper at the dedication of the Laboratory of Ornithology
• a dancing pastry chef with her own rendition of Cherry Pies Ought to Be You.
• a fiery tempered goddess battling Zeus in a 30 minute musical tribute to President Hunter Rawlings.

Certainly, she had a presence on stage that did not allow you to take your eyes from her.

When I think about Carol as a performer, though, I cannot separate her from the person I came to know.

Whatever made her extraordinary on stage (it was so much more than the voice) - the openness, the charm, the generosity of spirit - these were all of a piece with who she was off stage.

And to me the real legacy to those in our division who came to know her is not so much the actress/ singer we loved so much but the friendship we developed over these wonderful years.

The one performance, above all, that I will never forget is when Carol played Cornell's McGraw tower.

She was a sexy, flirtatious, over the top clock tower singing a new rendition of an old Cole Porter tune.

She was enchanting to say the least and she convinced us all that when love comes in it does indeed take you for a spin.

I can't speak for everyone who saw Carol that night but I think of her when I see the McGraw Tower- and remain thankful for everything she gave to us.

Like the song she sang, she was and is Magnifique.