Football, Dancing and Song

Jim Benkert is one football coach who can’t rile his players by calling them choirboys.

Nine of his rough, tough Westlake High Warriors, who play Saturday in the Southern Section Division III semifinals, sing in the school’s award-winning vocal ensemble.

“Choir is the cool thing to do,” said senior tailback Jon Weems, who has rushed for 1,395 yards and has scored 22 touchdowns. “I got into it my sophomore year. It’s a lot of fun.”

Not to mention hectic.

This week, the choir is preparing for its winter-program performance, scheduled for tonight, Friday and Saturday nights at Westlake. All week, Weems and the other football players have dashed from football practice to choir practice, where they join about 200 other students.

Director Alan Rose has excused the players from Saturday’s performance to play in the game.

Don’t think it was an easy call. Losing nine performers is as disruptive to song-and-dance choreography as it is to a football game.

In fact, Rose sometimes sounds like a football coach.

“We’ll just have to suck it up,” he said of taking the stage without the players.

“We have athletes from almost every sport and 16 cheerleaders in the choir. At most schools you have choir geeks and jocks. At Westlake, we have choir jocks.”

Some coaches might roll their eyes at the song-and-dance routines and object to players splitting time between athletics and choir. Not Benkert. The football coaching staff has front-row seats to tonight’s performance.

“I’m very supportive of other things kids do on campus,” Benkert said. “It’s a kick for Alan Rose and myself to have kids who overlap.

“You hear of a lot of kids who play basketball and football. You don’t hear of too many in choir and football.”

Hearing them, of course, is what choir is all about. In addition to fall, winter and spring programs, the choir enters competitions throughout the school year.

“They compete against schools all over the U.S.,” said Marsha Weems, Jon’s mother and a fan of both football and choir. “They take sweepstakes every time. They are the hit of the school.”

The choir recently spent a three-day weekend in Lake Arrowhead learning dances, and Benkert postponed Monday’s practice until 7 p.m. to accommodate the choir jocks.

“Jim told me, ‘I’m the only coach in the country who has to work football practice around the choir,’ ” Rose said with a chuckle.

Rose, 39, a graduate of Simi Valley High and Cal Lutheran, is demanding in his own right.

“He’s intense,” Jon Weems said. “I guess you could call him the choir coach.”

Don’t laugh. The seemingly incongruous activities of football and choir have plenty in common. Talent, teamwork and repetitive practice are required, resulting in live performance under bright lights.

“I tell the football players, ‘You don’t know fear until you walk on stage,’ ” Rose said. “In football you have a helmet to hide your face. There is nowhere to hide in a choir.”

Weems approaches choir performances and football games the same way--with his stomach churning.

“It’s the same jitters, just like a football game,” he said. “Even more so for choir, for some reason.”

The song will remain the same for Westlake next season. Of the nine players in choir, only Weems, Darren Mastrangelo, Nick Campbell, Eric Henderson and Nick Androski are seniors. Juniors Kjell Nesen, Mike Soleri, and Marc Cittadino, and sophomore Travis Campbell return.