Former Amarillo choir director returns one last time

Two years ago, Frank and Jan Frisbie cried together and shared memories of nearly 25 years of marriage. They were in the critical care unit at Baptist St. Anthony’s Hospital after Frank had suffered a massive heart attack. A doctor was blunt. Frisbie may not live.

It was about 2 a.m. when Jan noticed her husband was awake and crying. She knew Frank, a devout Christian, had no fear of death, so what was bothering him at that hour?

“He said, ‘I wish I could have directed my kids one more time,’ ” she said. “That would have been the sweetest gift, he said, if he could have just done that.”

Two years ago, Frank and Jan Frisbie cried together and shared memories of nearly 25 years of marriage. They were in the critical care unit at Baptist St. Anthony’s Hospital after Frank had suffered a massive heart attack. A doctor was blunt. Frisbie may not live.

It was about 2 a.m. when Jan noticed her husband was awake and crying. She knew Frank, a devout Christian, had no fear of death, so what was bothering him at that hour?

“He said, ‘I wish I could have directed my kids one more time,’ ” she said. “That would have been the sweetest gift, he said, if he could have just done that.”

Frisbie, former choir director at Tascosa High School, survived the operation. Jan called it a miracle. She also made a silent vow, that if Frank survived, she would make his dream somehow come true.

Early Saturday, almost two years after the near-fatal heart attack, the Frisbies pulled into the Tascosa parking lot, which was filled with vehicles. Frank thought he was going to hear his granddaughter, Emily, sing as a member of the Les Chanteurs choir.

It was in the parking lot that Jan let her husband in on the real reason they were there, what was the secret culmination of 11 months of planning with a committee of ex-students. He would indeed direct his “kids” one more time. Once again, they cried together.