Photo By Chief Petty Officer Stephane Belcher | Laura Ringnalda is the Senior Civilian of the Quarter and Choir Director at Recruit...... read more read more
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Meet Laura Ringnalda! She’s the Senior Civilian of the Quarter and Choir Director at Recruit Training Command (RTC), the Navy’s only boot camp.
Ringnalda is from Valparaiso, Indiana, and started playing the French horn in middle school. She became a teacher but missed playing music and decided to join the Army band before switching to the Navy.
Now she’s married and a mother of two boys. She retired from the Navy as a Chief Musician after 23 years, and coincidentally, spent most of her career at Navy Band Great Lakes, Illinois.
Ringnalda said working as the choir director at boot camp is a good fit because she can still work with music and serve the military mission.
“I’m the only civilian over there, and I think only a military musician would be able to lead a choir in this environment,” she said.
As a veteran, Ringnalda understands the military structure and lingo. She also understands the boot camp experience, which helps her relate to the recruits.
“It’s not nearly as much pressure or stress as it was being a chief and having a lot of responsibility,” she said. “Now my job is very focused and it’s fun. I get to work with recruits.”
With all the stressors in boot camp, Ringnalda enjoys giving the recruits an environment where they can release a little stress by singing.
“They can come in and just sing,” she said. “Everybody loves to sing. They get to come to choir, and it’s more of a relaxed atmosphere than everything else they’re going through. It’s fun for them and it's fun for me to see their success.”
Even though each graduation has the same three songs, each new set of recruits in the choir has their strengths, weaknesses, and personalities. Many of the recruits are only a little bit older than her 18-year-old son.
“You know some of them are leaving home for the first time,” Ringnalda said. “So, it’s kind of fun to work with that young adult that’s just brand new to the world.”
When the recruits in choir arrive at boot camp, they don’t always have a musical background. Ringnalda only gets a few days a week for three weeks to teach the recruits before they perform in front of an audience at the Pass-in-Review Ceremony.
“The first graduation is always really nerve-racking to just try to get them to sing the right notes,” she said. “The recruits are really proud of the work that they do in such a short amount of time because they’re not musicians. Everybody has a different background and they’re all at different levels, so it’s hard to get them all at the same place in such a short amount of time.”
Ringnalda said it’s all about starting at the right level. She comes up with new and unique techniques to get the recruits to an acceptable level. Sometimes she rearranges the music to simplify it. She also purchased a portable keyboard and labeled it with the letter names of the notes so they can take it back to their compartment and practice their parts.
“Most of them don’t read music. In fact, I’m lucky if I get even one person in there that can read any music at all,” Ringnalda said. “I just try to set them up for as much success as possible."
It’s rewarding to see their accomplishments from beginning to end, she said. Especially when she’s always working with such a diverse group of vocalists.
“They’re always really nervous for that first performance, thinking that they’re not going to get where they need to be, and we always pull it off,” Ringnalda said. “They’re always so proud of themselves by the time they finish. It’s fun to see them go through that whole journey.”
Boot camp is approximately 10 weeks and all enlistees in the U.S. Navy begin their careers at the command. Training includes five warfighting competencies of firefighting, damage control, seamanship, watch standing, and small arms handling and marksmanship along with physical fitness and lessons in Navy heritage and core values, Warrior Toughness, Life Skills, teamwork, and discipline. More than 40,000 recruits train annually at the Navy’s only boot camp.
| Date Taken: | 05.17.2023 |
| Date Posted: | 05.17.2023 12:19 |
| Story ID: | 444938 |
| Location: | GREAT LAKES, ILLINOIS, US |
| Web Views: | 125 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
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