STORY AND PHOTO BY KAREN BOSSICK

There’s a tradition in jazz called the second line.

It refers to those in New Orleans who followed a brass band to a cemetery, mourning as they went. Once they had laid their loved one to rest, the band would strike up a lively song and the followers would begin pumping the parasols they’d carried to shade them from the hot sun while others marched around waving handkerchiefs in the air.

That tradition expresses itself at the Sun Valley Jazz and Music Festival every Sunday morning as festival-goers march around to “When the Saints Come Marching In.”

This year, however, the meld of jazz and the passing of life took on a new look thanks to the work of longtime jazz patron, sponsor and self-proclaimed Yale Whiffenpoofs “Mom” Marty Orwig.

What she did was premeditated. Orchestrated. All wrapped up in a moment of serendipity, human will and, perhaps even, divine will.

Diagnosed with brain cancer last winter, Orwig did everything she could to buy more years. But, when it became apparent she had just weeks to live, she put the organizational skills that she’d used on behalf of the Republican Party and the Moose Foundation to organize her own farewell party.

She decided nothing would do but to have her favorite gospel band—the six-piece High Street Party Band from Boise—play at her memorial service. And she decided she wanted the Whiffenpoofs, whom she had sponsored for years at the Jazz Festival, there, as well.

Then, she somehow managed to slip away three days before the festival began, ensuring both groups would be in town.

“Marty Orwig has prepared for us an uniquely marvelous celebration,” Pastor Mark Inouye told those assembled for her celebration of life at the Presbyterian Church of the Big Wood as the 2017 Sun Valley Jazz and Music Festival kicked off on Wednesday.

Orwig’s party was all the more marvelous since she recognized that there’s more to life than this life, thanks to the promise of afterlife through Christ, he added: “Though we grieve, we do not grieve like others who have no hope.”

Marty Orwig was many things in life. A short-term bush pilot missionary in Alaska. A political consultant, who began her political career as the chair of the Blaine County Republicans and worked her way into an appointment to the George H.W. Bush administration.

But in recent years she’d become known as the Whiffenpoofs’ wrangler. She delighted in helping sponsor the appearance of the world’s oldest men’s a cappella group at the Sun Valley Jazz and Music Festival every year.

She organized a yearly Coffee Tour, taking them around to sing at pop-up concerts at businesses like Perry’s and Atkinsons’ Market. And, as soon as they’d sung their last note of Kermit the Frog’s “The Rainbow Connection” or “Down by Sally Gardens,” she would evoke her famous whistle and herd them onto the next venue.

Under her watch, the Jazz Festival became a vocal boot camp for the 14 young men, who have a complete turnover ever year, to hone their harmonies before taking them on tour around the world.

“We run them through their paces and tune them up. By the time they leave here, they know how to work together and stay on schedule. They come in great, and they leave fantastic,” she said last year.

Although this year’s Whiffenpoofs had never met Orwig, they had heard about her. And they joined her friends from the balcony in singing “Amazing Grace,” before marching out of the sanctuary to the rousing sounds of “When the Saints Go Marching In.”

There was no time for tears. Not at a service organized by a woman who had told Daryl Fauth: “Isn’t it great that God gave me something to die from that has the word “Blast’ in it?!’” referring to the glioblastoma that afflicted her.

Following the service, the Whiffenpoofs gave a sneak preview of the songs they’re sharing with jazz crowds this weekend as Orwig’s friends munched on red, white and blue cupcakes festooned with tiny American flags. And High Street followed up with hits from the 1950s, ‘60s and ‘70s that would become the basis for some rousing dance parties at the Festival a few days later.

Back at the Jazz Festival, Co-Director Carol Loehr noted the absence of Orwig, along with other festival volunteers, such as Siouxse Essence and Peter Scheurmier, the festival’s rental car organizer who had suffered a heart attack on the eve of the festival while walking his dog.

“We’re going to imagine we’ve gone to the cemetery and had our mourning. Now we’re going to rejoice together and make good memories,” she told those attending the opening ceremonies in the Sun Valley Opera House. “We will miss our friends—they’re part of our family. But we’ll be celebrating their memories all weekend long.”

SEE THE WHIFFENPOOFS, EXPERIENCE THE SECOND LINE

The Yale Whiffenpoofs will perform a free concert near the Sun Valley Inn Duck Pond at 11:30 a.m. today--Sunday, Oct. 22--weather permitting.

You can catch the Jazz Gospel tradition during three sets today at the Sun Valley Limelight Room. The Blue Street Jazz Band will lead the set at 9 a.m.; the Sun Valley Jazz All Stars, at 10:15 a.m., and the “All New” High Street Party Band, at 11:30 a.m.

A badge is required for the gospel performances and will also get holders into other performances during those times and at 12:45 and 2 p.m. Badges start at $37. For more information, go to www.sunvalleyjazz.com.