Former students pay tribute to retiring Georgia choir teacher with emotional final performance
BARTOW COUNTY, Ga. - A metro Atlanta choir teacher's final performance before retirement is touching the hearts of people across the world.
Jim Stanley spent nearly three decades teaching piano and chorus at Cartersville High School in Bartow County, but this year he decided to finally take a rest.
But before he walks out of the classroom for the last time, Stanley decided to call up all of his former students to reunite for one final show.
Atlanta resident Maggie Smith Kuhn was one of those who answered the call. She wrote on TikTok that she didn't hesitate to head back to school.
"I blocked it in my calendar and didn't work a wedding, specifically so I could go to my small hometown and sing for one last time with all the people I grew up knowing," Kuhn wrote.
In her video, students from Stanley's near-30 years of teaching all gathered in the classroom to sing Edward Boatner's "City Called Heaven."
"We only had this one day of rehearsal before performing, but we all remembered his style," Kuhn wrote. "He changed our lives."
The video has already received more than a million views and thousands of comments from people feeling the impact of the music.
After a request by a commenter, Kuhn also posted the night of the show with Lisa Lowe Douglas performing the solo.
"It was so emotional. So many memories flooded back, we had the strongest choral program of a town our size, all because of Stanley," Kuhn wrote. "Many of us became artists and musicians professionally."
The group is now paying tribute to Stanley with contributions to the Etowah Scholarship Foundation, which helps gives scholarships to Bartow County students.