Karen Grindle blew into a small kazoo Tuesday in the middle of nearly 20 women at Trinity Lutheran Church, the buzzing sound of the instrument unmistakable.

“Very good," Sheila Wayman, director of the Coeur d’Aleers, said from her music stand in front of the stage. "Let’s tune up."

Members of the Cancer and Community Charities (3Cs) Coeur d'Aleers singing group take themselves and what they do seriously, but they still know how to have fun. They work to have a good time, and they are currently practicing for two upcoming concerts at 2 p.m. April 25 and 7 p.m. April 28 at Trinity Lutheran Church.

They are also celebrating the choir's 30th anniversary this year. The Coeur d'Aleers began last century when its founders shared a vision of bringing music and joy to people while building a community through music.

What they do has stayed the same since they started, singer Barbara Campbell said.

“It’s a good group of women,” she said.

Campbell moved to Kootenai County from Mammoth, Calif., around 1993. The first thing she did was find a local choir, where she met fellow Coeur d'Aleers Wayman and Mary Ann Mathews.

Mathews has sung with the choir since before it became the Coeur d’Aleers. The friendships formed in the group have been a rock for her and many members.

Originally called "the Chorale," the Coeur d'Aleers group was created in 1986 as a part of the 3Cs in founder Harriet Buker’s home, where she gathered six women to sing in nursing homes. The group grew to over a dozen members by 1993, when Christine Hubble became the music director and formally renamed it the Coeur d’Aleers.

Membership had consistently been about 40 people, but was cut in half because of COVID-19 and hasn’t fully recovered.

“We’re all buddies,” Campbell said. “They’re dedicated, they enjoy singing and they have nice voices.”

Campbell arranged the original score for the Coeur d’Aleers' theme song, "Ladies of the Choir," when the group officially changed its name.

“Music has always been my background,” Campbell said. “Writing and arranging has been a natural fit for me.”

Coeur d’Aleer Joan Pyle wrote the lyrics to the song over three decades ago. The ladies sing it at the beginning of every concert to introduce themselves as “ladies of the choir … here to share and sing a song or two … a sisterhood of love and joy and song and gratitude.”

The Coeur d’Aleers performs four concerts a year, with main concerts in the spring and around Christmas. The singers volunteer to perform at local assisted living facilities. The group is active September to December and January through April.

“We spend two hours every week getting prepared for these concerts,” Coeur d’Aleer Trudy Shrigley said. “Getting older is a challenge and singing is something people can do long after they do other things. Music has its charm for people.”

The choir also performs mini-concerts twice a month when in session.

“It’s just a whole mix of songs,” Shrigley said. “The people who come seem to enjoy it because we enjoy it.”

Coeur d’Aleers members sing a combination of pop and traditional music and music “from Broadway tunes to anything that is written,” Shrigley said.

At Tuesday’s rehearsal, they sang ragtime hits, backed up by the kazoos.

“It’s good to stretch your voices and sing higher than your comfort zone for a little bit,” Wayman said.

Following the kazoos, the choir worked on a song that was runner-up in a competition for the state song of Idaho, "Hi-De-Ho Idaho."

“Now, if they stop you at the border and they check your sins, that’s because you’re on the line where heaven begins,” the ladies sang. “Ninety-five will get you through, you’ll Hi-De-Ho for Idaho too!”

While Coeur d'Aleers members have a good time, the choir is about more than singing. Members have directors meetings before rehearsals to plan concerts and work through logistics. They decide who will make cookies to hand out after the shows and how they’ll package them. They plan who will oversee program distribution, gift basket raffles and marketing materials.

It’s a lot of work for the small group of women, but it's something they've enjoyed for decades.

“It’s rewarding,” Shrigley said.