Sue Milne of Gibsons was a musical light for the Coast and she shone very brightly. She passed away on Sept. 28, peacefully at home. She was 73. Though she and husband John Milne had lived on the Sunshine Coast only since 1999, it seemed, as one guest put it at her memorial, that we had known her all our lives.
Sue first joined a choir at the age of 15. “She’s been loving it for a long time,” John said in an interview with Coast Reporter.
She sang with a choral group in the Hamilton/Toronto area and later when the couple moved to Ottawa she earned a degree from Carleton University and worked as a German/English translator and as a grants officer. She also turned her attention to raising a family. It was not until she and John moved to the Coast that she jumped into her beloved music activities.
“She generated part of that music scene,” John said, and she promoted many Coast events from a Lenten organ concert to several jazz groups. She was a member of various choirs over the years including the Pender Harbour Choir, and she was still singing in her latest group, Suncoast Phoenix Choir. In 2007 she and her fellow choristers sung with a Powell River choir in an Easter performance of Messiah and she was also a part of a choral breakaway group, the Sasspenders, singing mostly soprano, but with a range that allowed her to creep into the alto section.
Her role as president of the Festival of the Performing Arts for four years was integral to the success of this long-running musical event. When Allan Crane stepped down from his impresario role with the Sunshine Coast Music Society, Sue stepped in to lead the SCMS. With her at the helm, the SCMS organized a Festival of Strings in 2012. Her vivacious personality gave support to musicians of all ages but especially music students. When a particularly promising student performed, she would sometimes weep with excitement.
In 2012 she was awarded an honour in the arts and culture category of the Celebration of Excellence for volunteers on the Coast.
Plans are firming up for a concert in her honour, to be performed around Christmas. Sara Douglas, choir director, will be organizing the event and she will need others to step forward and help. Those interested can phone her at: 604-219-4586 or email: [email protected]. A sure bet to be performed at the concert will be one of Sue’s favourite choral pieces, a South African song that goes: “Think of me, forget me not/remember me wherever you go.”
