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SPRINGFIELD, Mo. (KY3) - On a beautiful afternoon in Springfield, a quartet calms a busy, city lunch hour.

“We can carry tune a little bit,” Lou Fees joked.

They are the Coaches 4 Quartet - a quartet made up of area coaches.

“We just love to spend time together,” Jeff Klein said.

Locally, Klein has coached at Willard, Mountain View-Birch Tree/Liberty, Hillcrest, Parkview, and now at Evangel.

Lou Fees has been at Missouri Southern, Hillcrest, and Evangel.

Gary Strunk brought high school soccer to SPS, coaching at Central twice, Parkview, Hillcrest, and now Catholic.

Then there’s Kent Meador and his coaching experience...

“In a formal fashion? No,” Meador joked.

But sports at Hillcrest High School is something they all have in common. Kent played on the state championship basketball team in 1984.

This quartet was conceived on a Saturday morning inside the football office.

“Lou and I were coaching at Hillcrest,” Klein said.

“We were just sitting there breaking down film one day,” Fees added.

“He starts singing a song, a southern gospel song,” Klein remembers. “And I knew it and I started harmonizing with him.”

“What if we tried to put a quartet together,” Fees said.

“They said, ‘Hey, we’re thinking about doing some singing. Would you be interested in that,’” Strunk added. “And I said, ‘Of course I would.’”

“We talked to Kent, he was our song director at our church, and we just kind of put it together,” Fees concluded.

“My thought initially was, ‘Lou, what are you talking about,’” Meador joked.

Over the years, the Coaches 4 Quartet has performed at Missouri State games, the Bass Pro Tournament of Champions, the Springfield Cardinals, and even their parent club.

“By far, the singing at Busch Stadium,” Strunk said, “that was a delight.”

“We have sung in St Louis with 40,000 people,” Klein said.

“We’re getting ready to sing,” Fees remembers, “and I’m looking over there at the right field line, and there’s Albert Pujols, Yadier Molina, and Adam Wainwright all sitting there with their caps off. I go. Is this really happening?”

But it’s events like these at Founders Park in Springfield the quartet really enjoys. It’s a chance to open up their catalog and entertain.

“We love our country, and that’s why we do all these patriotic songs, and then the love of the Lord by singing these gospel songs,” Klein said.

“Every time we get together, we come back refreshed and enlightened,” Strunk said.

“We had a lady that heard us one time,” Fees said, “she wanted to have us come over and sing Happy Birthday to her grandmother over at one of the facilities.”

“I hope it encourages others to just step out of their comfort zone a little bit,” Meador said.

The Coaches 4 Quartet has been around for almost 20 years.

This was the finale of the Concerts at Founders Park. The Springfield-Greene County Parks Department hosts these concerts every May and June.

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