I’ll get back to review of our 50 years periodically, because it might take a while to complete that. In the meantime, I don’t want to lose other thoughts that come to me that I want to write about.
I want to write about music tonight. Music has always been such a big part of my life. I’m not a great singer – I wish I were, but I can carry a pretty good alto harmony on most songs, especially if I’m standing next to a strong alto in the choir. 😀 I love to listen to the oldies and doo wop songs of my teen years. For some reason I like to listen to that music when I’m quilting. It would always remind me of “home” and my high school years. Now I can listen to it and be smack dab in the area – although things have changed a bit! Most of my music revolved around instruments. I played 1stchair cornet my freshman year – although I was the only cornet/trumpet player! 😀 But most of it revolved around the piano. I wasn’t a great solo pianist. I was/am an accompanist – boys’ choir (which I adored, of course!), girls’ choir, all school choir, all kinds of ensembles. I even played the base drum in a drum quartet for contest one time..
My piano teacher was a little old delightful lady here in town, Marjorie Tidwell. She just taught me to “play.” There weren’t any real basics of music. I learned that from my school music teachers. I wish I had learned all about chords, but that came later as an adult, by necessity as the contemporary praise songs came along. But that’s another whole story. I could not play by ear (I wanted desperately to!!), but I could play just about any music you put in front of me.
My most favorite music now is gospel music – especially the Collingsworth Family. She I get to heaven, I’m going to play just like Kim Collingsworth!! When I had my reconstructive scalp surgery and was in ICU for 7 days, I had one of their albums, “Fear Not Tomorrow,” on my iPhone, and day after day I listened to that album with my phone quietly beside my pillow. It was a large part of my healing process at that time (and still is).
I’ve always been a church pianist wherever we attended until the last church in Alabama. It was a very large church with a professional-like praise team. Their talents far outclassed mine. It was quite an adjustment at 1st. I wanted to play sooo bad!! But I soon came to realize that my playing-in-church-days were over. I didn’t even play the piano at home! I guess you could say I was sort of piano-deflated. I settled for singing in the congregation and finding the harmony in the contemporary praise songs.
I guess it was in middle school or high school when I started playing in church. Of course, we sang hymns. I experimented a little with adding a few notes and a “run” or two here and there, but I didn’t get very fancy - I was too timid and self-conscious. (Actually, I was too much of a perfectionist, and I didn’t want to hit a wrong note.) Two people along the way helped me with that more than any others. They pushed and challenged me to go beyond what I thought were my limits. One was my freshman music teacher, Mr. Kaylor. He’s the one that put me out there to accompany lots of choirs and ensembles. It’s hard to remain timid when you accompany boys’ groups. The other man was John Nance, our music director at Hutchinson 1stChurch of the Nazarene. This was/is a fairly large church, and we did some choir programs and arrangements that were HARD! But with his belief in me (and pushing), I was able to play them.
When I was in early high school, I wanted to play the organ sooooo bad!! I asked the pastor (at that time) of the Congregational Church if I could practice on their church organ. He said I could. In those days, the church doors were always unlocked, so I would go in there for hours and play my heart out. I didn’t have any lessons – just figured it out on my own. When we moved to AL, I played the organ part time and the piano once in a while in the first church we attended. Anyway, during the time Guy was in Viet Nam, I decided to buy an organ. I didn’t really have his blessing, but I bought it anyway. Well…….what else was I going to do for a whole year besides work???? It wasn’t a big fancy church organ, but it did have preset rhythms on it, and it was a lot of fun – and helped to pass the time away. I got pretty good with the foot pedals, too.
Somewhere in the early years of our marriage, I sold the organ and bought a piano – the same one I have today. In our early AL years, I bought a keyboard. It was a terribly fancy one, but it had a full 88 keyboard. I used that at a church that we helped to plant. When that church did not make it, I donated that keyboard to that church district – not sure why. I really wish I had kept it. (It was a charitable tax donation write-off). Several years later I bought another one, nicer one. This one I still have, and it is nice – not giving it away.
For most of the years in Alabama, we attended a rather small Nazarene Church. I played my keyboard there. For most of the years there, we continued to sing hymns. Then the contemporary choruses started to creep in. We had a music director who played the guitar, and he began to teach us these new songs. Some didn’t like it at first (some never did!), but I was determined to learn them. This meant a whole new way of playing. You didn’t just play notes on a page – you learned the chords. OH, NO! CHORDS that I never learned as a youngster. But I found out that that I felt the rhythm of the songs – I just had to learn the chords. When I did, it was a whole new freedom-way of playing. Don’t bother me with the notes, just give me the words and the chords, and let me listen to the song a few times so I can get the rhythm of it. I really enjoyed those songs and the total different way of playing. So when we ended up at the big church, I wanted to play those songs!!!!
So now we end up in Little River, and we are in the Conservative Congregation Church, so much like the little Nazarene Church I grew up in. They have a piano – and there is that organ sitting there that I played so many years ago! But no one plays it. At 1st, I was just thankful to be able to go to church, what with my cancer treatments and all. But I decided to place my keyboard there – in front of the organ (I didn’t really have a place to put it at the house anyway.) I was thinking, “Maybe some time – once in a while – when I’m feeling good, they will let me play it for the service.” I could use the organ setting and play along with the pianist. Now, they didn’t know my music abilities from Adam, and frankly, I had not played for so long (6-7 years), I wasn’t sure of my abilities anymore myself! I talked with the pastor about it and let him know that I might be able/like to play my keyboard using the organ settings. He decided to give me a try. The first Sunday, I got so many complements – they LOVED the ORGAN! “We miss the organ sound so much! “It added SO much to the service!” So Pastor began to ask me to play more and more as I felt like it. Now, I’m a regular! 😀 I do so enjoy the privilege of being able to play again – to have a place where I can “give” something. I hate just warming a pew! Last week I played for a funeral. It had been a long time since I did that.
Kind of an amazing thing is beginning to happen. At 1stwhen I started playing again here, I was sooooo nervous. Could I do this? Will I ever get comfortable again? Plus, my eyes were really bothering me from the chemo treatments, and it made it hard to see the music. But they got a light for me, and that has helped tremendously. Playing for that funeral, I was more relaxed than I have been in a long time. The old “feeling the music” started to come back. You know, there are people that play the piano – play the notes on a page – just to get through the song. And then there are those who play the piano – they feel the music, and it flows from that feeling. I started to feel that music again. It’s hard to describe, but most pianists will know what I’m talking about. I have a favorite piano arranger - Elmo Mercer. His arrangements have the chords that I hear but I just can’t find. His style of music is my style of music.
I’m certainly no accomplished pianist – those are the Kim Collingsworths, the Dinos, the Karen Dimonds (my sister-in-law – you can just hum a tune, and she can play it.) But I enjoy playing, and I want to play for the Lord. When I play, I want it to addto the service. I don’t want to play in such a manner that it detracts. I’m so thankful to be a part of a church where I can once again participate in this manner. And I’m so thank that the Lord is helping me get back the “feeling-playing.”
Music is so much a part of my life that when I first get out of bed in the morning, the Lord gives me a song, and when I go to bed at night, He gives me a song.
“What a Day That Will Be” when we can sing in the heavenly choir……♫♫♫
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