Family Music

I wasn’t much into music, but my parents were, especially my father.

His mother and father and all four of the boys played instruments — piano, violin, trombone, etc. They would gather around the grand piano and play together regularly (at least every Sunday).

The four boys were literally a “band of brothers.”

Dad learned violin, clarinet, saxophone, and bugle. (e was, for a while a bugle boy in the Army). He later taught himself the piano — a chord method that enabled him to play, with confidence and zest, popular music for others to sing to.

When he was Dean of Instruction at Plymouth State College, he moonlighted playing saxophone in a dance band, and also in the town band for concerts on the green.

When he was in his eighties, he played violin in two community orchestras and put on one-man shows at his assisted living.

Wherever they lived, Mom and Dad both sang regularly in the church choir, often singing solos and duets. (They enjoyed harmonizing together). And every night after dinner, Dad would play the piano and he and Mom would sing popular songs, often show tunes. He particularly liked songs from My Fair Lady, like Get Me to the Church on Time, songs from Fiddler on the Roof, Gigi, and The Music Man.

After his stroke, when he could no longer talk, he could still sing.

Here’s a brief recording of that at YouTube

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