My Dad’s Wisdom & Music

Listen to Music. All Kinds. All the Time.

Years ago, I heard that a fantastic way for anyone to develop into a talented musician is to have any kind of music going on in the home, as often as possible.

My dad loved the radio. He constantly listened to music or talk radio. I grew up listening to all kinds of music! Over time, my favorite style of music became jazz. My mum took me to jazz clubs when I was a little kid. My dad had so many wonderful jazz records from the 1940s, 1950s, 1960s, and beyond.

He also had genres of other music, too, in his record collection. I still have the original Star Wars & Empire Strikes Back vinyl records from the 1970s.

Saturday night radio was “Hot Jazz Saturday Night” on 88.5FM in the Washington, DC area, where we lived. That was my favorite night of music. Dad tried to guess when songs were recorded “1927!” He’d say. And he was right. He said recordings got trickier to distinguish by year after the 1930s - because recording technology improved so drastically around then.

Sunday, on the way home from church, we heard a group of British men listening to random songs and talking about the recordings. The show was funny, entertaining and educational! I enjoyed that show. It was fun to hear the different British accents of the men talking to each other, too.

Sunday afternoon was filled with bluegrass music (probably my least favorite kind of music), and organ music (definitely my least favorite). Thankfully, Dad didn’t like opera, so we didn’t have that on, either.

My dad played a lot of musical instruments, too. He played alto sax, tenor sax, harmonica, piano, guitar and banjo! My brothers and I all, also, play piano and at least one other instrument.

My dad also wrote music, and loved taking annual songwriting classes each summer.

I remember seeing a kid play violin on PBS’s “Sesame Street” when I was in Kindergarten. I’d already fallen in love with the sound of the stringed bass when I was in those jazz clubs with my mum, but seeing a little kid hold a similar instrument that was kid-sized made me say, “I want to play THAT!”

I started learning violin in 4th grade. I’m now in my 50s, and I am still learning violin. I also play viola. I played soprano and alto recorder for a while, and I have some harmonicas I have tried. I also recently splurged and bought myself a concert-grade ukulele.

Last year, I started following one of my favorite musicians on Discord - Harry Connick, Jr. For folks who can afford it, he teaches group piano lessons over the platform. Now and then, he answers questions from folks in his Discord chat about any topic at all. He loves his wife’s cooking so much and talks about that, and also talks about learning how to play piano.

One of the things he said last year struck me deeply - someone asked about improvising and writing music. Harry said to practice scales and arpeggios a LOT. He said, “Eventually, you start to see patterns.”

I have been thinking about this for a year now. And it has helped me write some music and improvise.

Scales and arpeggios. The basis of music in our Western culture.

Kansas

It has been my observation that the musicians in the Wichita, Kansas area are very good. I played for a while with the college students in the Friends University Orchestra. And I have been to several performances with the Wichita Symphony Orchestra, now. I also took violin lessons from a guy who is half my age. He is a phenomenal violinist. Wichita State and also Friends University each have Musical Performance degrees that students can earn. I never knew, growing up, that this was a potential degree to be earned!

I am in another orchestra outside Wichita. I have been enjoying the camaraderie of playing with other folks who love doing what I do - playing music together under the guidance of a good conductor.

I have run into a few people in the group whose parents may push them to learn music, but the students don’t seem musically inclined. I have been struggling with understanding what’s going on. So I talked with my partner about it.

My partner pointed out that I don’t practice very often. He thinks I am actively working Against myself by not practicing. He has listened to me work hard at a few difficult phrases or music, and nail them in the concert after I declared these passages too difficult to learn.

This last concert, I barely practiced. I have some sort of ADHD inner resistance to practicing. But then I got to the concert and did just fine.

I can sit down and sight-read what I think of as “simple music.”

My partner pointed out that what I think is simple may not be simple to the other students I have recently encountered.

Also, there is a teacher in the group who looks at the music that I think is simple and says it’s too difficult for high school students to ever learn. I am flabbergasted because that is what I learned in late grade school.

My partner kindly pointed out that we all have our own talents. Mine happens to be music. I thought back to how my dad always had music on. And my mum did too, come to think of it. Both of my parents (who divorced when I was a toddler) took me to live musical performances of all kinds of variety, come to think of it.

I gained an appreciation for all kinds of music growing up. I grew up surrounded by music and spent hours and hours practicing my instruments. I loved to open my bedroom window and play for the apple tree outside.

I hear these other students play and I feel sad - because the music hasn’t permeated their body the way it has mine. I am pondering telling them to start playing music at every opportunity.

I sat for hours, listening to records growing up. I memorized Star Wars, of course, and Mary Poppins and Snow White and some Bubblegum Pop and 1980s rock stars too, as I got to high school. In college, I was all about jazz. I became a radio DJ in college and after college for a while. I think about starting up a radio show again sometimes. Not sure if I will get around to it, but it was fun to do when I did it in college !!

I wrote a song for a bride and groom this month. It’s a pretty song. I gave them the sheet music last night. I also gave them a digital recording of the song. I hope they enjoy it.

If you would like me to write you a song, I am happy to do that, too!

I have a new music writing program that I have been using for the last 2 months or so. My previous one was too tedious and cumbersome. It would put in musical mistakes and be a bear to take out and start over with musical phrasing. This new one doesn’t make mistakes when I change a note’s length. It adjusts the measure to fit. (This is weird to explain in a tiny paragraph. I am happy to talk more at length about either songwriting software to folks who are interested.)

Here is a video my partner took of me during the latest orchestra concert I was in. We had 2 choirs on stage with us. My partner was being stealthy about recording from his phone. I love the version of this song - “Home on the Range.” It turns out that this is Kansas’s State Song!

There isn’t much violin prowess in this particular song, but it’s a pretty song with some unique styling and I want to share. I hope you enjoy it. I am the blonde violinist - third from the left.

I hope you will enjoy the music. I look forward to play violin and viola in a quartet at a wedding in Oklahoma this weekend! I hope you have a lovely Halloween & nice beginning to November!