My mom played piano, as did her mom (my grandmother). As a toddler, I had a little one-octave toy piano that I plunked on (there are still old 8mm films of that, but without sound).

My mom wanted me to learn piano, so I slogged through the John Thompson method books. I don't believe I had the natural talent like they had, but I worked at it.

In sixth grade, I said I wanted to learn to play trumpet. My folks said, okay, as long as I kept playing piano (which I agreed to). The middle school teacher would come over to the elementary school once a week and give a half hour lesson to those that wanted to learn. I guess I did learn, because I played either 2nd or 1st chair all through middle school, high school, and in my college band (I went to a military college, so I became very close to Mr. Sousa there). smile

By the time I got to middle school, I didn't want to do the method books anymore, but wanted to play music I liked and heard on the radio. My mom said okay, but I had to buy my own music with my allowance, which I did. And whereas before she had to yell at me to practice for half an hour, once I started doing my own thing, I would sit down and play for hours at a time. I still had to work hard it.

After college, I didn't play much trumpet, because the military took me many places. But even stationed in Germany, we bought a piano and played that. Back in the states, my mother-in-law gave us her piano, which we had restored and kept for many years.

I never was much of a singer (I would be one of the pew potatoes in church that mumbled the words to the songs), but one day had an epiphany and sang out. I ended up joining the choir and helped start and lead the praise band for the new contemporary worship service we started.

I consider myself an adequate singer and pianist, but I love doing it. I don't play by ear, but I can read music and most chord charts that aren't too difficult.

I guess I must be doing something right, because after moving to Pensacola with no job (I had been laid off in Washington, DC, so we decided to move here to be closer to my aging parents), one of the local United Methodist Church's hired me as their paid pianist, and then another UMC subsequently hired me as their paid choir director (to replace the retiring director of 40 years). Congregational comments are that the choir sounds great and sings with more joy than ever under my leadership. So I'll take it.

When I lived in Virginia, I collaborated with a good friend of mine (Chris Werle) and we co-wrote quite a number of mainly Christian oriented songs, but also others with a more pop or country flavor. That's when I got into BIAB and PowerTracks and ultimately RealBand and learned about the wonderful things you can do musically with a computer. (You can listen to some of our original music at my web site - see my sig below).

Add to all that, that I've always had a large music collection (I currently have about 1500 vinyl record albums with a working turntable, about 800 audio cassettes, and about 2000 CDs), so I've listened to it all. I'm working on digitizing all of them to MP3, because vinyl doesn't play well in the car and it's a fun project. I like classical, country, rock, soul, pop, Broadway, alternative, anything interesting, novelty, you name it. I'll even listen to rap in small doses.

Most of my musician friends can outplay and outsing me by a long shot, but that's no reason not to do it. At church, our extremely talented organist/pianist just loves my approach to music, because I give her so much freedom to be herself and we get to create some really neat sounds. I arrange a number of the choir pieces myself; I'll do interesting medleys; and always try to have fun.

Music has also allowed me to meet some really cool people along the way. On the forum, my wife and I hosted Pat Marr in our home when he made his road tripo (so he knows the limitations of my playing abilities) and I got to meet and spend time with Matt Finley and his wonderful wife when we vacationed at Hyde Park, NY. Here in Pensacola, I have the honor of knowing Frank Emon, a former Navy Band member who is a Pearl Harbor survivor (they had to put down their instruments that day and pick up their rifles), who is now 99 years old, still sings in my former choir where I was pianist, tells his story on Veterans' Day, and occasionally directs the local civic band.

So life is good, I have a great musical outlet at church and have so much fun creating on the computer and just playing and singing at the piano at home. I post stuff on the internet and folks can either like it or not. So far, the likes seem to win out.

That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

Next!

John

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