Tag: music

Musicians make the best community

When my family moved to southwestern West Virginia more than 50 years ago, only boys were allowed to participate in the school band. I’d played clarinet in upstate New York and wanted to continue. So my mother marched down to the local board of education and forced them to change the rule. Other girls integrated the band along with me. I was never very good but felt pressured to stick with it until ninth grade. That feeling of always being the odd-one-out has stuck with me for most of my life. Especially with music.

During the pandemic, I started recorder lessons. My instructor was a very patient young man, who met with me on Zoom once a week. Even though recorder is very similar to clarinet, it had been decades since I’d had any regular lessons. He endured my squeaks and poor rhythm, then assigned me more challenging pieces, talking about embouchure, fingering, and breath control. He said I was his only student who actually made progress during the pandemic. After 18 months, he declared that I was “ready to play with other people.” What a thrill!

One day, during a neighborhood jam session, I pulled out my recorder. I usually just sang backup while they strummed and crooned. Everyone laughed. I felt like I was in middle school again. “Oh, I used to play that thing in 5th grade,” someone said. I’d practiced Lean on Me and Ashokan Farewell using sheet music. I couldn’t tell them what chords to play or even what key it was in. Nobody told me I sounded good. They indulged me then moved on to more familiar guitar-centric tunes. But it gave me a huge boost of confidence. 

Now I play regularly with different groups – my jam band (rock), a Celtic ensemble, an old-time group, and an ad hoc recorder group. I’m even in a chorus — when I can make it to rehearsals. I still feel that everyone is a better musician than I am, but the groups are also extremely welcoming and encouraging. So many older adults are coming back to the instruments they abandoned as teens, re-learning what it means to play with others and finding the joy that was missing when we were adolescents trying to please others. 

If I don’t know the song, I’ll sit out a session. If my soprano recorder is too shrill, I switch to the alto. Sometimes I just play the root notes – something I’m still learning how to do. Jam sessions in someone’s house, open-mic nights, classes, and informal gatherings in the park are perfect spots for self-improvement and socializing. It’s so much fun!

As I pick up knowledge of chords, rhythms, and the requirements of various instruments (I just purchased an Irish flute), I’ve found a place where I belong. The DC area is full of older musicians gathering regularly for just about every style of music imaginable. The community of musicians is a true brotherhood/ sisterhood. I can go out almost any night of the week to a music event and run into people I know. 

When so much is going wrong in our society, it’s heartening to find a strong, welcoming community. Musicians are the best! 

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So grateful

I live less than 10 miles from the White House. It’s hard not to feel demoralized by the astounding changes to the world around me since January 20, 2025. Federal workers laid off, the decimation of vital U.S. government agencies, blatant homophobia and misogyny masquerading as policy, and the dehumanization of immigrants. I’ve spent part of the year in mourning for the America I once thought I lived in.

However, the “sickening moral slum” of this presidency is countered daily by the activism of friends, colleagues and total strangers. As 2025 wraps up, I choose to focus on things that make me hopeful.

Fellow rally-goers. I’ve been to No Kings Day demonstrations, marches for immigrant rights, and sing-alongs in front of a courthouse. Every time, I am warmed by the spirit of civic engagement. I am proud to live in a community where we are (still) free to assemble in public and express disagreement with our government.

Musicians. I have joined so many sing-alongs, karaoke nights, protest-music nights, and other music groups that I feel like a groupie. Musicians carry the spirit of our times like few other artists. They can bring a group together in a way that uplifts the entire community in real time.

Colleagues. Teachers are the most amazing group of people. And teachers of immigrant students have a special place in my heart. I work in a school with an enormous ELD department (formerly ESOL). Even as the students stop coming to school (fear of ICE raids) and attendance is at an all-time low, my colleagues persevere. They help the students who show up and reach out to those who don’t. We support each other in the office before school, during lunch, and after school. In a job that can be emotionally draining, my colleagues make it better every single day.

So, as the meme says, have the best year. My resolutions for the new year are exactly those shared in this image.

My advice for the New Year: Get outside every single day, no matter the weather. Join a group. Honor your commitments to yourself.

Wishing you the courage to pursue the activities that give you joy.

The Power of Singing Together

100 days of the Mad King and we’re all trying to cope with the chaos, fear, and profound sense of loss. How many times can we shake our heads at the absurdity of this moment in US history?

The democratic system of checks and balances may not survive this administration. Like many Americans, I sat in stunned silence for a couple of weeks after Inauguration Day, as executive orders started to tear down the institutions that make our country great.

Then people organized. Rallies, protests, Tesla take-downs. Letter-writing campaigns. Phone banking. Grass roots movements that start with like-minded neighbors, groups, and communities.

I found my people in a choir. It’s not a church choir, even though we sometimes meet in a church. It’s less than three months old, but we’ve already made it to 11 rallies, marches, and protests — some of them organized super last minute. We sing songs of inspiration and protest. We take old, familiar tunes and change the lyrics to suit the times. Or we sing old protest music from the 1960s. We bring tambourines, drums, shakers. We bring our voices and our shared passion.

Bystanders have approached us after every event and said how much they appreciate the power of singing together. Our choir does not perform in the traditional sense, but we help the crowd focus and unify. Rallies with group singing reinforce the emotional connection among strangers. We desperately need to feel connected right now.

The health benefits of group singing have long been studied. According to an Oxford University article, singing together in a group improves breathing, posture, and muscle tension. Choral singing enhances our sense of belonging and happiness through the release of neurochemicals.

Others pour their creativity into making amazing protest signs and banners, or grabbing a megaphone and shouting slogans. Singing in a group is how I plan to save my sanity. The thing is: you don’t even have to be a good singer to join this kind of singing group. All voices are valued. Together we fight the daily assaults inflicted by our own federal government.

If it’s Thursday, it must be community singalong time. I highly recommend it!