Was it ecstasy?
Or was it excruciating
pain?
It was a funeral,
or the more politically correct,
Memorial. I didn’t know the lady
well. She was the wife of one of the older
barbershoppers. I had met her. After the twenty-five minute eulogy delivered
by a granddaughter, I realized I didn’t know her at all.
She was a music
lover, a dedicated member of the local Sweet Adelines chapter. She planned her own memorial, so it was
filled with music. The ceremony began
with “I Believe” sung by her husband’s quartet recorded many years ago.
That was followed
by the church choir singing “Precious Lord.”
Then came the local Sweet Adelines chapter with “What a Wonderful World.” A quartet from that group sang “Chord Buster’s
March”.
After the pastor’s
brief message, a lady from the church choir sang solo, a capella, “His
Eye is On the Sparrow.” Then the
granddaughter was up with her eulogy.
I saw that the
last thing on the program was “Jerusalem”, but I never thought any more about
that than I had any of the other songs on the program. The choir director and the young man
accompanying him, the same one who played for the church choir, took the stage.
By this time, we were
past one hour for the service. I was
ready for a break. Our electronics age
has conditioned us to expect a new activity every few seconds, and while there
had been a good variety, I was ready for it to come to a close.
The pianist lit
into the accompaniment and the soloist sang:
Last night as I lay a-sleeping
There came a dream so fair
I stood in old Jerusalem
Beside the temple there . . .
I suspect my
hackles arose. I closed my eyes to stop
the tears. I come from the generation
where it’s unmanly to shed tears.
When I closed my
eyes, I immediately had a mental picture.
I saw my mother at the piano. My
dad stood there with a 3 x 5 note card in his hand that he always used when he
sang that song because he couldn’t depend
on his memory to get all the words.
I was taken back
60-70(?) years. The pianist flawlessly played
the catchy lefthand runs throughout the song.
The vocalist wasn’t
exactly Dad’s voice, but the piano accompaniment was exactly what Mom used to
play, or close enough to the same, to keep the painful (or joyful) memory alive
in my imagination for the duration.
The song
finished, I surreptitiously blew my nose and dried my eyes. The preacher blessed us and released us
row-by-row. We met the soloist in the
hall and I stopped him long enough to tell him what his rendition did for (to?)
me and thank him.
How long has it
been since I heard the folks sing / play that song? When was the last time I heard it? I can’t answer that, but I understand once
again why Mom and Dad answered so many requests to perform it at funerals.
What was mostly a
courtesy call to show respect for a fellow barbershopper will probably be a
funeral that I will remember for a long time.
I still don’t
know if it’s pain or joy. Whichever it
is, it lingers.
A U-Tube performance of “The Holy City”:
https://www.google.com/search?sca_esv=589420358&rlz=1C1SQJL_enUS892US892&tbm=vid&sxsrf=AM9HkKlHSL4WAunibNvEtXUIcgpSgrK8xQ:1702144653091&q=male+vocal+solo+with+piano+accompaniment:+Jerusalem&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjIjJ379oKDAxVMIzQIHdJ9CzQQ8ccDegQIDBAJ&biw=1536&bih=715&dpr=1.25#fpstate=ive&vld=cid:c70c3bd7,vid:EGoCiiSBs-k,st:0
