Skylark, have you anything to say to me?

One of my sabbatical goals was to start voice lessons again.  I studied for about seven years in high school and college, and though it never "went" anywhere (obviously, I didn't become a professional singer), I enjoyed it immensely and have missed it ever since.  There's something about singing that's very Zen-like for me: it's effort, but from a totally different part of my brain and body than anything else I've ever done, and when it's going well I can slip very easily into that optimal sense of flow.

This time around, though, I didn't want to study classical repertoire like I did before.  While I enjoyed singing all those arias at the time, that music kind of leaves me cold now.  What I really want to do is sing jazz--not necessarily scatting (I'm not sure I'll ever loosen up enough to do that in a way that isn't deeply uncomfortable for me and any unfortunate listener)--but just a more relaxed, personal kind of singing that makes the best use of my range.

WVU offers private lessons through its community music program, and I found a local teacher who was willing to take me on, even though she's more classically trained.  I had my first lesson yesterday, and it was great fun--even doing scales and various silly exercises to loosen up the face and lips was a real blast from the past.  

But.

About midway through the lesson, I was overwhelmed by a deep sense of grief.  It caught me unexpectedly and swamped me for a few seconds, until I realized what it was about.

Dad.

In part, I'm doing this because at the end of his life, I saw how vital music was to him--it was, in many ways, the thing that most sustained him and gave him the deepest pleasure and peace.  And I realized that it's something I not only admired but envied in him, his ability to sustain that hobby and passion until the very end of his days.  I wanted to rekindle that love, which I shared with him, in my own life.

While my new voice teacher is excellent, I think it's fair to say she's not a pianist.  In fact, she pretty much "accompanied" me in the same way I accompany myself at home: by picking out the melody with the right hand, or just hitting the first note in a measure, and then going acapella from there.

Midway through the lesson, I wanted my dad.  My dad, who could play almost anything by ear, or in a pinch, from a fake book.

Dad at the piano(s)

Wanting to keep my own interest in music separate from his, we very seldom played together.  And now I'm sorry that we didn't play and sing every damn time we saw each other.

And it also made me miss my longtime voice teacher from all those years ago, Carol Marty. She died in 2012, and when I heard the news, I felt freshly guilty about having lost touch with her.  Not only was she my teacher, but she was also a good friend, and in addition to formal lessons, we frequently went out to sing old tunes from the 20s and 30s at a nursing home in east Columbus, often followed by lunch at the Kahiki.

Again, adulthood--or my theories about it--got in the way.  Though I doubt I could have articulated it at the time, I think that after I'd graduated from college and started working, continuing lessons was a final tie to my adolescence that I wanted to sever.  

But yesterday, I appreciated her in a whole new way.  Not only was she a great voice teacher, she was a remarkable pianist, and a very skillful, sensitive accompanist.  I know I wasn't as aware of and awed by that as I should have been at the time, but I sure am now.  In the midst of picking my way through Hoagy Carmichael's "Skylark" yesterday, I wanted nothing more than for Mrs. Marty to be there, playing a lush accompaniment, the two of us gauging each other's tempo and phrasing so that voice and piano would not just synch, but together create something more full of life and movement than either alone could.

As a teenager and a young adult, I was blessed with two incredibly talented accompanists who took my interest in music seriously, nurtured it, and who went a step further and loved me.  And sometime between 4 and 5 p.m. yesterday, I finally understood that.  Too late to thank either of them.

In honor of the great Linda Ronstadt, who recently announced that Parkinson's disease has left her unable to sing a note, I'll post her version of "Skylark."  A nice reminder that if you've still got the pipes, you've gotta use and cherish them.  Will do, Dad and Mrs. Marty.  It's the best tribute I can make to you both.

(Not necessarily my favorite arrangement of that song, however...I prefer the spareness of this one.)

Memorial Day 2011

According to the San Francisco Museum's website, the Pepsi-Cola Center for Service Men and Women opened on March 5, 1943. The center offered telephones for troops to call family members, stationery for writing letters, and wire recorders to make voice recordings to mail home.  It also served hamburgers, hot dogs, and--of course--free Pepsi.

My dad arrived there on November 27, 1943, after a long train trip from Camp Hood, Texas, where he'd been in the Army Specialized Training Program.  He was en route to Camp White, Oregon for more training and eventual deployment to North Africa with the 91st Infantry Division.

While in San Francisco, he took the opportunity to record a greeting to send to his mother back in Grantsville, West Virginia.  I don't think the mailer it was sent in got preserved, but there are some great images of a mailer and its enclosed record here.

There's a similar recording posted on this blog, too.  Incidentally, the author there notes that his "Dad would never pass up a free deal, especially one that involved advanced technology." Sounds familiar. I'm quite sure my dad didn't even notice the writing paper or the telephones as he made a beeline for the wire recorder.

We've posted here before about other recordings  my dad made before, during, and after the war.  While we knew about dad's Christmas 1941 greeting, and had heard the interview he did for Armed Forces Radio while in Italy, this is one of a stash of recordings that the family never knew about until Mom came across them after Dad died.  I'll try to post some of the others later, but this is probably the best of the lot, both sound-wise, production-wise, and content-wise.

By the way, I love the fact that my dad spends ages in this recording describing the Salton Sea (its size, its depth below sea level, etc., etc.), but crams his adventures in Hollywood into just a few seconds at the end of the recording.  As a budding scientist, he was clearly more interested in the geology of the passing landscape, which must have seemed positively alien to a 19-year-old kid from green, rural West Virginia.

Still, I'd love to know what stars he saw at the Hollywood Canteen.  It's so like him to leave 'em wanting more.

Christmas 1941

When we think of December 1941 these days, we automatically think of the Pearl Harbor attack on the seventh, and the declaration of war.   To hear my parents talk about it, though, at the time most people in the U. S. had never heard of Pearl Harbor, and Hawaii seemed a long way away.

My Dad was a senior in high school at the time, and after he graduated the following June, he'd be drafted straight into the Army.  In December 1941, he wasn't thinking about any of that, though:  in his teenage techie geekdom, he was more concerned about recording a Christmas greeting to send to his older brother, who was doing his medical residency in Minnesota.

This was the result.


This was recorded on a paper disk with a thin plastic coating on it, made on a record-cutting machine that Dad borrowed from the Calhoun County High School.  Pretty remarkable that it's even held up for nearly seventy years, much less still be semi-listenable! 

My favorite line:  when Dad complains about his grandmother and sister's "backwardness" (i.e., shyness), saying, "Brother, I tell you:  this is a trial." 

From left to right:  my great-grandmother Sophie Hathaway, my aunt Virginia Hathaway Kirby (looking just as uncomfortable having her photo taken as she was being interviewed), Dad, and his mother, Eva Hathaway.

Lost & found video

My brother Mark recently digitized a reel of 16mm film that my Mom had found. It was in bad shape--had eroded and discolored over the years, and was very fragile.

But when he got it somewhat cleaned up, it turned out to be a film that my Dad had made the summer he and Mom started dating, in 1950. According to Mom, Dad was taking some kind of an "education A/V" course, and had to shoot and edit a short film.

This is the result. I call it "Mom & Dad Go on a Date," and it's impossibly sweet.

(It's a silent film, so don't worry that you're missing something sound-wise.)





Readers familiar with West Virginia University might recognize the setting: Women's Hall, now Stalnaker Hall. It's one of the most visible buildings on campus, situated at the very top of the hill above the academic buildings. And yes, those million flights of stairs are still there, too. And I'm sure anyone running up those stairs probably stops running at about exactly the same point my dad does in this film!

Sixty-five years ago today

On April 18th, 1945, my Dad was interviewed by Armed Forces radio in the Po Valley of Italy, about his job with the 91st Infantry Division. After the war, he requested a copy of the recording, which arrived on a shellac 78 rpm disc...and which, long-time readers won't be surprised to hear, my dad kept all his life.

This is the original interview, to which he added a short introduction some time later, when he transferred it over to audiotape.* I'm not sure when he did this, though his voice still sounds quite young to me, so I imagine it was at least thirty or forty years ago.

Happily, he did get to "go home where it's quiet" soon after this recording, since V-E Day happened less than three weeks later.




*And thanks to my brother, Mark Hathaway, who had the foresight to digitize the whole thing a few years ago! Good thing Dad's techie gene got passed down.