Although education and coaching dominated much of my professional life, the persistent backdrop of my journey has been in the arts: music, theater, literature, and poetry. Much of my writing has focused on life’s transitions from childhood to adulthood to old age without appropriating justice to the arts’ roles in those transitions. Without apology, it’s time to acknowledge my nerdy side; starting with music.
A Trumpet Player
Neither mom nor dad played a musical instrument, but both loved to dance and listen to the music on the radio. Their love for the big bands and movie musicals was always evident while I was growing up in Braidwood. Country music later became mom’s favorite. (They also loved Spike Jones and the City Slickers.)
Around the age of 10, I was asked by my parents if I would like to play a musical instrument. Without hesitation, I said, “the trumpet.” I had heard mom talk about Harry James, the trumpeter for the Benny Goodman band. So, mom arranged for a music teacher (Billy Cox) who also provided a used trumpet, and I started my first weekly lessons at the East Side school across town in late afternoons.
Thus began a series of lessons and teachers over the next several years. Larry Rou of Wilmington succeeded Mr. Cox, and then at the age of 14, I continued with George Hendrick at the Joliet Conservatory of Music on Chicago Street. How my parents afforded the cost of music instruction is beyond my comprehension especially since they were also paying for piano lessons for my sister.
Music lessons produced nothing more than more music lessons until I joined the Joliet Catholic High School band as a junior. I was now 16 and had a car, my own transportation rather than a restrictive bus schedule after school. Over the next two years, the band played and marched at football games and a parade in Chicago in addition to band contests and concerts. By my senior year, I was also writing a column, the Band Wagon, for our student newspaper.
The conductor of the band was Mr. Bob McNulty, a fine teacher and good man. He also arranged for our band to take a trip to the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and a road trip to Greenfield History Museum in Michigan.
After high school, I attended Lewis College and was primarily an English major and student athlete. But…my trumpet days returned one time when I played in a small music group for a student musical, “A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court.”
Music Appreciation
Beside my trumpet playing days, I learned more about music history in a high school class, “Music Appreciation,” taught by Mr. Burdeau. I learned about classical pieces as well as operas and composers. The combination of being able to read and play music, an understanding of history, and the acquisition of a high-fidelity record player inspired me and my family. It also motived us to invest in records, both 45 rpm and Long Playing (33 and1/3rd) discs, a collection that I still have.
Live Music, Movies, and WLAC
We didn’t have many opportunities to attend live music while I was growing up in Braidwood. But later in life I had the opportunity to see Ray Charles and Johnny Cash at the Rialto in Joliet.
Going to musical movies at the Mar and Wilton theaters in Wilmington gave our family options to see Showboat, Oklahoma, and South Pacific, while television taught us more about WWII on Sunday afternoons with “Victory at Sea” when I was 12 years old. Narrator Leonard Graves and the NBC orchestra provided the narrative and composition that still resonates with me.
My love of early rhythm and blues captured me on late evenings when I could tap into the radio waves of WLAC being broadcast from Nashville, Tennessee. For some reason, that particular station could come across loud and clear in Braidwood after 9:00 pm. None of my peers seemed to know about WLAC, so I felt privileged to learn about the early black pioneers of rock and roll like: Little Richard, BB King, James Brown, Otis Redding, and Aretha Franklin. Of course, there was also Screaming Jay Hawkins.
Braidwood Beginnings 