Magical Memories

There I was in my lecture mode offering great pearls of wisdom to the senior level music class, a class of 4 eager students whose goal is first to graduate and second to be successful. A class of students needing to understand the difference between programmatic music and absolute music, and it was my job to help them with that understanding. As the lecture on the life, music, and significance of Beethoven progressed to the point of discussing one of the first programmatic symphonies, the wonderful "Pastoral" Symphony, a work in 5 movements which portrays a storm and the beauty of the world after a storm, a work whose simplistic joys are only surpassed by the majesty of the presentation, a work that somehow achieves intimacy while encompassing the whole, I intended to give the students profound information useful for their musical lives.

A tone poem or a symphonic poem as it is sometimes called is an instrumental work that tells a story or describes events through music without words. We had earlier discussed why and how Johannes Brahms avoided programmatic symphonic music as well as the various composers who chose to write a tone poem and why. We mentioned Symphonie Fantastique by Berlioz, Les Preludes by Lizst, and referenced the Moldau by Smetana. It was time then to listen to Beethoven's masterful work the 6th Symphony otherwise known as "Pastoral." I found an excellent excerpt of the piece on Youtube, went to the last movement and began.

The clarinet begins with a lovely argeggio, followed by the horn statement of the same. As the horn concludes, the main theme comes in--beautifully, simply, calmly, yet with the same boldness of expression found in most of Beethoven's music. So the theme began and without warning, without any preparation, without any intention, the tears began to flow from my eyes as the magical memory of my childhood came gushing forth from my inner being. Trying as hard as possible to keep my decorum as a professor, all efforts were in vain as I could hear my Dad's voice singing and see him strumming his guitar to that beautiful melody written by Beethoven.

Using classical melodies, Dad would sometimes write words to the music and sing songs that in many ways were lullabies to his family. Strangely, I grew up believing this to be the normal practice of all Dads! Didn't every Dad in the world play guitar and sing songs to his boys? Of course, I now know my Dad was giving me songs to place in my heart that would last forever. Songs of love, songs of thankfulness, songs of culture and appreciation, songs of humanity, and songs to embrace all of life including its joys and its sorrows. For in my father was an unbridled zeal of life and a limitless love of his family. His tenor voice rings clearly in my ear and I can see his eyes shine as he sang this song based on the famous Beethoven melody.

Please click on the link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=23bJlv4UgjA&feature=related

Wait for the string melody found at count number 16 and fit the words into the melody:

Father, we thank thee
We thank thee for this day
We honor and serve thee
In each and every way.

Dad loved the Lord, he loved music, he loved people, he loved his wife, and he loved his boys. As I discover frequently, he left me and my brother Jeff with an infinite number of magical memories that continually make our lives complete. It was through music that Dad taught us the most and the song of my father is the song in me. I just hope and pray I can be the song for my own children.