To Sing Or Not To Sing

The last time I performed recently was for a faculty concert at the local junior college. I had fun because a friend and colleague who I deeply respect played the piano. It was a pleasure to perform with someone as compassionate as this kind man. But I haven't performed since then until today. In fact, I stopped performing four years ago. I guess I've been dealing with questions about why I performed, the relevance of what I was performing and who I performed for. My heart kind of went dead and no matter how much I tried, when it came close to a performance I would lose heart and cancel the engagement. Of course that doesn't do much for your reputation as a professional, and I didn't want to explain the whole situation to people, so I just stopped singing.

Then, out of the blue, I got hired to teach a music class at the local junior college the day after I had to quit another job. It seemed kind of meant to be and I remember wondering what the God had up his sleeve. Well, I guess God wanted me back because the incredible person I met and the events that unfolded after that led to me to submit to Christ as my Savior. God blew open my heart and I began to heal in so many ways it's unbelievable. That's when I started to hear music again and wanted to sing. I guess I finally had something worth singing about.

So, it's been almost a year ago that I started hearing simple songs and writing them down. They all ended up being folksy, gospel songs. This was ironic (as just about everything that's happened to me this last year is ironic) because, while I've always liked folk music, I've always disliked gospel music and especially songs about Jesus. So, I am writing these old time type gospel songs about Jesus this and Jesus that...very weird. I'm thinking, "why?" I'm a classical singer. But, then I remembered back when I was about 26 years old a very devout Christian friend (he'd been a hardcore Rocker before his conversion) stopped me in the music department hallway one day and read me the riot act. He told me he felt strongly that God wanted me to sing praise songs and that I shouldn't get involved with the older, classical guitarist I was starting to perform with. I was pretty irritated, blew my friend off and then proceeded to engage in a ten year rebellion against God that ended with me finally not being able to sing.

Hmm...maybe I'm supposed to be singing gospel songs. Duh! Well, when I set my mind to something I generally do it. I figured God was giving me these songs for a reason. I decided to write down what I was hearing, start learning guitar and wait for God to provide opportunities if he wanted me to perform them. Yes, at 45 years old this seems rather insane. But...I've made a commitment to staying open to what my mind tells me is impossible and singing if I'm asked to sing. Two weeks ago, God's answer came quicker than I expected, I was asked to sing for a benefit concert, featuring a group of song writers, for a young, Christian boy, Joel Teixeira, who needs a life saving operation. My mom told the organizer I wrote songs, so they asked me to do two of my gospel songs. Joel loves gospel. The guitar teacher at our school agreed to accompany me and asked a gifted student to play mandolin. We practiced my little bluegrass songs this afternoon a few times and then performed them tonight. I got to talk a little bit about why I wrote them and it felt very good to be singing songs I've written about something I passionately believe.

Praise God!

For more information abou Joel's Wish check out www.cmsmusic.net