It's Wednesday. I love Wednesdays. On Wednesday mornings i spend about an hour having a blast with a group of twenty or so people whose average age is 80. They make me feel so young....and they constantly remind me to disregard information from my teenagers to the contrary. They are my Seniors Chorus.

I have the privilege of conducting an extraordinary group of people (my mother-in-law included) in songs from the '30s, '40s and even some modern tunes from the '50s at one of the thriving Seniors centers in my county. We have so much fun singing and laughing and "breathing" correctly. (Yes, Free Church, they even sing "Mickey-Minnie-Goofy Donna" just like you used to do!)

The best part of chorus, though, is the amazing stories i come away with...stories of lives lived in both remarkable and unremarkable, yet real ways. A few weeks ago, one of the women who serve lunch at the center was listening in on our rehearsal. She is in her late 70s and flushed with excitement by the end of her "private concert."

"Oh, listening to those songs brought me back to my younger days on the boardwalk at Atlantic City. It wasn't a gambling place then, Atlantic City, but song "palaces"...they were wonderful. All of the up-and-comings would strut their stuff for the big deals...it was somethin'."

Her New Jersey accent seemed to come out stronger in the excitement of remembering, "I even got to hear Rosemary Clooney before she was anybody. Gosh, I haven't thought of that time in years..." The twinkle in her eyes and the look of fond reflection on her face made the morning's efforts so rewarding.

This morning, one of my altos recounted in her thick German accent, "Music saved our lives during the war. Yah, my father was out of work for fourteen years and we had no radio and no money to do anything, so we would sing and play our harmonicas together each evening. Music saved us from despair."

Was it Martin Luther who said, "Music is a fair and glorious gift of God?" It's so true. 

Martin Luther, the musician