Tag Archives: Legion

Am I a musician?

So, my trumpet and I made it to the Meet and Squeak on January 31. I only knew one person when I got there, another trumpeter I had played in a marching band with in the early 1980s. It was thrillingly scary to be sight reading again after 40 years, feeling the locked doors in my brain click open with every passing bar – that’s a crescendo, count four bars, mezzo piano, staccato. Breathe, take a breath, you’re running out of breath! Squeak!

I grinned through the entire evening, amazed to be once again surrounded by the blending of instruments, turning little dots on paper into coherent and lyrical sound, back in a place of comfort and belonging with all the band kids!

I wondered if I would be able to commit to the weekly rehearsals, but somehow my family and I made it work and I only missed a couple of nights due to having COVID-19 for the first time (and nursing my mother, also a first-timer, through it at the same time, which was interesting).

We are called the East Prince Community Band. It’s a lovely group of people, some extremely talented folks and others like me who are trying to find their way back through the music maze. Our conductor, Tristan Fox, is totally committed to the idea of life-long music making, encouraging and funny, everything you could want in a band leader.

We ended the first season this past Wednesday with a concert at the school where we had been rehearsing, Summerside Intermediate. We played seven songs including a Beatles medley, a snappy march, Bohemian Rhapsody and a zydeco number. It was so much fun, we sounded pretty good, and I’m looking forward to rehearsals starting again in the fall.

I’ve been practicing a half hour most days of the week and guess what I discovered? Practicing consistently improves your playing. Who knew? Oh right, all my music teachers. I wouldn’t say I’m 100% back to where I was when I last played in June 1984, but I’m not far off. My range is slowly increasing, and I can hit a clean high F most of the time. I can quickly play almost-flawless chromatic scales. My breath control is so much better, and my tone is getting cleaner.

I felt that my skills were strong enough that I volunteered to play The Last Post at a Legion funeral service today in Tyne Valley. I have vague memories of playing at outdoor Remembrance Day services, so I know I had done it before and hoped I could do it again. It was for an old family friend, a veteran and dedicated Legion member, our families woven together in a million different ways, and I wanted to honour his long life of service.

The first person I encountered when I entered the funeral home this afternoon was a man who moved to our area a few years ago. He looked quizzically at my instrument case and I told him I was going to be the bugler, and he said “Oh, I didn’t know you were a musician.” “Yes, I am,” was my immediate reply, which didn’t seem to surprise him, but certainly surprised me.

Am I a musician? Was I a musician these past 40 years, just one who didn’t play music? My rapid reentry into that identity feels natural, like I had never stopped playing. I started to read music and play piano when I was six, so I had learned another language that settled deep into my brain. I’ve always loved listening to music, singing along, dancing, but I had stopped playing, and now I had stopped stopped playing.

I made it through The Last Post, the minute of silence and Reveille without too many flubs. People were moved and appreciative of the live performance of that meaningful sequence. I was relieved to have that first behind me.

I seem to be a musician.

Legion

Both of my parents served in the RCAF during the Second World War, so attending Legion services on Remembrance Day has always been a part of my life.

My father joined the Ellerslie Legion Branch #22 right after the war, but women weren’t allowed to join at that time, so my mother didn’t immediately become a member. In the 1980s, the Legion helped her get the disability pension she should have received after the war for hearing loss she suffered during her service, so she must have finally joined in 1991 as she was presented with her 30-year membership pin at today’s Remembrance Day luncheon.

My mother was recently in the hospital for a couple of weeks with pneumonia, a serious condition at 99, so it was heartening that she was able to rally today. She has always been a very social person, happy and upbeat, so people were thrilled to see and speak with her, and it greatly helped her recuperation. For many there today, she’s a link to their own long-gone parents and grandparents, a walking, talking time capsule. I heard one woman, who has to be in her late sixties now, reminiscing about buying candy at my parent’s general store when she was a child, glowing with the memory of those visits.

It was a lovely afternoon with old friends and extended family, everyone glad to gather again to remember.

My mother, Vivian Phillips, and fellow Second World War veteran Jimmy Burleigh, with MLA Robbie Henderson (back left) and MP Bobby Morrissey. Jimmy and Bobby were on the Unit One School Board with my father, Harold, and Robbie’s father, George…we are all connected in so many ways here.