The Keys to Sweet Music
When I was a young girl (many, many years ago), I took piano lessons from a woman in St. Albans. I had not been taking lessons for very long before she told my parents they might as well not waste their money, I was never going to be able to play the piano.
I believe we always had a piano in our home. My dad played by ear as did his sister, my Aunt Mary. I wanted to play! I sat down at the piano often, picking things out and really wanting to be able to play.
So I decided I would learn how to play on my own. My technique was terrible, my fingering horrible, my timing not too hot, but I kept it up. I used a song I knew to see what the 4/4 or 3/4 notations I saw meant. I realized it meant that between the bars, you should have four beats. But sometimes I would look at the music and there were more than four notes in between the bars. What was that all about? I don’t remember how I figured it out, but I finally realized that a dot on a note meant hold it longer. Little “flags” meant the note was played faster - the more flags, the faster you got off that note! Now I know about whole, half, quarter, eighth notes, sixteenth and even 32nd notes, but the first hymns I learned to play mostly had quarter notes or I could play it because I knew the song and wasn’t worrying about how long I should hold the note.
I was learning to play using a hymnal (of course). The first song I attempted to play was “When the Roll is Called Up Yonder.” Trust me on this - it didn’t sound like the song we sang at church. So I was playing the correct notes, but something was wrong. So then I saw these little things by the 4/4 time. They were flats! I was to hit the black note to the left of the note when I saw those. Of course, my first song was in four flats. Now I had to figure which notes I was supposed to flat. I just played the melody line until it sounded right. Later I learned that the flat was placed on the note in the key signature you were to flat.
Next problem was I wanted to play with both hands – soprano and alto with my right hand and tenor and bass with my left, but all four at the same time! Remember, I didn’t really read music. I sat there playing with my right hand until I got the hang of that. Then I tried with my left hand. To this day, I have trouble playing just the left hand. It seems my left hand was dependent on my right hand and I feel very awkward playing just the tenor and bass.
I just branched out from there. I would pick a hymn and pick it out with my right hand and then add the left hand. I didn’t know one key from another, but I had the flats down pretty well. Then I tried a song with a sharp. Playing a sharp meant moving my finger UP to the black note, not down like a flat. For years the most sharps I would play was two.
I began playing for a little mission church in Nitro, W. Va. They had no one at all, so I was literally better than nothing, although marginally! Frankly, I was terrible! Probably as many wrong notes as right ones, but eventually I got better.
I practiced at home, always out of a hymnal. To this day that is mostly what I play. I could only play one sharp for a long time and then graduated to two. But three sharps??? No way!!! But I figured something out! I could play the same notes, but play four flats instead of three sharps. I was onto something! I figured four flats and three sharps equal seven, so I tried it with four sharps and three flats and two sharps and five flats! And now, I don’t care how many sharps a hymn has, I can do it in flats and no one is any wiser.
When Clayton and I moved to St. Clairsville, we went to Thoburn United Methodist Church and I was interested in the organ. They let me practice on it some and I listened to my friends, Carol Poston and Joyce Crouch to hear how they played the organ. It is a totally different touch. On the piano you can pick up your fingers and play. On the organ you slide from note to note to make the sound even. If you are reading this and you play organ, please excuse the incorrect descriptions of organ playing. I didn’t take organ lessons either!
So when Clayton’s office closed down and we needed additional income, I actually took a job as organist at a Lutheran church in Benwood. I didn’t realize that a liturgical church service was very different from a Baptist church service, but the pastors and members there were very gracious and encouraging to me. So I played there for several years and got some experience.
I now play for First Baptist Church of Wheeling. I feel I have a good sense of worship and play hymns well (most of the time). I don’t try to play “over my ability” and the church is very kind when I mess up.
I had a strong desire to play the piano and the determination not to let it beat me. Some would call that a hard-headed West Virginian. They would be right. But I love to play and am glad I stuck with it and learned. I don’t claim to be a “pianist”. I claim to be a woman who loves to play and loves the hymns I play every Sunday. I don’t even care what key they are in now.
