Presidential Music

Everyone is still talking about the inaugural festivities. Every four years it seems that our nation's ceremonial side comes out with great success. While watching the ceremony last week, I remarked to some friends that I was really surprised to see Yo-yo Ma, Itzhak Perlman and the other players trying to play in such extreme temperatures. Most musicians would have known that their priceless instruments would not react well to the weather. So it wasn't surprising to hear that the music had been pre-recorded to ensure the beauty and tuning of the musical offering. I was grateful for their forethought, because I wouldn't have wanted the performance to be less than the stunning rendition we all heard.

I love to watch inaugurations partly because I enjoy following politics, and partly because I have great memories of attending and participating in the 1977 inauguration of our 39th president, Jimmy Carter. I grew up in Americus, Georgia, the county seat of Sumter County and neighbor of Plains, Georgia. Our family participated in the campaign, and enjoyed knowing many members of the Carter family.

Among my great early musical memories is being Drum Major of the Americus High School Band when we played for countless campaign rallies, and for the enormous crowd on election night. Sometime in the middle of the night I was approached by a campaign staffer and asked to come to the platform and prepare to play the piano while the crowd sang "God Bless America." I did as I was asked, which meant that when the Carters came to the podium to announce the electoral victory I was stationed at the piano right behind them. The crowd was so boisterous that we never even thought of asking them to sing, and I never sat down at the piano. But my "Forest Gump" moment came when the Carters arrived and I was standing right behind them on international television.

A few weeks later we led the inaugural parade as the home-state band of the Carters. My photographs from those experiences are among my most cherished posessions.

This weekend I am involved in a service of unity between several Baptist groups at which President Carter will be the keynote speaker, so I've been re-living some of those 30-year-old memories. I realize that being a musician tends to put you into unusual circumstances, and I'm grateful for the memories.