House of Melodies
Coming home each day, I’m greeted by a Hammond organ just inside the back door. It’s not the only instrument that’s made a home here over the years—it’s accompanied by three guitars, two electric and one acoustic, an electronic keyboard, a flute, a set of drums, and a large guitar amp, all like additional members of the family. A box of vinyl records, many of them original pressings from the 1970’s and 1980’s, sits in the basement, and an ever-growing collection of CD’s lives on bookshelves and inside desk drawers. We still use clock radios to wake up every morning.
My dad’s musical collection is characterized mostly by spirit, swagger, and guitar riffs of every kind. A peek at his bookcase reveals the full discography of blues guitar legend Stevie Ray Vaughan, numerous funky albums of the late great Jeff Beck, and the entire career of the blues-country-rock Allman Brothers, among many others. Each shelf contains numerous stacks of CD’s separated in alphabetical order by the artist’s last initial, so he can always find the exact CD he’s looking for with just a quick scan.
My mom’s library includes the sweet folk-rock sounds of Bonnie Raitt and Linda Ronstadt, as well as the upbeat energy and playful cheesiness of the disco and 80’s pop she grew up with. We both crossed an item off our bucket list at a concert by the top disco band of the 1970’s—for her, a twenty-year wait to see KC and the Sunshine Band, and for me, a chance to step into the Hampton Beach Casino Ballroom and all its history for the first time. The 70’s were
alive for two loud and lively hours in that old ballroom on one night in July of 2022, and it was a wonder to witness.
I recall her watching me at the age of six as I clung to the edge of the bleachers for dear life at my first roller skating night, hosted by the school where she teaches and the same place where I began my school years —the beginning of a lifetime of cruising around the school gym every second Saturday of the month under dancing disco lights, soundtracked by such hits as “Video Killed The Radio Star” and “Footloose” and “Dancing Queen.” When the wheels flew out from under me and I slammed down on the wooden floor, she was there to make sure I got back up and rolling again. Whenever we lace up those well-loved rented tan skates, it’s like reuniting with an old friend. In our world, you’re never too old to skate.
My mom is always the first to turn the radio up when a surprise ABBA or B-52’s song comes on. Santana’s iconic rock song “Smooth” is also a must-listen in the car. She has a way of spreading enthusiasm for even the smallest joys and surprises—a fact I complain about in the early mornings when I’ve barely woken up and she’s ready to take on the day, but a quality I aspire to have every day.
Even before I was around, my mom sang in the same Catholic youth folk group in her hometown of Hudson that my dad later joined to play guitar after moving to New Hampshire. I always thought they met because of St. John the Evangelist Church, but they’ve told me the real reason they met was music. While our view of what it means to practice faith continues to grow and change, I still have no doubt that music is a spiritual experience. Whether it’s two or three friends jamming on a whim or a band playing full volume to a crowd of thousands, there’s something deeper that lives in the space between each person and their instrument. Air and electricity and touch become sounds that provoke all kinds of emotions, from overflowing joy to profound sadness or loneliness. As listeners, we have a chance to step into that space for a moment, if we just listen closely enough.
My dad maintains that messages and lessons can, and often do, come to us through music, and that those lessons should draw our attention to other patterns in our lives. He’s fond of saying, “There’s no such thing as a coincidence.” What he means is that even the smallest moments and coincidences can have a meaning behind them. It could be taken as a message from a higher power, or just things lining up in the universe. That song on the radio when you have an important day ahead? It was bound to happen. You were just thinking of someone you haven’t seen in a while and ran into them today? That’s no accident. I’ve started to keep a list of these “coincidences” so I can look back over time and see how magic can sometimes find us in the most mundane places.
In my first week of fifth grade at the Villa Augustina School, I discovered that my whole class (yes, the entire grade was fourteen students!) all played instruments. I refused to be confined to the bench in the back of the room all year, so after an unsuccessful fifteen-minute trial with the flute, I picked up my first pair of drumsticks. A few months of struggling through basic exercises from the snare drum book turned into simple concert pieces, then playing “We Will Rock You” behind the drum set for the first time. Those sticks have led me through ten years of learning new songs, meeting friends in the downtime before and after rehearsals, quick exchanges of a job well done with new acquaintances, and the honor of working with many music teachers, each with their own unique approach to music and relationships with their students.
The drums I’ve practiced on for almost ten years originally belonged to Uncle Charlie, my mom’s uncle and a lifetime bassist and drummer who cut his teeth playing jazz with his brothers in the 1940’s as high school students. They performed at dances all around the Monadnock region of southwestern New Hampshire, and he continued to play during his time in dental school at Tufts. His enthusiasm for jazz never waned throughout his life—he loved to talk about the people he’d played with, and even had a string bass in his apartment at the retirement community. He was fond of saying, “Make friends with the instrument.” I remember driving up a dirt road on a sunny February afternoon in 2014 and stepping into the living room of my great-grandparents’ original house, where the drums lived prior to us settling them into their new home. The set came with an old leather case filled with metal hardware, polished drum sticks, and wire brushes. For weeks, I struggled to play even the simplest beat, but my dad made sure I kept at it. Even now, he reminds me: “Remember, slow is fast.”
I still struggle with this idea, but on every new journey through the creative process, I’m reminded over and over again that he’s right. Someday, when I’ve been alive for much longer, I hope to have his knack for looking into the future and the wisdom to make it happen.
My dad developed his keen ability to envision a project and see it through in high school, when in 1974 he decided he was going to run his own rock band, named “The American Way” in honor of the upcoming U.S. Bicentennial celebration. No warning or doubtful remark was about to hold him back from the mission he was on. He and his friends scoured the classified ads in the local newspaper for cheap instruments and equipment and auditioned for the Surf, a prominent South Shore booking agency that landed them at high school dances all over eastern Massachusetts and even an opening slot at a popular ballroom owned by the agency—all between their sophomore and senior years of high school.
On one occasion in the fall of 1974 the group of fifteen-year-old boys, still lacking drivers’ licenses, placed an ad in the paper looking for a van owner who could drive them to a gig. On the day of the concert, a delivery truck for the cookie company Archway showed up. All was going as normal until the drive home from the gig, when my dad’s friend exclaimed: “It smells like a peanut butter sandwich on fire!”
Indeed, the driver of this cookie truck had a soft spot for marijuana and a job tailor-made for a man with the “munchies.” At home, my dad often apologizes for telling too many “American Way Stories” while reminiscing about their time together as a band, especially to my mom who has heard them at least once a week for the last twenty-five years. I always reassure him there’s no such thing, that I’ll never get tired of these little journeys back in time.
My dad first set foot on the campus of Saint Anselm College in 1982 to see Buddy Rich, widely accepted as the greatest jazz drummer in history. The Dana Center for the Humanities had just opened to the public, and my dad seized the opportunity to see a living legend just a thirty-minute drive from his home city at the time. Two women came in after the show had started, and when the song was over, Buddy wiped the sweat off his forehead with a towel, pointed to them and asked, “Why were you ladies late?”
I can only imagine their reactions as one of the world’s most well-known and respected drummers teased them about their tardy arrival. Twenty years later, on a Friday evening in April of 2002, my dad returned to the Dana Center with my mom to see the Blues Brothers, featuring most of the movie’s original cast turned touring band. After some negotiation with a student working security, my dad managed to shake hands with none other than the Memphis guitar legend Steve Cropper and got a signature on his book of Blues Brothers guitar charts—all in the basement of the Dana Center. Of course, Mr. Cropper left the biggest impression, but that work-study student planted a seed in my dad’s mind that came back many years later.
Fast forward to February of 2020. I had received acceptances from three local colleges: Southern New Hampshire University, Saint Anselm College, and the University of New Hampshire’s Manchester campus, all of which were strong contenders for my final decision. I typed exhaustive lists of the pros and cons of each school and finally decided that I would enroll in the communication arts program at UNH. That is, until my dad raised the idea of Saint Anselm again.
“I think Saint A’s might be the best choice,” he suggested.
“But UNH makes more sense.”
“There’s a lot of good opportunities at Saint A’s. And you could do work-study in the Dana Center. Just like that student working the Blues Brothers show.”
I was still stumped as to which school was the best choice, so I let the idea bounce around my brain for a few days and ultimately trusted my dad’s instincts as both a professor and a former student himself. I finally submitted my enrollment to Saint Anselm in mid-March. Upon starting as a student in August of the same year, I immediately questioned my choice of school, but my mom encouraged me to find my niche and never backed down. As it turns out, the Dana Center was that niche on campus I was looking for. In three years of work-study there, I’ve sold tickets and greeted guests for a fascinating range of shows ranging from stunning tap-dance performances to traditional Irish music to a troupe of rescue dogs stealing the audience’s heart with their “acrobatic” tricks. I look back on the shows I’ve witnessed and smile at what an incredible honor it’s been—all because my dad met that student in 2002.
Today, I create Spotify mixes to play at home, carefully selecting songs to set a cozy and relaxed mood or add a boost of energy to the room. In between semesters, I read biographies of the very musicians who bring a little extra color to our daily routines and share what I’ve learned, giving my dad an opportunity to discuss the countless rock concerts he’s seen or my mom a chance to recall her and her siblings’ favorite records and what her college years sounded like. Every day is a new beat in our house of melodies.