Hitting the High Notes
Mum can sing really well. One of my earliest memories is of her singing "Up the wooden hill to Bedfordshire....." and considering we were then living in Dar-es-Salaam, Bedfordshire didn't register with me as a county in England, and because we lived in a bungalow, "Up the wooden hill" also remained a bit of a mystery to me. There were no wooden hills to climb, but I did connect the "bed" bit with that fact it was late and time to sleep.
I also remember her singing "Watching the World Go By," whilst I sat on her knee.
My Grandma was also a good singer, with a wicked sense of humour. She was born in Liverpool, but every year the family would go to London for three weeks, and see all the plays, visit the concert venues and music hall shows. This was before Grandma went deaf; in later years, when she was profoundly deaf ("As deaf as a doorpost!" she used to say - there was no beating about the bush with her!) she told me that when she was in bed at night, she could cast her mind back to those holidays in London and, in her imagination, she could hear everything again. All the music, the sweeping strings in the orchestra, every word of the songs from the stage, including those sung by the saucy Marie Lloyd - she might have been deaf, but for Grandma, the memories were as fresh as if she had heard the shows only yesterday. She "got" all the double entendres, and instilled in me an appreciation of clever, subtle lyrics.
Grandma also sang to me, songs she had learned from her father, which he'd picked up on his travels around the world in the 1880s, from America and Australia.
Now Mum is nearly 98, and she can still sing and hit the top notes. She knows so many songs from the war, all the Vera Lynn songs - We'll Meet Again, There'll be Bluebirds Over the White Cliffs of Dover - occasionally she will get a line mixed up, or even add her own words to a song, but it all makes sense.
Singing uses different areas of the brain; if Mum has been in one of her moods, and if we can get her started, singing can really change her mood for the better.
We have a piano in her room, and another in the lounge, so we are never far from being able to make music. After dinner, and again after supper, we have a regular sing-song. Apart from helping the dinner to go down, it's lovely to hear her in good voice; another bonus is that I get so much practice, even my piano playing has improved!
Songs are so evocative of a time and place; hearing a long-forgotten tune can bring memories flooding back.
I wrote this poem for Mum - and perhaps it will strike a chord (sorry!) for other people, too. Whatever your favourite song is, I think it is important to keep singing,
LYRICS
It's amazing how the lyrics
Of songs roll back the years
With the melodies and rhythms
That at your heartstrings tear
"Those were the days, my friend"
Never fails to take me back
To the time when all was yet to be
And the future an unknown track
And there were songs from Music Hall
I learned at my Grandma's knee
Who could have guessed they'd still be sung
By my daughter, Mum and me?
"If those lips could only speak....."
For "A bird in a gilded cage....."
Those melodramatic lyrics
Still echo down the age
And the sun shines bright
In my old Kentucky home
Where the beautiful dreamer
Once chanced to roam
In the Stephen Foster songbook
The lyrics play their part
To become entwined in our mind,
And forever in our heart.
