Singing School
Years ago when I was in middle school I went to singing schol for the first time. Its a southern tradition that uses shapes to desiginate each pitch on the scale. The first year I went it was a 2 week overnight camp and I was scared. I didn’t know anyone and I didn’t want to be away from home for that long. By the end of the first week I was so excited that I could not restrain my joy to return for the 2nd week. I had been exposed to some of the songs in old connvention singing books, but didn’t fully comprehend it all. I would sit next to people and be amazed at their ability to sight read with ease.
This week my children got to spend their second year attending singing school. Watching their joy everyday as they experience the North Georgia School of Gospel Music has been fablous. My beautiful wife has done the hard task of driving them to and from each day. I wish I could join them. Some of the gladness I feel comes from seeing the staff at work. A couple of my kids have Mrs. Janet. I can remember when I was in singing school that Janet was one of the students along with me. I look around and see so many others I went to singing school with now teaching my children. The incredibly talented Myers Trio (Justin, Jason, and Jessica) now teach classes. I was definetly transported back in time to watch them perform again.
I got to sing a little Bass this week. I was able to sit next to Nelson Bailey and sing a few new songs and even some old favorites written by Jack Clark and Glen Wilson. Nelson is an amazing musician and is kind and talented. While looking through some old videos on youtube I found me and some friend directing a Nelson Bailey song from 20 years ago. He was a good writer back then, some people just have the knack.
Glen Wilson was a mainstay teacher at singing school in my youth. No cooler man may have ever existed. His tall, thin figure and plesant deamanor made anyroom he inhabited a joy. The fact he drove a blue El Camino and was Texas native just made him all the greater of a legend. Glen had the ability to craft a song and not forget that the Bass section likes to do more than sing the root of every chord. But when singing a Glen Wilson song you had better be looking 2 to 3 measures ahead because he was going to sneak in a eighth rest you weren’t expecting.
The smoothest operator in any of these circles was by far Jack Clark. Never has a piano been touch with such velvet layered authority as when it is in Jack’s hands. Jack’s life has been in the music business and that dedication is clear when he appraches anything. A quick glance at a song or the group singing it and Jack has the instant ability to make it 10% better with a slight dynamic suggestion or the floursing of a few notes on the high end of the keyboard.
I’ve met many people in my time, but few have proven as fast and true as singing school friends. When Dacula won the state AA Quartet title in 1996, two singing school friends (Joel Singleton and Cliff Duren) were on the winning quartet in AAA. IN the 1990s I rode with my grandfather to a singing at Belmont. I was afraid I wouldn’t know anybody. The first thing I heard when I walked in the door was “Hey, theres Eli” as some folks from singing school were there.
Each night this week I’ve loved hearing what my kids have learned. They run in with their cousins showing me staff paper with sharps and flats. I watched as teachers referred to them as “The Stancel kids” and smiled broadly as they keep calling Jude “Eli.” To see my kids singing a Nelson Baliey song that I sang 20 years ago brings joy I just cannot explain. I got to watch my kids practice conducting this week and hear them practice intervals. Those skills are something that they will have the rest of their lives, just like the friends they make at singing school.
Eli-June 17, 2022.
A Nelson Bailey song I led in 1999 that my kids got to sing this week.