Make the Music Last

The final note from the piano resounds making one briefly think the sound may carry on forever. It fades though, so subtly, so smoothly, one cannot distinguish when it actually stopped being audible. Then, it’s gone.

At that time we were less like our parents and more like the children of our parents. Life was just opening up then and the possibilities seemed without limit. We gathered there in that small west Tennessee town for a few years to pursue an education knowing at some level these were life-changing times but not realizing how broad that change would be ultimately.

Some tend to say there’s nothing to do in this small town. Of course, there is, if you are creative enough to make things happen or know the creative people who make things happen. Life was, and still is, what you choose to make of it, no matter where you are. So, then, from time to time, that place kicked out the jams and rocked.

Usually, one of those leading the way in this regard was Gregg. This town was his home. Maybe that was why he looked and seemed so comfortable rattling the keys on the piano or hitting some licks on the guitar. Maybe that’s why the lyrics he wrote and then performed seemed to come from the heart. It seemed to be what he was meant to do.

Many of the rest of us who made this town our home for a time would gather at the foot of the stage. The band rocked under the bright lights while we watched in awe, captured for a time in the spectacle, the magic, the music.

Now those days are memories scattered among other things which remind us of then from time to time. Those memories come flooding in when something sobering happens.

Earlier this week, Gregg passed away.

The memories of that time and place get stirred around again. It’s as if we are standing at the edge of the stage now. The lights have faded, the band has left the building. The spectacle has ended. The magic has evaporated. The music though still resounds in our ears. It seems like that last note will ring in our ears forever. We try with all our might to get it to last just a little longer. We try to hang on to it before it’s gone although we know that it is subtly, smoothly slipping away.

Gregg, rest in peace, brother. May God’s care bless your family, your friends and your fans.