day 9 with music

My friend Dawn is hosting 30 Thankful Days, and I have been trying to be intentionally thankful all this month. Hop on over to there to see what she's thankful for.

Today I am thankful for music. For Beethoven. For John Rutter. For the Beatles.

Earlier today I was listening to the Beatles, and it cheered me up. It made me happy, and uplifted my spirit. Then in second grade, I was teaching about Bach, and one of those little guys came up to me as class was ending and said, "Teacher, you must really love a lot of different kinds of music."

I smiled, nodded, and whispered, "Yes, I really do."

He paused, then said, "More than a thousand?"

And I nodded again. And smiled about it for the rest of the day.

Tonight I had rehearsal, and we sang through the first 2 movements of the Beethoven Mass in C (written in 1807). As we sang and sang, I was thinking about how much I enjoy singing Beethoven, and how happy it made me feel. I should know, because I have sung the Beethoven's 9th Symphony Finale several times. I think it is 4 total, but I've lost count. Usually when I teach it to my kids, I sing a few phrases of the German,and they are impressed, even though my German pronounciation is not impressive. :)
Then we sang through the Gloria by John Rutter. This is also a piece that I love to sing. It makes me happy, and usually gets stuck in my head for the next few days. Had to sing it a little as I typed that...

As I sat in rehearsal singing, I should have been thinking about the music, but instead I thought how all those different musics made me so happy, and how lucky I am to have sung so many pieces. So many different, interesting, fun, happy, challenging, and epic pieces.

Including school and rehearsal, I think I've sung for over 5 hours today. So I'm tired and going to bed. But here's to God's great gift of music. The thing that makes me excited to get up tomorrow and do it all again.
K