Downtown Beats

by Pam Everhardt Bloom  Rowan Public Library

Helen Keller said it beautifully, “Alone we can do little; together we can do so much.” The arrival of 2017 is an opportunity to continue to build community within Rowan County. To this effort, Rowan Public Library offers an opportunity to come together on a positive note.

Monday night, Jan. 30, 2017 from 6-7 pm, RPL will host the debut of DOWNTOWN BEATS, Rowan’s new impromptu chorus. Here’s the hitch, this isn’t one of our Community Concerts. We all can be part of this chorus. There is no need for talent, no need for commitment and definitely no charge!  Expect to arrive at 6pm for a short practice of two songs, With a Little Help from My Friends by John Lennon and Paul McCartney and Lean on Me by Bill Withers. The evening will culminate with the final performance being videoed. The chorus performance will be released on Rowan Public Library’s YouTube channel and facebook page. Downtown Beats will meet once a month on the last Monday of each month, January through April.

Why sing at all and why sing with a group? Music can connect us in ways our neighborhoods do not. Standing side by side with a member of your community and smiling and laughing for an hour might just transform some of our perceptions of those neighbors we don’t yet know. Most of us have antidotal evidence of how music can soothe, energize and connect. If you need more definitive evidence to convince yourself or to encourage friends to join you, check out the following from Rowan Public library.

Singing in the Rain, Sister Act and other musicals often bring a tune and a smile to our lips. Two award winning movies possibly overlooked, Young @ Heart and The Chorus = Les Choristes tell stories of the restorative magic of song. Young @ Heart depicts a chorus formed in 1982 consisting of residents of an elderly housing project in Northampton, Massachusetts with musical choices from James Brown to Coldplay. The chorus has continued for 30 years and new members, currently ages 73 – 89, are still singing and performing. The Chorus = Les Choristes, portrays how music can bring hope and inspiration to a home for troubled boys. Nominated for two Academy Awards, this film may be a movie you never forget.

Content to sing in your car or shower? Imperfect Harmony, Finding Happiness Singing with Others by Stacy Horn may convince you to give DOWNTOWN BEATS a try.  The author prefaces her story of the history and science of choirs with these thoughts on singing, “I become temporarily suspended in a world where everything bad is bearable, and everything good feels possible.  Don’t cry, sing.” Daniel J. Levition continues the science connection with The World in Six Songs, How the Musical Brain Created Human Nature while Donna S. Davenport portrays the memory of song with her haunting memoir, Singing Mother Home, A Psychologist’s Journey through Anticipatory Grief.  Should you be more interested in the mechanics of a working chorus or the popularity of the pop song, How Can We Keep from Singing, Music and the Passionate Life by Joan Oliver Goldsmith and The Song Machine, Inside the Hit Factory by John Seabrook may be among your next books to borrow from the library.

Still undecided?  Ponder this line from Mitch Albom’s Tuesday with Morrie, “Devote yourself to your community around you and devote yourself to creating something that gives you purpose and meaning.”  Come build community with Rowan County’s new impromptu chorus DOWNTOWN BEATS. Together we can find the right notes.

On a final note, Bebe Moore Campbell’s novel Singing in the Comeback Choir is my next read. One review promises that her intricate rousing harmonies of gospel music may make you want to shout “Amen!”  This book promises a story of family and community, hope and faith.