Living in the Major Key

I received the following email from newsletter subscriber Eddie Campbell. I was profoundly moved by Eddie’s beautiful words, and wanted to share them with you, with his permission, as this week’s letter. Every day we get to express ourselves is a blessing, but sometimes we need reminding of that.

Mary x

I want to tell you a short story about a wonderfully creative musician I knew. My wife of thirty-five years, Mandy.

She had a creative streak in her that would not be hidden. For three and a half decades she sang and played guitar in our church band while I plonked away on the piano as best I could. When Covid came and we were locked down for six long months, and not being able to congregate, she took up an online pencil-drawing course until we could put the band together again.

Around about that time, the mysterious Motor Neuron disease affected her. Her brain sent instructions to 'Do this and do that' but not all the information got through to her hands and tongue. She started slurring her words and could not sing anymore. She continued to play guitar. When she was no longer able to pinch a plectrum or press chords, she learned bass guitar. There was less hand-action involved and she played on in the band, plucking and pressing one note at a time. (She became our Suzi Quatro, but without the leather). She could also no longer control a pencil as before and switched to painting. What she did with bright blobs of paint and swishes of colour was amazing!

Eventually she did not have enough strength in her legs to get up on stage at church. She would sit in her wheel chair and monitor our band sound and show us with hand signals what we were doing right or wrong.

In June last year, she died.

As we head into a new year, I am slowly coming out from under the fog of mourning and depression. I'm starting to fire up the keyboard and fool around with chords, try a few riffs on the guitar and even piece together phrases for my next song. It's coming back.

Some of my days are lived in major keys, some in minor keys but Mandy's creativity inspired me so perhaps her story can inspire others as well. She would be happy to know that.

Her paintings hang on my wall, telling me 'I did what I could, while I could. You do the same.'

God bless

Eddie Campbell, Cape Town

(Independent Artist of the Week: LA-based musician Novak the Enjoyer’s track ‘See All Of The Beauty’. This is a great example of using YouTube and gear demonstrations as a way of promoting your own music. Excellent job and beautiful song!)

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