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“Once upon a time…”

A dear friend of mine once said those four words were the most captivating a child might hear. Well, certainly the most magical.

Those four words also begin one of the most poignant, emotion-touching songs I’ve ever heard. And the melody? Oh, my. Hauntingly beautiful. We often sang it when I was in the Sir Walter and Greenville choruses.

Talk about “eyeball sweat”. Long ago youth and love remembered in four-part acapella harmony.

As memory allows, please let me at least share the lyrics with you.

“Once upon a time, a girl with moonlight in her eyes, put her hand in mine, and said she loved me so. But that was once upon a time, very long ago.

“Once upon a hill, we sat beneath a willow tree, counting all the stars, and waiting for the dawn. But that was once upon a time, now the tree is gone.

“How the breeze ruffled through her hair, how we laughed as though tomorrow wasn’t there. We were young and didn’t have a care. Where did it go, so quickly?

“Once upon a time, the world was sweeter than we knew. Everything was ours, how happy we were then.

“But somehow once upon a time, never comes again.”

In so many, many ways, music has the power, the inexplicable magic, of engendering diverse emotional responses in us. Well, at least in most of us, I would think.

A Robert Burton wrote, back in 1621, “Many men are melancholy by hearing music, but it is a pleasing melancholy that causeth; and therefore, to such as are discontent, in woe, fear, sorrow, or dejected, it is a most present remedy.”

So, it is today, mostly, I would say. Well, perhaps not for such as rap and hip hop, and there is no intended slur or slight for these and some other genres of current pop music.

Actually, there is music for just about any mood or mind set, and some that sets your foot tapping and makes you happy. You know all this, of course.

I have always greatly admired those with special musical talents. The enjoyment they bring to others, as well as themselves, is needed in this world. Especially now.

Time to end this. I’m rambling.

APROPOS – “Keep a song in your heart.”

-Anon