The subject came to mind, as I found myself humming JaDa... a song we sang at YMCA camp, with my ukelele playing fellow counselors. back in the early '50's.
We grew up with music... A piano in our 9'X10' dining room, against the wall... mom played and tried to teach me, but gave up... At grandma Miller's house, with aunts and uncles and cousins... in all about 30... crammed into the "parlor" around the player piano, where cousin Margie and I pumped the pedals, and we ALL sang Harbor Lights, and When Johnny Comes Marching Home Again... in the 1940s.
Uncle Jerry was a tail gunner in a B24, and died over Poland when his plane was shot down. Jerry played the violin, and my grandmother decided that someone had to carry on the musical heritage, so little Bobby, won the violin, and in 5th grade began lessons in Mrs Sherman's after school... free music class. For two years... right through 6th grade, I carried that damned thing to school... defying the bullying of the day. Got up to the 6th position. Dad finally relented, and I gave the violin to my little brother, who dropped and broke it... A solution I had never thought of.
After grammar school... to High School... not good enough for the chorus, and they didn't need aviolinist in the band... It was a small marching band... The School was Pawtucket West... (there was also a Pawtucket East which was twice the size)... At the highschool football games, the band always played at halftime. Yes... a small band... 5 players... enough to make a "W"...
But it was in highschool that this musician flourished... Western singing was beginning to take over the country... before Nashville was in Tennessee. We listened to WWVA, Wheeling West Virgina...on a radio "skip" at night and bought the words to the songs at the dugstore for $.10.
Too costly for a guitar, so we all bought ukeleles and "made believe". Learned every song, from every country western singer who ever sang... hundreds of songs... knew every word, and ... ahem... still remember them today. Swam for the Boys club, and we won the National Championhip in 1953 and 1954. Six of our swimmers played the uke, and we serenaded the audience, and made the NYT...
Couldn't do that today.
College was more of the same... but added playing the recorder, the tin whistle, harmonica, and guitar. Got good enough in singing to join the chorus, but bored after 1 year... and knew I'd never make the Meddiebempsters... so became a troubador.. mainly at parties, and usually best after 11 PM.
Also in College, took Music Appreciation, as a hoped for "gut course"... to offset Calculus and Biology... OMG... didn't realize that the music labs were 4 hours long, with headphones, listening to and parsing classical music... If you've done that, you'll understand. But yeah... definitely a wonderful lead in to listening to, loving and subconsciously analyzing the classics.
After college, did the usual... bought 45's, then LP's then 8 tracks, then cassettes... Mostly popular music of the 60's, and 70's. Stopped everything in the 80's... right after disco... so am totally ignorant of the in-between '85 and '13...
So in the early 90's when Napster was semi legal, managed to download about 3000 of my favorites that I still have and play regularly. Haven't P2P'd in 15 years...
Now... still play ukelele, harmonica, electronic piano, and jam with some buddies in our retirement community, and play with them in the "talent" shows. No violin.
I guess music has followed DW and I throughout our lives, and helped over the rough spots...
"Music hath charms to soothe the savage breast, To soften rocks, or bend a knotted oak" ~ William Congreve