Live Oak Church asked Daddy if he would teach a singing school. Daddy taught singing school regularly with Uncle Dixie before Uncle Dixie died. Daddy has a grand deep bass voice.Pump Organ photo from Anisworth Antiques
'Can you sing?' he asked the boys and men on one side of the church. 'Sing a song for me.' They looked at each other and some huddled together, then bellowed out a rousing round of 'Yankee Doodle' without much tune:
"Fath'r and I went down to camp,
Along with Captain Goodin',
And there we saw the men and boys
As thick as hasty puddin'.
Yankee Doodle keep it up,
Yankee Doodle dandy... at which point Daddy stopped them.
Daddy hung a tonic Sol-fa chart on the wall and started to teach one of the Yarbrough boys to sing from a notation — to moderate his voice, and produce something of a musical tone. The men grew interested when they found it possible to guide their voices according to written signs and shapes of the notes.
He did the same with the girls, except that he didn't ask them to sing something first and started with one of the older girls who had been to singing school before so the younger ones would not be so shy.
At home, he is teaching me to produce the tones by the shapes on the staff with my fingers on the parlor organ keys at home. He says in no time, I'll be able to play for group singing.
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