Church Music

Disclaimer: I'm LDS (or Mormon), and this post might be confusing to those unfamiliar with this church. I had to post it anyway because the memory of this experience still makes me laugh. For those unfamiliar with Mormons, I've tried to explain the confusing parts in parentheses.

Now that I've written this all out, I get the feeling it was funnier in my head.

As you know, we're a conservative group. We are pretty calm when it comes to our meetings, and many people may feel it makes them boring. In my mind, it just makes it easier to listen for the Holy Ghost and the promptings I feel as a result.

When I was in high school, we had a Ward Conference (each congregation is called a ward, and in this case, there were three wards meeting together). The woman asked to play the organ for hymns as well as the choir numbers was a lounge pianist by profession.

This meant she would tend to ad lib a little, and inevitably you'd start to unconsciously tap your foot to the beat of the song. I happened to be sitting on the stand for the meeting, so I could see the congregation as they filtered in.

All of the sudden, from the side door right in front of me, this woman came in. She was pretty young, but she seemed to be limping pretty bad. I couldn't really see her except for her head and shoulders due to the wooden partition in front of me. As she turned to come up the stairs, I noticed she was lugging a huge guitar case. (Typically, we keep excess instruments to a minimum and usually only have the more easily reverent instruments like the violin or flute, simply so people can more easily focus on the words and the meaning of the hymns we sing.)

I was a little surprised to see her coming in with this, but got distracted as a guy about her age came in through the door behind her. He was also limping, and when he rounded the corner, I noticed he was carrying an amp.

By the time we started the meeting, I forgot all about the two who set up shop behind me. When the choir starting singing, all of the sudden, I was nearly knocked out of my chair when the guitar came in with the amp right behind my head. It turns out she was actually carrying a bass guitar.

It was a great song, and I'm just sad I can't remember what they sang that day.