Bryan Shelton (age 93) and grand-nephew David Shelton of Cisne, Illinois. ....... This is a recording made in 2001 of my great-uncle Bryan Shelton and myself. Bryan, a life-long resident of the Cisne area, was 92 years old at the time, but he still loved to sing... a lot. I had just relocated from Denver, CO to Cisne. Bryan, who I had only met a couple of times, heard that he had a relative living in town and came by to introduce himself (I wish more people did that nowadays). Although Uncle Bryan was 92, had terrible vision and had lost one arm to a corn picker accident in the late 1940s, he still drove. Bryan came back by the next day...and the next...and the next... He would come by and reminisce (he liked the fact that I knew the names of all of his dead relatives) or see what I was working on, or invite me to come by the his house and Aunt Leona would make me dinner and more often than not he would sing me an old hymn...or two...or nine.
His visits were sprinkled at random times throughout the day, sometimes as early as 6:30 AM - and as a bartender who worked well into the wee small hours of the morning in a cabaret for years, I rarely saw 6:30 AM - at least not as a starting point. I would be lying in bed, content in blissful sleep and Bryan would pull into the driveway, repeatedly tooting his horn to greet the day. I would cuss and drag myself out of bed and go say hello. My Grandma Shelton, already into her late 80s, gasped when I told her and said, "He's gonna made a nuisance of himself." Thankfully Bryan's sunrise services were infrequent and I always made time for him.
Over the years, my Shelton relatives had all bought reel to reel tape recorders and would sometimes like to record someone singing a song, their small children learning to talk or sometimes letters to Uncle Bill who was stationed overseas. I had copied some of these old reel to reel recordings to cassette tape and one day, it occurred to me that Bryan might like to hear a recording of his father, Wayne Shelton (1882 - 1968) that had been made in 1962. My great grandmother also plays piano while her husband sings. Bryan was surprised that such a recording existed so we sat down in the library and I played the recording. His eyes were wet with tears as he listened in disbelief to the voice of his father, which he hadn't heard in 35 years, quietly saying, "That's him....that's him" over and over. Before the song was over, Bryan broke down sobbing.
A few days later, I asked Bryan, if he would like to sing some of his songs into a microphone and make a recording like his father had. I would even find a piano player if he was interested. He thought for a minute and decided he wanted to "make a record." I asked Marie Rutger if she would come over to the house and accompany Bryan on my piano. By the end of the week we had recorded about eight songs. I sang with Bryan on two songs and while our singing won't win any awards, they certainly mean a lot to me. Bryan died the following Spring at the age of 93. But sometimes on really quiet mornings around sunrise,as I am lying in bed, not quiet awake and not quiet still asleep and still halfway in a dreamlike state...a part of me can still hear that infernal honking coming from the driveway and I smile.
13 ноя 2016
