How Can I Keep from Singing?

The room went dark.

The fans stopped,

minutes before the Paul Winter Consort

was to step on stage to pay tribute to

America’s 250th birthday.

Here we were.

Hundreds of people gathered

in this historical concert hall

on Music Mountain.

on this unusually hot night.

Outside, the trees swayed vigorously,

thunder shook the hall and rain pelted the roof.

Suspended in time, we waited.

People began to stir, nervously.

A feeling of unease filled the room.

I could feel the communal panic building and

I shifted from curiosity to fear.

I closed my eyes.

Noticing the quivering in my body,

breathing with it,

feeling my feet on the ground,

and the support of the Earth beneath me,

I was able to find my center.

How fitting, I thought.

Gathered here on July 4th,

during one of the darkest times in our nation’s history,

the lights go out.

“The sky is turning green!” a woman exclaimed.

“A tornado is coming!”

Three times from three different women, I heard this.

Simultaneously, a few women began to sing quietly,

sending a soft smile of hope into the room.

I began to send a silent prayer to Paul,

“Please play.

Please light the darkness and our hearts with your music.”

We waited.

Oskar, Music Mountain’s music director, stepped on stage,

shining his iPhone in the dark so we could see him.

“The show will go on!” he announced.

An eruption of applause followed.

In moments,

the backstage crew carried out what appeared to be two

battery operated lights.

The Paul Winter Consort stepped on stage.

The exquisite, brilliant sound of Paul’s Soprano Sax

brought tears to my eyes.

That unforgettable moment felt like a turning point.

In the Consort’s choice to play acoustically,

without microphones or amplifiers and stage lighting,

the darkness began to melt.

“The dark night is over and dawn has begun,”

Theresa Thomason belted out in her powerfully clear voice.

Sax, vocals, piano, cello, bass, drums, percussion…

Paul Winter, Theresa Thomason, Henrique Eisenmann, Dave Haughey, Peter Slavov and Bertram Lehmann,

playing each embodied note

from the depths of their hearts and souls.

Who needs electric power?

The power of music is inextinguishable!

As we continued to bathe in this magnificent sound,

the shift in the energy of the room was palpable,

filling every cell of my being and every corner and crevice in this great hall and beyond with the light of love:

Unified.

Peaceful.

The sky began to clear.