Music accompanied our lives in the 1940’s and 1950’s. We learned to dance to Big Bands and then to Rock and Roll. We sang along with the radio in the car and the record player at home. Whether we are professionals, amateurs, or fans, the music of those years brings back vivid memories for many of us.
In June, the 1960 Reunion Website is featuring stories about music and the ways we enjoy it, then and now. Share your stories about music in your life by sending an idea or a story to Diane (ddzinn@aol.com), Marilyn (mbellert@niu.edu), or Fred (elder@engr.wisc.edu).
- Are you singing in a church choir or a community chorus?
- Do (or did) you let off steam by making music with friends in a jazz, C&W, or rock and roll band?
- Were you part of the music business but not a performer – composer, arranger, teacher, business manager, publicist, or photographer?
- Has opera, orchestra, or band music played a role in your life?
- Are specific moments in your life tied to particular songs?
Lee Ayres assembled his own playlist of great hits that will be spun on the website turntable every Monday. See the first installment and hear those tunes again at Lee’s Playlist: Great Hits of the ’50s and ’60s.
Dan Tontz’s stories will be published soon as will Skip Granger’s tale of a music experience that turned macabre. We would love to hear from you, too.
A number of our deceased classmates were musicians. Click on their names to see obituaries.
- Marilyn Fletcher Verdier, violin
- Ron Gooden, conductor and master of many instruments
- Jack Graham, clarinet
- Bill Millis, percussion
- Marla Skiles , piano performer and teacher
