Television and piano lessons (1970-1976)
By 1970 a big deal for me was a new comic book like Archie, Richie Rich, or Casper the Friendly Ghost, and looking in the back to see what new cartoons were coming out in September on ABC, NBC, and CBS. Like no other composer of any significance whatsoever - ever - television music had a huge impact on me. Between age 6 and about 12, I watched enough episodes of The Brady Bunch and Merry Melodies cartoons to permanently wire music constantly swimming with music. Having successfully made it through the 1960s, and at age 6 completely unaware of any war in Vietnam, I learned how to operate the television and lie on my stomach for hours on my parents' bed dozing in and out. I continued to do this until my early teens, usually after I had eaten several spoonfuls of peanut butter dipped in sugar. Mom was away, and dad was at work.
I remember trying to memorize the opening string runs in Bewitched and the final cadence of orchestration as Samantha flew by to whose animated twinkling lights, the power of the Flintstones intro and closing music, plus those orchestral runs and brass hits in The Jetsons. I can still hear the atonal motif that keeps repeating as the sharks circle and destroy a raft made by Gilligan and the Skipper as they try to float to safety but never get out of the lagoon. And those quirky intros and outros in The Brady Bunch define groovy more than groovy ever was, for me that is. I can't say enough about the music behind all those Merry Melodies cartoons.
Sometime in the 1970s, my sister imposed the Do-Not-Enter Rule for her room that only applied to me, but she was gone a lot. She had a record player from Sears. It was olive green and all plastic. I played these a lot without her permission: The Bugaloos, The Partridge Family, The Jackson Five, and Credence Clearwater Revival. Later on she bought (and I stole a listen to) records by Roger Daltry, Bachman Turner Overdrive, and The Carpenters.
At age 5, according to my parents, I was firmly resolved to play the piano. I didn't know this until 2004. They said I "begged" to take lessons in first grade, but they wouldn't let me (officially go to a teacher) until I was in second grade. My sister was taking piano lessons, though, and that was enough to drive me insane wanting. Just as soon as she got up from the stool, I hopped up and pecked out her lesson from memory, or at least I tried. I understand now that she didn't appreciate that very much. But it was my turn at the piano, and rules were rules.
All of my piano teachers until I was a senior as an undergraduate music major eventually fired me, starting with my first one in the second grade. Oh, I got the miniature busts of the composers all right, and I think I chewed a few of them up belatedly teething, but I was convinced that any close improvisation of the assignment would do. After all, I was only making the music better wasn't I? By age 9 or 10 I had learned the original version of The Maple Leaf Rag in Ab, complete with all those bouncing octaves in both hands and the diminished arpeggio closing out the exposition. I played it way too fast, but I got a standing ovation at Meadow Lark Elementary school's talent show in fourth grade. This was sort of instant piano fame for me. Who knew? At the end of the show the entire student body sang Horse With No Name by America, and even then, that song seemed like something from the past. It still does. This was all in the same gym that we played dodgeball with those little balls you could really huck. I got hit in the head a number of times.