History is Just Life Happening
Listen to Joyful Noise Under a Palm
Joyful Noise Under a Palm
My father did not set out to become a musician. A high-school basketball coach suggested band instead of bench time, and he chose trombone because a friend played one. It turned out he had talent — though life had other plans.
The Second World War carried him to the South Pacific as a searchlight operator, a job that made him an obvious target at night. Later, assigned to kitchen duty, he discovered he actually liked cooking. Eventually he was sent to audition for General MacArthur’s band in Manila, handed an unfamiliar E-flat baritone horn, and told to practice under a palm tree for an hour. He figured it out — and got the job.
After the war, there were no parades waiting for him. He returned home, took over the family feed store, and made music a weekly gift instead of a career. Saturday nights meant city band concerts in warm Kansas air. Once, I sat beside him and played his trombone. He was proud of that moment.
History remembers generals and presidents. But the world is really shaped by lives like his — redirected by war, obligation, disappointment, and small joys that persist anyway.
Many people measure success by wealth or status. My father’s life suggested another measure: joy. Not happiness, which comes and goes, but something deeper — the ability to carry sorrow, laugh anyway, and tell the story with gratitude.
This piece celebrates the sound of brass instruments, bold and imperfect, supported by timpani and cymbals — a musical parade that never quite made it down Main Street. It is not about brilliance or achievement. It is about playing whatever instrument life hands you and discovering, sometimes by accident, that joy was there all along.
A joyful noise under a palm.
