SAM’S SILENCE

SAM’S SILENCE
Since my childhood, I have been visiting rest homes to serenade the residents there. Recently I made an appointment to sing some favorites at our local facility, the Sunshine Terrace. Not being blessed with the ability to play by ear, I asked the nurses to ask the residents to identify their favorite songs. One of my special friends, Eva Knoulten, was conspicuously missing from the list. I inquired of the head nurse why that was the case, and she informed me that Eva had told her that the songs that meant the most to her were from her homeland and sung in German. I decided to surprise Eva at the end of the recital with a song just for her. When I arrived I was warned by a number of the nurses about Sam Johnson. Sam was suffering from the inability to communicate in acceptable means. They knew that he enjoyed music because he would navigate himself in his wheelchair to the organ, piano and radio to look and listen to music. They felt sure that he would enjoy my singing, though they were afraid that he might begin to make some inappropriate disturbance in the middle of the proceeding. I reminded them that I had been coming since my childhood, and that it was very unlikely that Sam could do anything I had not experienced before and break my concentration. I was, however, very aware of Sam in the back of the room, seeming to be some place else, staring at some unseen vision. When I got to the last song, I said to the group that I had a special song for Eva as a surprise and I began to sing Brahms’ Wiegenlied or Lullaby: Guten abend, Gut’ nacht, mit rosen bedacht Mit englein besteckt stupt unter di deckt When I got that far, I was aware of someone singing with me in perfect harmony...it was Sam.. Morgen früh wenn Gott will, wie im traum’s paradis. When we finished, Sam began to clap loudly. The nurses became alarmed and went to him to stop him. I compelled them to let him continue. With tears streaming down his face, I asked him how he knew Brahms’ Lullaby. He said “I served a mission for my church at the age of 19 in Vienna, Austria.” I don’t know how old Sam was, but I assume he was speaking of an experience which must have happened nearly 60 years before. Words and feelings “locked up” in his memory bank, which were allowed to come flooding out due to the musical genius of Johannes Brahms.