WHAT WILL THEY BE SINGING? -
So, last week, the church I'm serving hosted a banquet for the volunteers and board members of the local Meals-On-Wheels-type program here. Our church is the home base for the cooking and delivering of meals to the homebound.
The dinner was very tasty - roast beef and potatoes, plus the obligatory jello with fine chopped lettuce or slaw and shredded carrots,(this is afterall a church hosted dinner) roll and cole slaw.
The amazing thing is that no government money supports this program. It's all locally funded by donations from churches and groups. Sometimes, they will write a grant for something specific.
There were 70 people at this banquet - from cooks, to helpers to drivers.
The entertainment was a grandson and his wife of a board member. The grandson played piano and his wife sang. They did a couple short operatic type songs and then a couple of oldies like "When You're Smiling", etc.
As they performed the oldies, I looked over the group gathered in the downstairs social room and noted all the silver hair and balding heads. The performers and myself (no spring chicken anymore) were the youngest there. I could also see this performing duo going to nursing homes for gigs.
Which got me thinking about the young people of today and what will happen when they turn old, hitting their 70's & 80's and land in nursing home themselves. What will the performers play for them? What sing-along music is there from this young generation that have grown-up with hip hop and rap?
Can you even begin to imagine performers coming into their nursing homes singing the old, golden classics like: "Who let the dogs out? Who, who?" and "Let me tell you what I want, what I really, really want..."
Can you even picture it?!!!? (Ok you can stop laughing now!)
I don't think they will be singing to those long forgotten, lusterless tunes that aren't even singable and whose words nobody can even remember. It is funny and sad in a way, that the oldies we'll be singing "I Wanna Hold Your Hand", "Ain't No Mountain High Enough", etc. can be sung, danced to and remembered. The hip hop and rap stuff is trendy: here today, gone tomorrow and a generation who will have little to sing in their old age.