Letting the Spirit Flow
Yesterday I stood in the place where I sang in public for the first time.
I was a teenager, backing up two friends who had written a song. I didn’t have a solo. I just sang the melody on the chorus.
I was nervous. Sweating.
When it was over, while folks were congratulating my friends, I stepped off to the side, and a man came up to me. I don’t remember his name now. I don’t even remember who he was.
But I remember what he said.
“I saw you were nervous. You’ve got to let the Spirit flow. You’ve got to let the Spirit flow.”
More than forty years ago.
Simple words from someone whose name I have forgotten, spoken to a nervous kid who had no idea where music would take him.
I never became famous. But I became a singer and songwriter. I had my own band. I taught myself to play. I still write songs. I still sing. I still give concerts.
And yesterday I stood again in that simple shelter of concrete and wood where it began.
I took out my phone and recorded a brief video.
And I sang.
No band. No stage lights. No great audience. Just that old place, an older voice, and the strange distance between the teenager I was and the man I have become.
Forty-plus years later, I finally stood there again and did exactly what that unnamed man told me to do.
I let the Spirit flow.
