Seventy-Six Trombones.

And One Woodblock.

Many of us who write for tnocs.com began sharing stories connected to songs covered over in Tom Breihan’s “The Number Ones” column. Often, we shared deep personal memories about the song Tom wrote about. For many people, a particular song might bring back a moment in one’s life that they could never forget, or even place them in that time, location, and even what they were wearing when that song played.

For me, there’s a few songs like that. Sister Golden Hair will always be a 10/10 as a result…

…while Abracadabra turns me into 13 year old The Gue, listening to my dad lamenting that there’s “no good music since 1964.”

An interesting take since The Beatles were just arriving in America that year.  

But can the memory of a moment in time, connected to a song, be replaced by a newer memory?

For the first time in my life, I believe I can answer: yes.

I’ve mentioned my middle school music teacher in the past, the one who made us listen to Styx for nine straight weeks while we learned guitar, over and over and over. Two years earlier, my sixth grade class had weekly lessons with her, and on this particular day, we were learning how to keep a beat, and the song she used was the instrumental version of Seventy-Six Trombones by Meredith Wilson. He also wrote It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas.

I was given a woodblock and a mallet.

I was an immature eleven, and I tried to goof off like I did in the regular classroom, but the music teacher wasn’t having it.

And I was able to keep the beat. She cited me as the best in class, and told our teacher she was keeping me out of class the rest of the day to perform for the other sixth graders.  

Well, that was a problem. Because I had a crush on a girl in another class. Denise was cute, funny and engaging, but all from afar. You see, in my wild sixth grade class I was a class clown, but outside of it I was incredibly shy…and never interacted with Denise. Ever. I began to sweat. 

Would she notice me? 

Would she be impressed by my woodblock playing? Could ANYONE be impressed by smacking a piece of wood? 

Why hadn’t I paid more attention when taking guitar lessons??!!

I stood in front of class, as Denise’s class shuffled in. She was wearing a bright red sweater, designer jeans, her hair feathered just right, laughing with a few of her friends. The class sat down, and the music teacher introduced me, standing in front of them in my pair of Toughskins, hair matted down, parted in the middle. Time stood still…and for a brief moment, Denise looked directly at me. I turned beet red, and focused on my instrument. 

For the next thirty minutes, I played the best damn woodblock I could.  

I never did ask Denise on a date, or a slow dance, or…well, anything…and that has been my memory for the last forty years. But this past Saturday that may have changed. 

My daughter loves ice skating, and she’s good at it. Every Saturday for the last month she practiced for an ice skating performance, and the show was last weekend. 

The song used? Seventy-Six Trombones.

She was incredible.  

Now, when I think about this song, I’m not carried away to an awkward moment in my prepubescent life.  I simply… smile.

Will the memory of my daughter skating overtake and replace the previous one?  I can only hope, but early results say “yes.”

Now, if I could only do something about “Renegade”…

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