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Don Cornelius and the Staple Singers on Soul Train
Image: Wikimedia Commons
“Music picks the strings of your soul.” -Victorine Basley Goldston.
One of my best boys texted me late one evening, “Yarbrough, I’m in the basement jamming some Boy George and Culture Club. As soon as I read the text it took me back to the kitchen of another good friend where we were sitting laughing and talking and listening to Boy George and Culture Club. I just took a moment and marinated in the feeling associated with the memory. It was good.
I’ll bet a dollar to a dime, certain songs bring you to a place of enjoyment and fun. A trip back to Times Gone By if you will. We all have examples. I feel you going there. I “see” the smile. Takes us back in mind, but then we realize that time is over never to be relived again. We rejoice. And then sometimes we try to go back and relive that past in the present. What a No-no.
James Brown
Listen. After my ministry’s fundraiser last May, we hung around for a while. The DJ played some tunes. You know what he did… played James Brown, “We Gonna Have A Funky Good Time.” I grabbed one of my friends and we started dancing. Then grabbed another, one on each side, and decided to…well, act like me, doing the bump with two women. “How low can you go? I want to take you higher!” I was jumping around, going low like I’m doing the limbo or something. I was having a Bobby super good time, living in the memories of times gone by, Friday Nights at The Portside, when I was much younger. OK, so with my “BAD” knee that I tore up in 1985 playing basketball, it was a good six weeks before I could walk right again, but that music, those memories, I, Rev. Bobby, had A Funky Good Time.
Music for me has always been reflective or tied to the experience I was having at the time. How wonderful! How sad. Yes, the music was there with me through it all. The rhythms, the beats, the sounds that resonated deep within my soul. The sounds that are representative of my life. The vibrational “feel” that is attached to the music. Then, there is the deep stuff. How the music, the rhythms, the melodies represent the vibrational essence of life itself.
I like all genres of music. But what I vibrate most with is the African influenced beats and sounds contained in the African drums, the Latin horns, the Caribbean steel drums, and the way the Brazilian tunes are constructed. That is not to say I don’t enjoy classical and other genres. My best female friend sometimes shakes her head at me because I love Country Music. Country is the Blues of a different race yes, but the Blues nonetheless. I love the Blues.
Music is the universal language. You get people from all different backgrounds in a gathering with some good jazz, they all be tapping their feet, smiling at one another, talking sharing with each other. Whatever cultural differences are perceived to matter, kind of disappear and are not of any real importance while enjoying the music. Which brings me to my one idea / concept that I would like to leave with you to ponder:
Let music Speak. It’s a language we all understand. Peace.
– Rev. Bobby
The Reverend Doctor Robert I. Yarbrough is an independent New Thought Minister, trained and steeped in Fillmorian Theology. He is a writer, author, lecturer, workshop / seminar facilitator and former television host, of “Eating From The Tree Of Life” in Chicago. His extraordinary Bible skills led him in his two year series on the book of The Revelation, where Rev. Bobby shared the secrets recorded in the most loving book in the Bible with others. His unique presentation style places audiences at ease which is always conducive for them to come away with some spiritual meat that they can immediately apply to their lives. In his newest book, 28 Days A Journey Within, Rev. Bobby establishes the bridge necessary for those ready to breakthrough and move all of their desires into manifest reality. Reverend Bobby is also a board member of the X-Tend-A-Hand Ministry in Chicago. He handles all pastoral care duties and functions as the non-profit expert as he incorporated the ministry and developed the 501 (c) (3) package. Rev. Bobby also fields, initiates and handles all communication between X-Tend-A-Hand and the government agencies that have oversight responsibilities for non profit organizations