Ethan Parker

The blog has a new music tab and the first of many tunes is here! It’s a rap I made for my friend on his B-day.

All music is copyrighted to me, Ethan Parker unless blatantly stolen from someone else.

Ethan

“Yaggo make me lose my mind; up in here, up in here.
Yaggo make me go all out; up in here, up in here”

These famous lines from a contemporary musician and thinker pose one question: Who is Yaggo? How does he possess such influence as to affect this man’s behavior and grammar?

-Ethan

Could it be Iago?

Matt, Josh, and I decided to do a song as a special musical number for our church today. This is a recording of a practice. This song is called “My Shepherd Will Supply My Need”. It is more well known from a performance from the Mormon Tabernacle Choir.

I’m in a civilization class right now and we’re learning about music, art, and literature from 1500-present. It’s a great class with a true musician for a professor. He’s passionate and a little bizarre like any musician should be. This is one of the pieces we’re studying currently, here’s an Asian guy rocking it out.

I’ma buy a piano and learn this!

Franz Liszt “La Campanella”

Today it was my friend Mary’s birthday. I randomly saw her on campus at the Wilkinson Center so I started singing “Happy Birthday” to her in the hallway. She liked it, but wanted me to rap for her. Odd request? Yes, but she has also witnessed me perform 2 birthday hip-hopanonymous stomp-clap renditions for a good friend and also a good brother. Very sadly, I don’t have those videos. I’ll have to redo them or make more.

So Mary wanted a rap, and I needed a beat. She thought she’d need help stomping and clapping so we recruited one of her friends. This is attempted rhymes on the spot, be kind.

This video was taken by a phone, forgive the sound & picture.

Here’s the picture we used for our ward directory this semester. Time to own it, we are rockers . . . acoustically.

I went to a choir concert Sunday night. It was a community choir that a few of my friends were in. I was surprised at the quality of performance considering they only practice once a week and they’re volunteers. One song, Carol of Joy was my favorite because we sang it when I was in Men’s Chorus.

Men’s Chorus was a big thing for me at the time. It’s an auditioned choir at BYU that practices five times a week for an hour and performs every month for usually two nights in a row. The time commitment was like a part-time job. It was so rewarding, though, because of the stellar attitude of the choir’s director, Rosalind Hall. She knows the power of positive thought and good works. She knows the influence a person can be on another’s life. And her Welsh accent is super sweet.

Sister Hall is definitely one of those people I stand in awe of. She has a command and mental discipline that I respect more than worldly accomplishments or position. Being in her choir was a big deal for me because I had never really sung in a choir before. To prepare for the audition I took a choir class and had my musical prodigy friends coach me. It helped and shockingly I was on the list for basses fall semester of 2007. Men’s Chorus changed my life.

That’s the logo from my sweater.

This is my buddy Dave, he rocks at bass. He’s played with Young Ambassadors, BYU’s Synthesis and here he is with the band at a basketball game.

I was visiting our neighbors next door and in comes Eric, funny phrases a blazin’ and says “come quick! The pizza fell down the well!” He was right. So tragically right. It fell past the oven grates right to the oven floor. Here’s a pic of the damage. Yes, it was still good. Mmmmmm $0.79 pizza…..

Speaking of things being stuck down wells, here’s a piece of Simpsons where Bart pretends to be a kid stuck in the well. Celebrity Krusty gathers famous people to sing for the imaginary kid in the well. Kinda funny how it takes a post as long as this just to explain one of our inside jokes.

Now that you’ve enjoyed that, you can see what the Simpsons was parodying. Yes, Michael Jackson’s trusted and true “We are the World” thingy with lots of celebrities most American youth wouldn’t recognize:

Oh Kenny Rogers, you are one silly former chicken maker.

If you haven’t heard that name yet, you’ve missed out on one of the world’s truly great people right here in Provo. Today is her 88th birthday and she’s as spry as ever and full of songs and jokes. Yesterday I went to visit and take out the news paper recycling and we sat down and talked for a bit. I feel lucky to know her. Here is how we met:

September 13, 2006 my dad and I drove my 1986 VW Jetta from Ventura, CA to Kaysville, UT. It was a gift from my dad’s cousin in Valencia marking the end of my LDS mission. The next day I started classes at BYU. I was still getting used to Provo and had no idea where anything was so I used to drive to class and park in nearby neighborhoods. One rainy day I was headed back to my car when I saw a nice lady walking in the rain with an umbrella. I said “Hi, how are you?” -she looked excited and walked up to me with a reply “Did you say hi, Janie?!?!”. I’m sure I looked a little confused while shaking my head.

I asked her where she was going in that kind of weather and she mentioned that she was headed downtown to pick up some typewriter ribbon. I offered a ride and off we went. I didn’t know they still made typewriter ribbon! She was so kind and honest in the way she spoke.

After we got there she said I didn’t have to wait for her and that I could just go back home. I was going to take her up on the offer, but thought that just wouldn’t be right. Rain, she’s old, I guess my conscience wouldn’t let me. When I was about to drop her off she offered to have me over for dinner that Sunday. I accepted. From then on we had a deal where I would do some yard work or chores around their house and they would feed me. She lives with her sister and brother-in-law and a grand-niece. She also offered to give me two tickets to the Homecoming Spectacular at BYU in a couple weeks. I thought that was cool, and it was if you’ve never been.

That was the beginning of a beautiful friendship. Corny phrase, yes. Janie has made my experience at BYU something totally different and special. I really feel like I am a part of something great because I know Janie and have heard all of her amazing stories about how she started the Young Ambassadors, performed with Tony Bennet, founded Lamanite Generation (now Living Legends), did over 2000 shows in her career and jammed with Glenn Miller overseas in WWII. She also served on the Young Women’s General Board for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints for 16 years.

Janie’s testimony is rock solid, too. She really has helped me stay on the right path since I have been home from my mission. Being accountable to her makes me live at a standard much higher than normal.

Last summe the city of Provo asked Janie to to a musical she wrote about 20 years ago called “We the People” and I got to be in it. It was also part of a documentary BYU recently did on Janie’s life entitled “Performance of Faith” that has been on KBYU a few times. The picture below is of Janie and I last summer. I hope she doesn’t mind (but probably won’t ever see it!) I have embedded a video of a song she performed at the closing banquet for the BYU football team from the 2006 season. It’s just an example of the hundreds if not thousands of great and super cheerful songs she has written over the years. This was a special serenade just for me in her living room, I wasn’t invited to the football thing.

If you’ve ever heard me talk about her or met her, that probably means we are really good friends. Read about her if ya like:

Deseret News

From the Ensign

There are so many songs that have English words and stories. It’s time we honor what someone can learn in 5 minutes from a friend who spent some time in Russia.