inside Rhodes

This week’s journey took us to North and South Carolina where we played a church service and two concerts. For our trip, we stayed with Nicole’s parents in Kannapolis, NC. Having stayed with them before, the hospitality that we found there was no surprise to me! On behalf of the entire group, we want to thank Mr. and Mrs. Baker for being amazing hosts for our travels. Thanks for all the great stories, good laughs, wonderful food, and for your overall kindness. We definitely could not have had a successful tour without your help.

Our first performance in Kannapolis was in the church that Mr. Baker pastors, Bethpage Presbyterian. We played the special music for both services and had a great time taking part in worship with the members of the congregation. Our first “heart warming moment” happened after our second performance at Bethpage. A member of the church approached us after the service and told us how much our music meant to her. She held each of our hands as if she didn’t want to let go. Although simple, it was an uplifting reminder of why we chose to take our music on the road to share with others.

As we pulled up to the church for the first time, we all got really excited about what we saw on the marquee…

Our name was up in lights! The actual evening concert at Bethpage was not until Wednesday night. Our first concert was on Sunday night at Grace Presbyterian Church in South Carolina. When we arrived, we were all amazed at the level of advertisement that was up for our concert. At every corner we turned at Grace Presbyterian, there were our faces! We played for an audience of 35-40 people who really seemed to enjoy the music. The concert went very well and was well received by the audience. There were some balance issues with the piano at times, but this challenge gave us another goal to achieve in our upcoming performances. After the concert, we stuck around and talked to a few members of the audience about the performance. I think we have all come to agree that this is the best part; hearing how our passion for music makes others happy gives us the energy, strength, and motivation to keep doing it. The picture of us below is right before our concert in South Carolina.

We didn’t just perform and practice all week, though. We had lots of fun in the Kannapolis area as well. We made sure to stop by the Dale Earnhardt Memorial Statue in the heart of Kannapolis. We played a few games of bowling (Laura wiped the floor with Nicole and me). We watched the original Star Wars trilogy (I had never seen it). We played a round of putt-putt golf at this cool course that is half under ground. We went to the skating rink and made fools of ourselves (see the video below). But…the highlight of our off time was our trip to Carowinds. Carowinds is a big amusement park on the border of North and South Carolina. We rode the roller coasters from the time they opened in the morning until about an hour before the park closed. We went on a Tuesday, before school was out for the summer in the area. Weekday + school= NO LINES! We rode some of our favorite coasters 5 or 6 times before the day was over. The best part of the Carowinds trip, however, was our “celebrity sighting”. After we got off of one of the coasters, a lady stopped us and starting giving us hand shakes and hugs. We had absolutely no idea who this was until she said, “I loved your music the other night. I was at the concert at Grace Presbyterian!” We all felt like celebrities!

Wednesday night was our final performance in Kannapolis. We performed an evening concert for our host church, Bethpage Presbyterian. The concert was well attended: we put out 50 or so seats and they were close to being filled. This is due, in no small part, to the fabulous advertising by the Bakers! At one point during the week, we walked into a Starbucks and saw the poster advertising our concert attached to the bulletin board! After our performance, we spent almost an hour at the reception chatting with the audience. It felt great, once again, to hear how our performance made others happy. Every time we shook a hand or received a hug, someone told us how much they enjoyed listening to the concert. I think I speak for all of us when I say that the open hearts of the audience made us extremely happy to have gotten the opportunity to share our passion with the community. The performance had its share of bumps and bruises, but the concert went very well overall. A few things about the concert stuck out that I want to quickly share.

An audience member approached us at both the intermission and after the concert to tell us how much he appreciated our passion for music. His encouragement will never be forgotten and will be used to encourage ourselves along whatever path our music leads us. A group of audience members that knew Nicole and her family personally made a special 2-hour trip to be at the concert. This was a very special token of appreciation to us and made the concert even more special. Other audience members offered the simplest compliments that meant the world to us: hearing someone confess that they had chills during a piece of music is one of the greatest compliments a musician can receive. We loved hearing all of the stories from the community members who came out to listen on Wednesday night. It was a very special concert that left us in a comfortable state of mind. All of the concerts throughout this tour have shown us just how powerful music can be.

Once again, we want to thank all the churches in North and South Carolina for their hospitality and open hearts. Also, another big thank you needs to go out to the CODA program at Rhodes College. Without your generous support, none of this could have been possible. Next week we will be in Oklahoma City for a worship service and concert, then we will finish our tour next Sunday in Tennessee. Stay tuned for more updates!