It’s been a bit of a marathon since Sunday.

Drove to Chicago Monday evening to pick up Sarah the daughter at O’Hare International. Tuesday I had to get my Mom to two doctor appointments. In the evening I had a rehearsal with church instrumentalists. Yesterday we ended up in Grand Rapids so my Mom could pick out new glasses at Pearl Vision (Google was wrong. There is no Pearl Vision at the mall in Holland.) I took along work for church and found myself sitting outside Pearl Vision in the mall with anthems spread all over the floor. Also somewhere in there I put an anthem into Finale so I could transpose it down for easier singing.

This morning I got up and worked on the bulletin article for this Sunday. I got stuck on the origin of the African American Spiritual “Do Lord, Remember Me.”

Researching this, I found out that there seems to have been a multi-generational family of black musicians named John Work.

It intrigued me and distracted me from my task. At least two of the men taught at the reknowned Fisk University and were associated with the Fisk Jubilee Singers.

One of them was dismissed at Fisk because he was too interested in “Negro Folk Music.” I would be fascinated to find out more about this musical family.