Their days started early and ended late and the breaks were few and far between.
All that rigorous work will be worth it Sunday when they hit the stage with 70 veterans from across the country at the National Veterans Creative Arts Festival Gala Performance in Riverside, Calif.
“We don’t get too much time to do anything but practice,” said Ernest T. Knox in a phone call from California. “You only have that one week to get everything together.”
The festival culminates a year-long fine arts talent competition in art, music, drama, dance and creative writing. The program is open to all veterans who receive care at Department of Veterans Affairs medical facilities. The veterans invited to the festival are all first, second or third place winners, who were selected this year from nearly 3,100 entries and 150 different categories.
Knox is in California with William Davis Jr., Larry Ealy, Marvin Hooper, Dezire Lauture and Carl Smith. The men were members of a choir that won first place with the song “Let it Be” by the Beatles. The group was formed as part of a musical therapy program at the VA hospital.
Hooper and Smith joined Knox on the phone call and the men discussed their musical histories and how they became involved with the musical therapy program.
“I was a heavy drinker in the ’80s,” Knox said. He entered the domiciliary in the late ’80s and eventually found his way into the music therapy department in 1994. Two years later, Knox was invited to the national festival.
The former high school trombonist is now a tenor in the choir and credits his musical activities with helping to “keep me and my mind going.”
Smith described the costume he was wearing that is part of an overview of classic Hollywood characters in the Gala Performance.
“I’m just standing here in a Dracula costume getting ready for rehearsal,” Smith said.
Smith also came to the music therapy program to help deal with substance abuse.
He was able to take his lifelong love for music and “channel my energy into something positive.” This will be his fourth performance at the national festival.
Hooper said he is a former band director with “music in my blood.” He has been performing at the festival for nearly a dozen years now.
“It’s a great trip,” he said. “It’s always nice to get positive feedback from doing something you love.”
Knox also said the musical trip has provided a big boost to his self-esteem.
“If the world was like this for a week, it’d be a wonderful place,” Knox said. “It’s a togetherness that you can’t get anywhere else.”
