What are some of your first memories of music , dance and song?

[landshark]

My sister kissing the TV set and girls fainting in the crowd when the Beatles were on the Ed Sullivan Show... 

[BluegrassDustin]

listening to my dad and uncles play music on the porch of somebody's house.

Everyone singing and pickin'...

[Auntie Hope]

Singing at church.

Nanny playing piano.

Aunt Joy playing guitar.

PawPaw playing Uke along with Bill Monroe and the Kentucky Bluegrass Boys, Flat & Scruggs and Ralph Stanley.

Grandma's classic 30's & 40's music on the radio.

Grandpa Tom's original recording of Madam Butterfly.

H & R Puff 'n Stuff on Saturday mornings. 

And of course, Mama rewinding Johnny Cash to make him go down in that "Ring of Fire" again, and again, and again, and again. (gosh, not again!) 

Auntie Hope

[apollo]

Singing to Mitch Miller sing-a-long records 

My mom loved those.

 Listening to: Canadian Sunset - Illinois Jacquet

[bouzouki]

MY FIRST TWO FAVORITE SONGS  Rhapsody in Blue         Yellow Rose of Texas

[TellurideTom]

Hearing my dad play the sax.
He had a big band back in the Dorsey Brother's days.
That's why I picked up playing the sax in grade school.

[Maineahhh]

was that before or after your champion swimmer days . . . . 

Mine is my mom n' dad playing dylan and neil till all ours of the evening . . . then coming upstairs and singing 'roadhouse blues' til we fell asleep . . . ahhhh twas such a dysfunctional yet beautiful childhood experience . . .

[TellurideTom]

was that before or after your champion swimmer days . . . . 

Mine is my mom n' dad playing dylan and neil till all ours of the evening . . . then coming upstairs and singing 'roadhouse blues' til we fell asleep . . . ahhhh twas such a dysfunctional yet beautiful childhood experience . . .

Before... and yes I was a champion swimmer in my youth.
I've got ribbons for first place and second place at YMCA swim meets.

[dayton]

i gotta agree with telluride tom and bluegrass dustin on this one...
hearing my dad play music when i was younger outisde on the porch with his friends during the summer in house i was born in was probably my first memories of music and song... i remember playing with my ghosbusters projector gun and shining the ghosts on the side of our house and telling everyone about nocturnal animals...
i was a weird kid

the first memories of dance was at smilefest later in life...

[Hippie]

My Dad singin Ole Man river with my aunt on piano at a family thanksgiving dinner.
How hard it was to blow a cornet and make a beautiful tone in the third grade.
The thrill of the cherub choir singing on Christmas eve in the main chapel.
My armpits sweating during my first performance on the stage in Phoenix gradeschool, it was a trumpet solo, that was about 1963.
The thrill that my male body had the best gran plie in a required dance class in college (my class mates were all girls) .
--- ---- ---- ---- ----
Playing Rocky Mt high on trumpet in the tiki lounge at 3am and realizing that I nailed it after not blowing a horn for three years.   

No one threw a shoe at me either 

[Debbiefromtucson]

My Dad would play/or sing Hank Williams to me so I would go sleep.. I especially remember "Hey, Good Looking".

Also, he was a paperboy in his youth and sold newspapers somewhere outside Ryman suditorium and he would tell me stories about the "Opry"

My first concert was Johnny Cash at Madsion Square Garden ( 1969??) w/ my parents because my Dad was a fan.. I wish I would have know then WHAT a special concert that was

Listening to Cousin Brucie on radio in NY

Staying up late on Friday nights and watching the "Midnight Special"

[bouzouki]

My family would sing in the car on long trips.  I knew all the songs on early Kingston Trio records.  We sang folk songs in music class in grade school.  After I was a reborn Heathen, Pagan, problem child to my peers, I remember some amazing moments where I HEARD music for the first time, and the next first time, and the next...TBF!  Does it count if it is just now?

 Listening to: #18 Throw down your heart Bela

[mark2010]

Sitting on the Banks of the Tyne in the late 60's wondering when Otis Redding had visited Tyneside.

[Hooch]

My mom playing an 8-Track tape of Debbie Boone.  It's amazing I still like music.

[Flagstaff Jess]

My father is from eastern Tennessee, left home at 17 and joined the Army.  He was stationed in Germany where he met my mother.  I was born there in 1965.  We lived in Germany until I was in elementary school.  When we moved to the states we stopped in Tennessee for a family reunion.  They were all meeting my mother, me and my brother for the first time.  Even though we were my dad's kids were about as "un-southern" as we could be and Dad never talked about his family.  So they were all strangers.

I remember being in a large park with huge trees.  There was a group of people under a tree playing music.  It was like something I had never heard before.  I remember just lurking around listening.  At one point this tall man - probably 6'4" set a guitar down against a tree.  When no one was looking I went over to check it out.  I was just about to touch it when the big guy came back and said, "Girl you know how to pick that thing?"  In total terror I sprinted over to my mother.  That was the end of that.

Five years ago at the urging of my friend Joe Cox from Fishbone I went to my first bluegrass festival.....Telluride.  I pulled up late Wednesday to the Fishbone camp.  Joe met me on the street we hugged, and then he took me into the tarp majal and there for the first time since I was that dumb little German kid I heard that music again.  My parents never played bluegrass or mountain music when I was growing up.  It was just pop radio.  I will never forget how I felt that night hearing bluegrass again - it was like I knew it on a cellular level.  I remember telling Joe I have to learn to play this music.  Have to.  It was never going to be enough to just listen.

Been a junky ever since.