About Laurie

My Musical Journey

I was born into a musical family.  My father was my first piano teacher and my mother taught me all the Girl Scout rounds that we would sing in our old VW Bus all the way across Texas to visit my grandparents in Midland.

My first instrument was  a rainbow-colored xylophone.  My dad would take my crayons and draw the colors in a sequence that matched the colors on my xylophone.  I loved the music and songs from the movie, “The Sound of Music”.  I had the vinyl record and listened to it all the time, knew every song backwards and forwards!  I wanted to be just like Maria when I grew up and teach children to sing.

My great-grandmother bought my piano that I still have and play every day.  I was six years old, and my mom said I picked it out at the music store in Bryan, Texas.   Then in 1969, we packed up everything, including my piano and got on a ship and moved to Central America.

In La Ceiba, Honduras I studied with Meta Popanken, a German immigrant who was in her late 80’s at the time.  She lived in a grass-roof hut with a chicken who nested on top of her old upright piano.  That chicken was my first metronome, and the smell of a kerosene lamp always takes me back to those first piano lessons.

After moving back to the United States in 1972, I began my studies with Lee Henrichs who was a close friend of my grandmother and was the choir director at her church.  Mr. Henrichs was very strict and insisted on heavy studies of theory and the classics.  I learned a lot from him, but when reaching my teen years, I needed someone a little more flexible and open to new music and ideas.

I began taking guitar lessons from Les Clark who was one of the musicians at our church.  At my first lesson, he asked me to play a song on the piano… of course I played my best Beethoven.  After that, he asked me about my favorite current bands, artists, etc.  I love James Taylor, Carole King, the Beatles, Cat  Stevens…… and many more.  He asked me to play my favorite song by Carole King… I froze.  “But, I don’t have the sheet music!” to which he replied, “the music isn’t always on the page.”  I learned so much about by playing by ear, transposing, chord families, etc.

At the age of 15, I got my first music teaching job at Sunshine Playhouse in Saginaw, Texas. Every day I took my guitar and sang with the children and realized, “I am Maria from The Sound of Music!”

After serving as music director for two Unitarian churches in Fort Worth, I returned to private teaching in 2006.  I teach piano, guitar, and ukulele.

Music was and is always part of my life with my own children.  I have three, wonderfully talented sons who all share a love of music.  I feel so blessed to be able to share my love of music with so many people and hope I can continue to do so for many more years!