Musical Interview: Phil Edge

For this blog, I decided to interview my grandfather, Phil Edge. He was born in 1946 in Greenville, South Carolina. He likes to say he’s an only child because that’s how he grew up but he does have one brother (who is 12 years older than him). He has been married three times and has one child and one grand child. He has held many jobs throughout the years but spent most of his time as a pastor in the Christian Church.

Q: What is your earliest memory of music?

“I suppose radio.” When he was growing up there were only a few ways to listen to music. You had music on the radio, live music, and phonograph music.

Q: How did you listen to music when you were younger?

“Well, I used my ears.” Honestly, he is one of the funniest people that I know. He has a lot of dry humor and ‘dad jokes’ that I’ve come to love and I think that helped to shape his musical tastes. “Radio was the only thing there was back then. Radio and TV. And Phonographs. We had a fairly large device that was a radio and record player combination. It was a piece of furniture, stand alone piece of furniture in the living room.” He had lots of music he was able to listen to in a couple of different ways. He had the radio which played more recent hits back in his time and he had records of music before his time and some more current for him.

Q: How did listening to music change for you as you got older?

“Well, technology changed the way you listened to music with the advent of different sources of devices for playing records. Then tapes came along. Then A-tracks and cassettes and then CDs were after that.” It became more accessible for him to listen to music and have his own sets of music that he liked. He had lots of different ways to listen and experience music.

Q: Did your parents/siblings/spouse/family influence the music you listened to?

“No, I don’t ever remember hearing my dad sing anything. My mom had a good singing voice but she sang rarely, only at church. I had a brother, but he was older than I was and didn’t live at home when I was growing up. He had already gone on to other things.” I think even without him thinking about it, family did influence his musical tastes. Think about it, when you’re growing up and your dad puts on a CD of Frank Sinatra and you find that you really like the sounds you’re hearing (which is the story of how I came to love Sinatra) then you start to listen to more of that music. Whatever music he listened to on the radio or on records as he was growing up in his household was probably influenced by his parents.

Q: What music did you grow up with?

“The best music ever. Music when I was growing up is what’s known now as music of the forties or ‘oldies’ but good music at the time and people from my generation still believe that it was the best music ever created.” I will admit that listening to some of my dad’s favorite songs make me think that he is correct in saying that it was the best music ever created. There’s just so many wonderful tunes that you can go around bopping to. Honestly, I love putting on his music and watching the way his face lights up when he hears it.

Q: Do you have any favorite artists?

“Yeah, Elvis was one of the tops ones. Several groups: The Everly Brothers and numerous other ones.” Mostly everyone knows who Elvis is. He’s one of the most famous artists there has ever been (in my book).

Surprisingly when I held this interview, I had never heard my granddad talk about the Everly Brothers so I had to do some research. They are an American Country-influenced rock and roll duo. I’ve attached a video of their top 10 best songs which I find to be really nice to listen to!

Q: Is there any music you hated?

“Did not like country music at all. It was prevalent in the south and was not one of my favorites. It just didn’t appeal to me.” I found this fact surprising. I knew when I was growing up that he didn’t listen to a lot of country music but he would sing along with Mom and I in the car when a song he knew came on. Considering that now we travel in the car with either Talk radio on or country, I was really surprised he said he didn’t like Country music at all when he was younger.

Q: What music was considered scandalous when you were growing up?

“I don’t know of any. Today it’s different, but there was no music that was considered inflammatory. It was just music designed to be danced by or sung by the listeners.”

Q: Did your parents have disagreements on what you should listen to?

“No. I don’t ever recall that taking place.” When I was growing up there was heavy emphasis that I should not listen to rap music or hip hop because it was unpleasant. Now I listen to some that I find to have good meanings but my parents and I always had a disagreement about it. I find it kind of funny he didn’t experience that growing up.

Q: Did you listen to the same music your parents did?

“No the music they liked was music of their generation and era. Music that was popular during World War II.”

Q: Do you have any special songs from your marriage or other major life events?

“Yes, several. Music has a special relevance to me. It has a special way of transporting me back to the time or place that I listened to that music when I was younger. That is one of the most meaningful things of music for me.” I relate to this. Music is powerful, it’s able to take you back to a time that you enjoyed. Every time I hear my mom’s favorite song, I’m taken back to a memory of us in the car jamming out to it on our way to pick up Papa. I know of multiple times that Papa has told me about how he came to hear a song that pops up on the ‘oldies’ radio station we listen to.

Q: Did your experience with music when you were younger cause you to want to learn more about music like play instruments or sing.

“I had the opportunity to take piano. I loved hearing it played but I didn’t feel confident that I would learn the piano. Grew up on a mill village. Two blocks from us there was a teacher and everyone learned from him. I never gave in to go. It was one of the things that boys my age weren’t in interested in so that’s one reason plus me thinking that I couldn’t do it. I do regret not going to try and learn it. I definitely think now that I would be able to play it and wish I had taken the chance.” Throughout my life, he has joked that he only knew how to play the radio. I never knew about the chance he had to play piano. I thought I was the only one that had an interest in music in my family, but apparently he had one when he was younger…he just didn’t chase it like I did. Now I can’t stop thinking about what he and I might have been able to accomplish together had he learned piano in the first place.

Q: What types of music do you listen to now?

“Mostly oldies. Some classical music and some religious music. I like really good presentations of religious music done by choirs. In Greer where I grew up, Praise Cathedral has a really good choir. First Baptist has a good choir here in Spartanburg. Also, the Brooklyn Tabernacle choir has some really good music. For classic music, I like Bach and Beethoven. Their piano concertos are some of my favorites.”

I love the big choir sound, so I decided to look up the Brooklyn Tabernacle Choir and found one of the songs that Papa and I always used to include in our praise music when we had our church. As I was listening to it, I was transported back to the first time I’d heard this song. And it was magical. I absolutely love their sound, so I can understand why he does too.

Q: Did your religion influence your musical choices?

“No, not tremendously. I did sing in a church choir at one point in my life in the 60’s. It was enjoyable and we had a pretty good choir for what we were.”

Q: Do you like other religious music other than the big choir type?

“Some of the quartets I listen to. Some are good and some aren’t my favorites. I like some contemporary music though I don’t really know the artists because I don’t listen to it as often. I remember that you like Casting Crowns and I like some of their stuff. I think it was, Who Am I by Casting Crowns that I really liked when you showed it to me.”

Yes, I make Papa listen to contemporary praise songs. I’m not sorry and I’m glad I do.

Q: How much has your musical taste changed over the years in regards to the types of music you listen to, access, and influences?

“Types of music and my favorites have probably not changed. The way I listen to them grows with technology. When I was growing up I only had the radio and record players. Then we started to get cassettes and CDs. I had really good collections of music as technology grew. And now you don’t have to have anything. You can just get it like it’s falling from the sky.”

Q: Do you have a preference on how you like to listen to music?

“I still like the radio. In my car if I’m not listening to talk radio, I’m listening to music. I do listen to some country music even though I said earlier that it wasn’t my favorite. The Hank Williams type wasn’t my favorite, but the Garth Brooks type is pretty good.”

I had to look up some Hank Williams songs after the interview because I didn’t really know who he was…I can say that I agree with my granddad, this is not my favorite country music.

Now, the Garth Brooks type, I definitely like. I grew up listening to Garth Brooks so it’s nice to know that my granddad likes some of the same music I do. I can see why he’d like this better than Hank Williams.

Q: Do you like modern music?

“Some. Some of the music you and your generation likes, to be kind, does not appeal to me. The Rap type music is a complete turn off. If I had to listen to that all the time, I wouldn’t listen to music at all.”

Q: Do you prefer modern music or the music you grew up listening to?

“Still prefer the ‘old standards’ as we call them.

Q: Why do you like music?

“As stated before, music has the ability to transport me from where I am now to where I was when that music was popular. In 1978, I was traveling for an insurance company and I was in Murfreesboro, TN when I first heard Gladys Knight and the Pips sing Midnight Train to Georgia. The song captivated me. Every time I hear it now, I’m transported back to being in my car in that town, looking for my next appointment. It just, it does that. There have been several songs through my romantic relationships that have meant a lot of me and are able to transport me back in time and maybe that person’s not around anymore but it reminds me of a time when they were.”

After this question, I thought about my grandmother who passed away three years ago. There were multiple times a song would come on the radio and I’d see my granddad become a little quiet with a small smile on his face. Now that I think about it, maybe he was remembering a time when he and my grandmother went dancing for a date. I’m happy he has those memories to look back on and that music can help him to go back to a time when he was happier.

Q: What do you think of the music I listen to?

“I believe that is your choice to listen to whatever you would like. I shouldn’t decide what you listen to. Maybe I can influence it so that I don’t have to listen to rap 24/7, but it’s ultimately your choice and your personality. Sure, I like some of it, but the rest, I just let you be you.” That’s honestly a better answer than I was going for. I’m surprised he thought that way about the music I listen to.

Q: Did you ever attend any live concerts?

“Yes. In High School, the popular groups traveled around in buses for concerts. For a $5 ticket, you might get 5 different groups with popular music. The 2 best concerts I went to, one was Ray Charles in Greenville. He performed alone. No other groups there. The best concert I ever went to was in Jacksonville, Florida. I had the opportunity to go see Elvis. He performed for an hour and forty-five minutes without any other groups there. I’ll remember that day for as long as I live. He sang American Trilogy, written by Mickey Newbury. Still hear it often today. There were 15,000 people in the building. I promise you that you could hear a pen drop.”

To say that I’m jealous that my got to see Elvis live would be an understatement. I’m glad he had the experience and was able to see the ‘King’ himself as I would have probably been very disappointed that he lived in the same time period as Elvis but he didn’t go see him.

Q: Did you ever meet a famous musician?

“Sadly, I didn’t get to meet Elvis…I know how cool that would have been for you. My brother had a business partner whose roommate in College was Ronny Dove. Ronny never made it really big, but he had a number of big hits in the 60s and early 70s. Had a chance to meet him and he was just a genuine and down to earth guy. He would come down to watch the Masters in Georgia and would perform at Johnny’s. It was a no charge thing, he was just there to entertain the people and watch the Masters. He was just a genuinely nice guy.”

My granddad has had a lot of interactions with music as he grew up and I’m glad to be able to share what he has experienced with everyone who reads this post. I’m glad to be able to have his influence on my music. It’s interesting to see how different yet similar our musical tastes are with someone of a different generation.