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Marji Hazen
Marji Hazen, a.k.a. "Granny Emm", prefers making live music to "sitting around the radio keeping quiet." She has made - and continues to make - plenty of it. Here is her story.
"I spent my Great Depression childhood in a little village where most people still made their own music together which was a lot more fun than sitting around the radio keeping quiet while Baby Snooks got all the attention. This was the time when the schools still used those lovely 18th and 19th Century popular songs in the music program- Robert Burns, Thomas Moore, Henry C. Work, and all those Victorian Ladies. Though I had piano lessons from age six on an upright grand bought from Grandpa, I was not a very inspired pianist and the only family member who seemed to like my music was the dog. I was legally blind and could never read printed music fast enough to develop any real technique.
My second instrument was a great big heavy white accordion that the music store owner and accordion band director demanded I choose instead of the nice little old 48 bass that I could have had for free. It could play the jazz and big band dance music my family liked. On the side I was learning to chord on a short-neck tenor banjo somebody had given me. I was still working days at Kresge's dime store, playing Autoharp and singing in harmony with my friend Lois evenings and weekends.
During college I acquired an antique Washburn guitar and a lap dulcimer to go along with the little banjo. I started writing songs, and got my own radio show. Marji's Ballad Book, a weekly live folk and traditional music program, began broadcasting on the college station in 1961 and continued through 1989 on whichever commercial or PBS station was willing to host it on sustaining (free) wherever I lived. I realized the music biz wasn't going to be an option because of the travel problem. So I took a teaching job, then became a radio advertising copywriter, moonlighted as a ghost writer, took a Master's degree and became a teacher again, and last, became a builder of instructional programs for the computer. I retired in 1991 as a CAI computer programmer with half a PhD in Instructional Design.
For a number of years I published a list of songs I knew to be in the public domain, presented public domain music workshops at music festivals, and helped set up public domain venues for small businesses that couldn't afford the escalating price of a music license. I've since passed that project on to a younger, more energetic person. Lynn has grown the project to be what I envisioned and more. It's still alive and well at http://www.pdinfo.com/
I organized a group of musicians featuring any number of folks instruments which has ebbed and flowed over the years, and followed me across the state somewhat. "Friends In D" did a few unforgettable gigs, but mostly just enjoyed playing together every week, for a time thinking about music instead of the rheumatiz and other elder plagues.
My current musical projects include notating the approximately 150 songs I've written over a lifetime, the public domain music I've arranged for dulcimers and their friends, and some good old hymns I've arranged for preludes and postludes for church. Getting the music written down is a lot easier and faster with Notation Composer combined with Creative's Prodikeys PC-MIDI computer keyboard. Notation Composer does what I need done, smooth as glass, and without a glitch. And that's the best compliment there is for a piece of software.
To read all of Marji's rich musical story and see some great pictures, click here.
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