Date: Jul 11 1999 08:23:28 EDT From: "Songs of Praise" Subject: Songs of Praise - Prison Concerts Good Lord's Day everyone, It is early on Sunday morning and I couldn't sleep. We got home last night from our prison concert weekend. Several people on the mailing list asked to hear about this afterwards. This is a report of what happened. Our group was composed of Larry Holder on acoustic guitar and vocals. I also played acoustic guitar and sang. My mother, Patsy Stevens played the keyboard and my step-father, Murray Stevens sang. On Friday evening from 6:00 to 8:00 pm we gave a concert in the Valley Unit in Gatesville Texas. The Valley Unit is intended for women who are slightly mentally retarded, but also is a haven for very gentle women who may not do as well in the regular units. There was a chapel that would have seated us all, but the warden was expecting a larger crowd and put us in the gymnasium. There was only one word for the situation... Hot! We set up our equipment and worked to get the acoustics to an acceptable level. Larry's mother and father drove down from Oklahoma to hear us and Mrs. Holder was very helpful in getting the sound balanced so that the songs could be understood. Approximately 50 women arrived promptly at 6:00 pm. We had selected 15 songs and had prepared handouts with the lyrics so everyone could sing along. The ladies were a little quiet at first, but slowly opened up and sang. We had also prepared to sing "All Of My Heart" in Spanish and there were 4 Spanish speaking ladies in the audience. We finished the song list with about 15 minutes to spare and took requests to fill out the remainder of the time. They sang much louder on the requests. Chaplain Marie accompanied us on the first concert. She is the lead chaplain in this cluster of units. We learned later that she has a policy where if one unit gets a program, all the units must get a similar program. After the Valley concert we went to the local steak house for dinner. We met one of the other church singing groups there. On Friday night Larry and I stayed at Chaplain Bartholf's home. He is the one who started us doing prison concerts almost 3 years ago. The rest of our group stayed in the local motel. On Saturday morning we got up very early and drove to the Terrace Unit. Again they put us in a gymnasium. Fortunately it was cool in the morning. About 45 women showed up for this concert. They were more animated than the ladies in the Valley Unit and sang very well. The first 2 groups really enjoyed "I Lay It Down" and "The Ballad Of The Cross" and requested we sing these and several other songs. They have a small choir at the Terrace Unit so I left them a songbook. So far, so good. We still had our voices. Chaplain Alexander came in during the second concert. Afterwards he took us to the officers cafeteria where we ate lunch. I have eaten prison food before, and this was a little better than average. Chaplain Alexander is a retired soldier and told us stories about his experiences in Viet Nam. After lunch we moved over to the Riverside Unit. All of these units are within 2-3 miles of each other. Finally we got to play in a chapel... with air conditioning! It was quite large and could seat about 140. We set up our equipment and adjusted the amplifier for the different acoustics. Only 12 women showed up for this concert, but they were very happy to be there and sang loudly. We never did find out what happened to the others. Maybe there was some other activity scheduled for the same time. After the third concert, one of the ladies stayed around to help us load the equipment. She also wanted to tell us about her testimony for Jesus. She has an incredible story to tell. I will give you just the basic events she conveyed. She wants to send the entire story to be posted on the web site later. It seems that about 10 years ago she was living in Dallas and making her living as a prostitute. There was a murderer preying on prostitutes at that time. He had already tortured and killed 4-5 women and had not been caught. He picked her up and her ordeal began. He eventually knocked out all of her teeth and was ready to kill her, but somehow when he tried to cut her throat, she pushed him and he cut her abdomen open instead. She escaped, naked onto the streets and was picked up by a cab driver who took her to the hospital. The doctors were able to save her life, but Jesus had not yet saved her soul. When she got out, she went back to her old ways and was eventually arrested. She met the Lord in prison and wants to tell the world her story. If everything works out I will post the entire story in her own words later. This is what I can remember. The ladies in all 3 units requested that we send them a tape of us singing the songs. We are going to try to make one this afternoon before Larry goes back to Tennessee. If it turns out well, I will also turn it into a CD that will be available to everyone. In other news, I added a midi of Lenny Smith's "Our God Reigns" to my site about 2 weeks ago. Many thanks to Lenny for allowing us to share this famous song. Larry, Lenny and I are also working on a new song called "Come To The Table" which will hopefully be completed soon. Thank you for all the encouraging emails. God bless you all. Yours in Christ, Elton Smith http://songsofpraise.org