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AT THE TALENT SHOW / Phyllis Barber Act I. The Soloists WHEN I WAS NINE YEARS OLD, the Bishop of the Boulder City Ward, who happened to be my father, asked me to be the accompanist for Primary where Mormon chUdren met on Wednesday afternoons to sing such things as "The Handcart Song," about pioneers who walked across the plains singing "Some must push and some must puU." "It's time to share the talent God gave you," my father said. I said yes. I went to work and, of course, I thought I sounded good. The teachers in Primary told me so; at the time I didn't understand how adults manipulated chUdren, praising anything that wasn't total disaster. Week after week, I Ustened for word filtering through the ward at large, hoping to hear about the new virtuoso rising up from under the desert sand, bubbling Uke a spring into the ward consciousness. One Sunday afternoon at sacrament meeting, my father, in his position as Bishop, made an announcement: "Two weeks from this Friday night, we're having a ward talent show. Dust off your banjos and ukeleles, warm up your vocal chords, mend that costume at the back of your closet. This is for the whole ward, not just for the few pros we love, but always hear from." During the week, the verification Td been waiting for came. I received three phone caUs. "Hello, dear. This is Sister Floyd. I've heard you're a fine Uttle pianist. Could you accompany me for the talent show? Td Uke to sing again." Sister Floyd had six chUdren who never sat still at church. The youngest threw themselves onto the floor in tantrums when they couldn't drink every cup in the sacrament tray. They grabbed handfuls of bread when they were only supposed to take one piece of the Savior's flesh. Sister Floyd was the woman I studied after my father told me about sex during a Sunday afternoon dinner when I asked the question he couldn't avoid answering. "She does that?" I asked myself later at sacrament meeting when I saw her with a baby on her lap. "Him too?" Her husband seemed so much smaUer than she was. Second phone caU: "HeUo. This is Brother Frost. I come out to 134 · The Missouri Review the ward once in a whUe. Maybe you remember me, maybe not. I used to play trumpet in a combo. Do you think we could practice together for this talent show?" I remembered Brother Frost. He didn't come to church much, and Td heard whispers about how he was a Jack Mormon and how he'd faUen. He scared me, a shadow at the edge of the ward activities while Td been taught to hold my candle high and bright and in the middle of things. He looked Uke a frost giant— a tower of a man with blonde wavy hair, a red-veined nose, and midnight blue eyes with snowflake spokes around his irises. But Td been given my talent by God, my parents reminded me often. It wasn't mine to hoard, and I should be generous with it, Uke Jesus holding out his hands to the lame and the diseased. "Td be happy to play for you," I said. Brother Higginson sounded Uke Methuselah when he caUed. "It's time to get my violin out. Polish up something for the show." He'd been retired from the railroad for twenty years and Uved with his son, the town barber. I was flattered. Nine years old, and three adults called me to accompany them. I was surprised they hadn't called Sister Doyle, the ward chorister, organist, choir director, and aU around leader of music. Brother Higginson started our first rehearsal by sinking into the big cushions on our sofa and telUng me about his raUroad days in Washington state—how he used to tend coal and clean cows off catchers. He unlatched his worn case that was more cardboard than cover, put the vioUn under his chin and began tuning the strings. "Give me an A," he kept saying, as though I hadn't heard...

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