AMY GRANT CONCERT
This was written October 27th, 2011 after Lorraine and I went to the concert.
Ok, I’m finally awake enough to report on the AMY GRANT/ MICHAEL W. SMITH “FRIENDS” Concert.
I asked Lorraine several weeks ago if she wanted to go, since she has loved Amy Grant since she was a kid. She said “let me think about it”, which I thought was an odd answer. Then I figured it out. With this stupid brain cancer, she is losing teeth. Then two of her front ones broke off, and it turns out she was embarrassed about it. We decided to have oral surgery and have them replaced, and when that decision was made, she brought up the concert and wanted to go. She just didn’t want to be seen with missing teeth!
As things turn out, several things came up which kept delaying the dental work, and she was having the surgery the day before. Meanwhile I purchase the tickets (4th row - if she had told me when I first asked, as a fan club member, we cd have bought advance tickets and gotten in 1st row, but whatever.) As a FOA (Friends of Amy, the fan club) she gets to go in afternoon for the soundcheck and see Amy warming up - they sent me an email saying “get there early”. So we go to the oral surgeon, he takes out the roots, and tries to place the partial - it won’t fit! They call the dentist and make an appt for the next afternoon at 2pm - now I’m worried sick she won’t be able to make it to the sound check!
So while waiting at dentist, Annette, Lorraine’s Hospice nurse, calls me on my cell to tell me that she got in touch with I don’t know who exactly, but that the concert people were giving Lorraine backstage passes, to be there an hour early, and don’t worry about bringing a camera, they will have a professional photographer take pictures! I can’t believe it! So the dentist fixes the teeth thingy in plenty of time for us to get to soundcheck. While we wait, Lorraine makes friends with everyone there and shows them the 11x 14 pic blowup of Lorraine with Amy Grant I took 23 years ago when All Childrens Hosp. got her a backstage pass.
There were only a dozen people at the soundcheck, and they were seated in the front row. We were just outside the front row b/c of the w/c. After the soundcheck, she came down off the stage and greeted each person/couple/whatever personally, had someone use their camera to take a pic w/her, and signed autographs. When we finally got there, she spent a good ten minutes talking with Lorraine and I (mostly Lorraine). Lorraine showed her the picture, she loved it, and they talked about it, and then she signed it (on the part of Lorraine’s arm) “To Lorraine, God Bless you, love to my little sister, Amy Grant.”
I wish I could remember everything that she said, but they talked about Lorraine’s illness, at one point she told Amy she wished she could see her and Amy choked up a little and said at least we can hear each other. They exchanged several hugs. I told Amy I heard her Mom died recently and that I was sorry, and she looked up at me with these huge eyes and really seemed to appreciate it. She told me she felt her Mom with her more now than before when she was on the road. I also told her that I loved her song “Come into my World” and played it just about every day (which she wrote several years ago about her own life at the time) and that it described MY life. I said I also said I felt the same way about Vince Gill’s (country singer/songwriter/her husband) song “Go Rest High Up on that Mountain”.
After we left, we rushed home to clean up, make/eat dinner, change and go back (thank God the theatre is just outside our subdivision) since we had to be there an hour early for the backstage pass thing. Since we just had a name and a place to go, no actual physical pass, I had a hard time convincing the people at the Hall that we were actually supposed to be there. A group of people waiting to go in who had actual passes said they would sneak Lorraine in with them if I couldn’t convince the people that she was to go. (By this time, the now autographed picture had made more rounds and Lorraine now had her own little fan club.)
Finally, someone found and checked with the person in charge, and they let us in. There were about 50-100 people there lined up on both sides of a long hallway, and Amy and Smitty (Michael W. Smith - we’re pals now) were going up and down the line saying hello and giving a little something of themselves to each person. The person in charge took us into a PRIVATE “THE GREEN” room, and said Amy and Smitty would come in to see us PRIVATELY. Whooooo!! Did we feel important! Smitty came in and you could not have met a nicer person. Who got down on his knees and spoke with Lorraine, asking questions, offering prayers for her, wanting to know the whole situation, etc. He had the professional photogs come in and took a bunch of pics. (I never thought to ask how we would get to see them.) All i could think of saying (both semi-fauxpas) was that my nephew Matti sang backup for him in VA last Christmas (he was one of a hundred) and Smitty politely said he couldn’t place him, and then I said that I loved his song “Friends” and always email a copy to any friends of mine who are moving. He said something like, “OOOOhhhhh I have to sing that song every day for the rest of my life.” It’s his most popular song, and it would be like Mick Jagger not doing “Satisfaction” in a concert.
(What was funny at end of concert, was that for the encore, Amy and Smitty came out and he played like three notes on the keyboard and the crowd went wild...he said “what, what?” like he didn’t know what they were cheering for, and then they sang it together. What was even funnier, that, with this inside knowledge I had, I understood why Amy kept patting him on the back consolingly and trying not to laugh during the song.
Ok, then Amy comes in the green room and of course recognizes us. It’s getting late and she hasn’t even gotten dressed yet, so I told her she didn’t have to stay, we had gotten a lot of her time earlier. I did tell her about the “Baby, baby” song she wrote and recorded and was very popular and how I emailed it to niece Christine when she was in India going through the arduous adoption process of their new daughter, a 12 year old orphan with some physical disabilities, whose name is “Baby.” When they got the email, they started playing it for her then singing it to her (she did not know much English at all) and continued to sing it to her all the time, and when they got home, the whole family did, and now niece Karen tells me Baby sings it to everyone else, eg, “Michael, Michael”, Rachael, Rachael”, etc. Amy cracked up over that and said they must be some great family. She seemed appreciative of the story and the fact that we didn’t try to keep her, but yet still very affectionate with Lorraine. More hugs.
So now we come out of the green room like we’re hot stuff and are shown to our seats (4th row, close to center.) There were a lot of lights shining on us so I know Amy and Smitty saw us, esp. in the place we were sitting which had a large empty spot in front of our seats, or rather my seat, and the place for Lorraine’s wheelchair. They looked at smiled at us several times. When Amy sang “Thy Word”, she invited everyone to sing along b/c everyone loves that song, and a lot of people stood and waved their arms and sang, and Lorraine even stood up and sang along! I posted a video of that. Also posted part of Amy singing “Baby, Baby” for Baby. Then, to my absolute shock, Amy told a little story about a song she was going to sing, and how someone told her she really needed to hear that, and then said, ta da.....”Mary asked me to sing this so this is for her.” ME, MARY, ME! She didn’t look my way at all during the song and you could tell she had tears in her eyes and had a hard time not choking up. It was unbelievable. I of course was sobbing. (Will post song from youtube b/c couldn’t find camera when rushing out of house and was low on iphone battery.) I’ll post all songs I mentioned, what the hay. After the concert, several of the people who were at soundcheck and were sitting around listening to Amy talk to us remembered my telling her about song, and ran over and carried on about how unbelievable that Amy sang that song for me. I didn’t know she was going to sing it, so I wouldn’t have gotten it recorded anyway.
When Amy was done with her set, Smitty did his.
Smitty is so emotional - his music is more rock than pop, and he had a large group who just went nuts when he was out stomping and carrying on. He really is very good, writes beautiful stuff, and cried several times during emotional songs. Not in a sissy way, but just raw emotion. He wrote a song about his oldest daughter leaving home for college, and had a hard time getting through the story and the song.
After the concert, a lot of people came up to Lorraine and promised to pray for her, admired her picture, etc. One lady had a picture Amy autographed for her but wanted Lorraine to have it. Just unbelievable.
Thank you all of you to whom I requested prayers that this would work out. Work out it did. An hour and a half for soundcheck, and five hours for backstage and concert (6:30-11:30.) This is after the dentist. I had to lug that w/c which ways a ton, in and out of the van so many times, and the Concert hall (Ruth Eckerd) is so hilly, I am still physically exhausted, plus the emotional stress and highs.
Even though she is now blind, she is still able to have a good time. She did say she wish she could have seen it, but I know she experienced it and haven’t her seen her smile so much since her birthday in July.
I am so sorry to hear of Lorraine's passing. I have always kept her in my prayers over the years. I know she was a wonderful person and she is now no longer suffering. May she always live in our hearts with the grace, strength and beauty she showed all of us.
Posted by: Tison Vega - Tampa, FL - Childhood Classmate/Friend Dec 26, 2011
Lorraine and Tison went to Christ the King School in Tampa together from K-3rd grade. They received their First Holy Communion on the same day. I don’t believe they have seen each other since they were eight years old, which makes his remarks so special.
The first thought that comes to me when I think of Lorraine is a beautiful sweet smiling face. As I observer her in my mind, I first see a girl, with the spiritual strength of a holy woman, as she is burdened by Illness and disability. I see her disability hindering her body but strenthening her spiritual life and holiness. Then I see her in her pain reaching out to others and loving them, accepting them with their faults and disabilities giving them unconditional love.
