Ballad Of Obadi Frye

’Twas a battered old, double-B, twisted bass horn,

With a yaw in the flare at its end;

A left-over veteran, relic forlorn Of the halcyon days when a band had been born

To the village of Buckleby Bend.

The band was dismembered by time and by death

As the years went a-scurrying by,

And only one player was left with his breath

And that was old Obadi’ I.

P. Frye.

Old Obadi’ Isaac Pitt Frye.

With a glow in his eye

He would plaintively try

To puff out the tune that they marched to at training;

But the tremolo drone

Of the brassy old tone

Quavered queerly enough with his scant breath remaining.

Ah, the years had been many and bent was his back,

And caved was his chest and departed his knack;

So, though he was filled with musicianly pride

And huffed at the mouthpiece and earnestly tried

To steady his palsied old lip and control

The old-fashioned harmonies stirring his soul--

There was nothing in Buckleby quite so for- lorn

As the oomp-tooty-oomp of that old bass horn.

To the parties and sociables, quiltings and sings They invited old Obadi’ Frye;

He’d give ’em doldrums of old-fashioned things

With occasional bass obligato for strings --Or at least he would zealously try.

The minister coaxed him to buy a cornet And chirk up a bit in his tune,

But none could induce him to ever forget His love for that old bassoon,

Whose tune

Was the solace of life’s afternoon.

So he’d splutter and moan With his thin, gusty tone But his empty old lungs balked his anxious en- deavor.

He hadn’t the starch For a jig or a march,

And with double-F volume he’d parted forever. For he hadn’t the breath for a triple note run, ’Twas a whoof and a pouf! and alas, he was done;

But the pride of his heart was that old double- bass,

He was happy alone with its lips at his face.

So he sat in his old leather chair day by day And whooped the one solo he’d power to play,

An anthem entitled, “All Hail Christmas Morn,”

As rendered by gulps on an old bass horn.

“All hail--hoomp--hoomp--bright Christmas morn,

Hail--hoomp, hoomp--hoomp--fair

hoomp--hoomp--dawn; Turn--hoomp--hoomp, eyes

Hoomp--hoomp,

HOOMP--skies,

When--hoomp--hoomp,

hoomp--H O O M P--born.’’

While a-tooting one morning his breath flick- ered out

With a sort of a farewell purr;

Of course there are many to scoff and to scout, But’twas sucked by that cavernous horn with- out doubt,

At least, so the neighbors aver.

They laid him away in the churchyard to rest And with grief that they sought not to hide, They placed the old battered B-B on his breast And that Christmas hymn score by his side--

His pride,

‘Twas the tune that he played when he died.

Now, who here denies That far in the skies

He is probably calmly and placidly winging; That his spirit new-born With his score and his horn Takes flight where the hosts are triumphantly singing.

Yet it irks me to think that he’s far in that Land

With only the score of one anthem in hand. For the music Above must be novel and strange--

Too intricate far for that double-B range,

But at last when the Christmastide rings in the skies

There’ll be some queer quavers in fair Para- dise,

For an humble old spirit will calmly allow “I reckin I’ll give ’em that horn solo now.” Up there we are certain there’s no one to carp Because Obadiah won’t tackle a harp-- Seraphs and cherubs will hush their refrain When a new note of praise intermingles its strain,

And he’ll add to the jocund delight of that morn

With his anthem, “All hail,” on that old bass horn.

“All hail--hoomp--hoomp--bright Christmas morn,

Hail--hoomp, hoomp--hoomp--fair

hoomp--hoomp--dawn; Turn--hoomp--hoomp, eyes

hoomp--hoomp,

HOOMP--skies,

When--hoomp--hoomp,

hoomp--HOOMP--born.”