Seeing “The Cradle of Country Music” on the banner of the newspaper made me think of my own tastes in music. I am not a musician. I couldn’t play chopsticks on a kid’s toy piano if someone had a gun to my head, but I know what I like to hear. I do enjoy country artists like Dolly Parton, the Oak Ridge Boys, or the Statlers. I also like some of the ‘good ol’ rock ‘n’ roll of four or five decades ago, but what I really like are instrumentals, specifically instrumental soundtracks.

I remember back in the 60s, riding on the bus to school, a bunch of girls were singing, I Wanna Hold Your Hand. I knew the words because I had listened to those girls singing it every morning. Still, I never developed an affinity to the Beatles. I do appreciate some of their music now, but not back when every kid on both sides of the pond absolutely adored them.

No, my hero was Henry Mancini. Yes, I know. You are saying—who? (I bet you didn’t see that one coming!)

But no, I adored Henry Mancini. And to help you out, he’s the guy who created the Pink Panther theme. He also did Moon River, Peter Gunn, Mr. Lucky, Baby Elephant Walk (from Hatari!) and many other compositions.

Henry Mancini, like all good musicians, country or classical, worked his way up the ranks. He played flute in a local band when he was a kid and sent some arrangements to Benny Goodman. He served in WWII and then joined the new Glenn Miller band. Later, a two week assignment to Hollywood turned into six years and beyond.

During his career, he won four Oscars, twenty Grammys, two Emmys, and had over 500 works published. Not bad for a modern instrumental composer. It was a sad day in 1994 when Mancini died. Of course, by then I had actually gone to one of his concerts at a time when my contemporaries were camping out waiting for tickets to Who.

As I mentioned before, in my adult years, I have come to appreciate so many other artists like Simon and Garfunkel, John Denver, America, all the way up to Michael Bublé (who I can imagine singing one of Mancini’s vocal compositions if Mancini was still alive).

Of course, when I am writing a story, I prefer my ‘roots’—besides Mancini, there are the instrumental composers like Jerry Goldsmith, (Medicine Man, Star Trek), John Barry, (Dances with Wolves, James Bond), and James Horner, (Braveheart, Titanic), all of whom have also passed on to that great symphony in the sky. There are others whose musical notes stir my creative juices like Hans Zimmer, John Williams, and Carlos Nakai.

Regardless of what music or artist you enjoy, you can’t really go wrong. Music brings joy, peace and happiness to our ears and souls, whether it’s Mozart or Tim McGraw. I was watching a news program the other day about a British choir that is made up almost entirely of people who have experienced someone in their lives going missing or being killed. Why were they singing after such devastating loss? One member explained that it calmed their spirits. The music helped them to feel peace. Another reason was to bring attention to all the people in the world who have gone missing.

There really is no bad music as long as someone gets some pleasure or healing from it. Pull up your Bluetooth, turn on your cd player! Enjoy! This world needs all the peace it can get.

Susan Kite is the author of The Mendel Experiment trilogy, My House of Dreams, and Realms of the Cat. She has contributed to several anthologies and won several awards for her published and unpublished works. To check out her books, go to: https://www.amazon.com/default/e/B00J91G0ZU/