My Talented Father...

One of my funniest memories of Dad was when he was a guest reader for Ashlynn’s Year 2 (1st grade) class in The Hague. He really hammed it up while reading The True Story of the 3 Little Pigs. He took on the persona of the wolf and by the end of the book had the kids in such a frenzy that Mrs. Cross was truly cross. Dad was pretty excited that he’d be remembered as the grandpa who nearly started a riot.

Following on his comedic reading, Dad starred along with Ann and the girls in two backyard plays. During our visit in August 2007, ten-year-old Veronica adapted Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night with each star playing at least two parts. Dad especially embraced his role of Sir Toby Belch, clearly living up to his name in this photo.

Two summers later, he was hilarious playing the mother in Travel to the Future, an original play by the girls.

Beyond his comedic abilities, Dad was a gifted jazz musician, playing the trombone and piano since childhood. After he retired, he played regularly in three local jazz bands. You might notice in this photo that he was a fair bit older than the other musicians. Age wasn’t the only thing that differentiated him from the others as they all were attending Stanford University and he never did, but they were short a trombonist so put aside any rivalry with MIT. He was thrilled to go on an European tour twice with the band, which is how I managed to take this photo of the band in Paris in June 2015. 

Veronica took these photos in August 2018 at the San Jose Jazz Festival. The girls regularly attended his concerts when they visited.

Ashlynn dedicated a show to Dad on the University of Glasgow radio station, including songs that he loved as well as songs that we remember him by (for instance, rock that he introduced to me but no longer listened to himself). Bilge, one of her flatmates, created the artwork: carps for Karp.