Something really magical happened last Sunday at our house.

I was in our home studio, tracking vocals on a new song I was working on (below), when Georgia, age 8, asked if she could sit in on the session. I hooked her up with a pair of headphones and once I was done with my first take, she said, “hey, daddy, I hear a part in my brain. Can I try recording it?”

Next thing I knew, she was laying down her own vocals on the track. A part and arrangement that she came up with herself.

It may not seem like much. But those familiar with the recording arts will recognize what a big step that is in a young person’s evolution as a musician and performer. It was awesome. Check out the track below.

The pandemic summer has been tough on the girls. We and they recognize how fortunate we all are. Tracie and I both worked from home before the crisis took shape and even though I’ve lost a lot of my clients, we still have enough work to keep us afloat.

But the girls still pine for visits with their Texas grandparents, a cancelled trip to California to see their grandmother there, playdates with their friends and Texas cousins, summer afternoons spent at our community pool, Saturday mornings at the bagel place.

They feel their parents’ stress as we fret about money and wonder if even the slightest cough or sneeze is the first symptom of something potentially debilitating or deadly. They sense our sadness and worry as family members, friends, and colleagues have fallen ill with the virus.

It’s a lot for a newly turned 7-year-old and a soon-to-be 9-year-old to absorb.

Their resilience and their positive attitude have been an inspiration to Tracie and me. Their strength is the reason we don’t give up hope, especially on those sleepless nights when we wonder how we’re going to pay the bills, how we are going to guide them through remote learning and keep up with our own work this fall, how and even when we’re going to get to the other side of this national nightmare.

Throughout the pandemic, summer music has been their balm. A place and space where they can feel free to express themselves as they fill our home with sound and joy.

From their “pandemic flash mob street concerts” to their remote piano lessons and our jam sessions, they’ve been nothing less than amazing.

I created the slideshow below (set to the new song) so that we’ll remember these long hot Houston summer days — the pandemic summer.

Thanks for listening and letting us share our blessings.

Protest Song (We Will Survive)
by Parzen Family Singers

People are yelling and running around
Starting to look like a battleground
And I just heard there’s trouble in town
Someone just said they’re burning it down

It’s just another of life’s mysteries
All of this chaos and monstrosity

Don’t tell me we got nothing to lose
So we’re hitting the streets and the avenues
Marching to the beat of a different drum
While old white men are calling us scum

Protests politicians pandemic in addition
Lightning thunder hurricanes’ll put me under
Portland Washington New York Tommy Gun
Feels like the whole world’s coming undone

We’re still alive
We will survive
Into the eyes
Of the Storm

Maybe it’s one of life’s sad ironies
Some people call it the human disease

Leftists Marxists Communists are on your list
Racists fascists supremacists and man they’re pissed
Borders hoarders new world orders
Anarchists and pacifists and oh-my-lorders

Sometimes it’s feels like there’s no end in sight
Sometimes I can’t tell if it’s day or night

Black brown yellow red all the colors round your head
Man child running wild what was that I heard you said
White man has a plan to be born again
That’s why I am running from the ku klux klan