“I can remember vividly sitting in the living room of our house and I was probably 17 or 18 with some friends watching MTV and thinking ‘if these guys can do this, we can do this man!’” Lee said. The next day, he and his buddies bought some used instruments and began teaching themselves to play.
Like Lee, Hughes is also self-taught. “I never had any lessons,” he said. “I just plunked away for a while and then in the late 70s, I joined up with a guy who was really good and we started doing an acoustic duo.”
McNaughton, however, brings a little more experience to the band. He grew up playing the piano and as a young high school student, starting playing in a band called The Zoids. However, after that, it wasn’t until 2006 when The Grateful SPLED formed that he started playing again.
Doug Dexter, the fourth member of the band, is the odd man out. Not only is he the youngest member of the band, he is also classically trained. As a child, Dexter became skilled on the clarinet and tenor saxophone. After high school, he attended the Berklee College of Music where he earned a degree in music business and also picked up the guitar.
“I grew up surrounded by music,” he said. “I was always that music guy that always sought out those kind of obscure bands and tried to have the most knowledge of all my friends about all the happening bands that nobody heard of.”
“It’s cool to see what everybody brings to the table,” Lee said, noting that each band member grew up in a different decade and, therefore, has an affinity for a specific genre. Together they play 1960s rock, folk rock from the 1970s and even some U2 and R.E.M.
“Everybody plays a different style and it’s just really cool being around these guys,” Lee said.
“It’s just fun,” Hughes added. “You get to hang around with people you really like doing something you really like doing.”
The Grateful SPLED has performed at multiple venues, including Centre County Grange Fair and The Last Cowboy (now The Arena Bar and Grill) in State College. They’ve also been known to perform for College of Education events such as the new graduate student reception that is held in the fall.
“For me, it’s just the comradery that music brings,” Dexter said. “It’s just fun to go down to the basement and just…jam. Music is a universal language.”
A learning tool for others
Growing up in a musical household, Alison Carr-Chellman, professor and department head of learning and performance systems, understood the importance music has on one’s life and was influenced by her mother.
“‘Girls, go play something for me,’ my mother would say after we finished doing the dishes in the evening,” she said.
Carr-Chellman and her sisters each played an instrument and sang, and performed at weddings and parties such at the annual postman’s ball. When she was in high school, she was involved with school musicals and band, but all that changed when she went to college.
“It was all about school,” she said. “And when I went to graduate school, it was the same deal. So there was no music during that period of time in my life.”
It wasn’t until after she moved to State College and settled into her faculty position with the College of Education that she finally welcomed music back into her life by joining The Big Pink Dog, a band comprised of faculty and students from the Learning, Design and Technology program.