Maybe you, like I did, read the story in the Washington Post this morning, “On Martin Luther King Day, nine facts about him that may surprise you.” Of course, this is the fact that jumped out at me:

His mother was also assassinated

Just six years later, his mother, Alberta Williams King, was also assassinated. She was killed in 1974 while playing the organ at a service (italics mine) at Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta, shot by Marcus Wayne Chenault, a young man from Ohio who claimed he had been aiming for Martin Luther King Sr., who was also at the church.

Upon further investigation, I found this on Wikipedia:

Alberta Christine Williams King (September 13, 1904 – June 30, 1974) was Martin Luther King Jr.‘s mother, married to Martin Luther King Sr. She played a significant role in the affairs of the Ebenezer Baptist Church. She was shot and killed in the church by 23-year-old Black Hebrew Israelite Marcus Wayne Chenault six years after the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr.

King founded the Ebenezer choir and served as church organist from 1932 to 1972. Her work as organist and as director at Ebenezer is considered to have deeply contributed to the respect her son had for music. She served as choir director for nearly 25 years, leaving for only a brief period in the early 1960s to accompany her son and assist him with his work. She returned to the position in 1963 and continued in the role until “retiring” in 1972.

Interesting, isn’t it, that the word “retiring” is surrounded by quotation marks!

Here’s a more complete description from The Guardian of what took place that day:

According to witnesses Mrs Alberta King, whose husband, the Rev Martin Luther King Snr, is pastor of the church on Auburn Avenue, was playing the organ for the Lord’s Prayer near the start of the service when the attack began. A young black man jumped and screamed: “You must stop this! I am tired of all this! I’m taking over this morning.”

With that he drew two pistols and for the next 90 seconds fired wildly and continuously, hitting Mrs King, another elderly woman parishioner, and a 69-year-old church deacon, Mr Edward Boykin.

‘Delirious’
While members of the congregation dived beneath the pews, a few men from the choir jumped on the gunman, who was shouting: ” I’m going to kill everyone in here – they did it to me in the war.”

Mrs King’s grandson Derek, who said he helped to subdue the gunman as he tried to reload a pistol, added: “He was delirious. He appeared to be in a fever. He said over and over, ‘The war did this to me. It’s the war.'”

Mrs King was taken to the nearby Grady Memorial Hospital, where officials said she was “barely alive” on arrival. She died shortly afterwards from a gunshot wound to the right of her head. Mr Boykin was pronounced dead on arrival.

The attack on Mrs King took place less than 100 yards from where her famous son, killed in 1968 at the age of 39, is buried.

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So, this afternoon I attended a special Martin Luther King concert at Kawaiaha’o Church, featuring baritone Leon Williams, soprano Georgine Stark, violinists Darel Stark and Arlene Koh, and pianist/organist Victor Simonson, who is the Associate Music Director of the famed Broadway hit, “Hamilton.” What a fantastic afternoon, filled with over the top blockbusters for every piece! The program ranged from the classical Gounod and George Gershwin, to African-American composers like Florence Price, Samuel Coleridge Taylor, Andre Crouch and Margaret Bond, to spirituals by Tommy Dorsey and Moses Hogan. There were a number of standing ovations during the concert, including for an amazing piano arrangement of “Amazing Grace” by Joseph Joubert (and stunningly played by Victor Simonson), but perhaps one of my favorite songs of the afternoon was a rendition of Tommy Dorsey’s “Precious Lord,” beginning with excerpts of Dr. Martin Luther King’s speeches narrated by Georgine and Darel’s son, Rafael accompanied softly on the organ and growing to a grand crescendo with both singers and both violinists playing obbligato descants.

The concert ended with Margaret Bond’s arrangement of “He’s Got the Whole World in His Hands,” one of the signature pieces that Georgine and my husband Carl used to perform together. This time Leon sang one of the verses, and Georgine sang the other, with both of them chiming in together on the last verse. It was always Georgine’s singing a high D that brought the house down, and today’s performance was just thrilling. Of course, I couldn’t help but think of Carl and the many times he and Georgine performed this piece together. With Leon added, it was even better.

Last night, I attended the Hawaii Symphony Orchestra’s concert at the Hawaii Theatre, just two blocks from my condo, and although it was billed as “Beethoven’s 7th Symphony,” it was the two first pieces on the program that caught my attention: “Variaciones Concertantes” by Ginastera and “Aconcagua” by Piazolla, both composers from Argentina. As you may remember, I’ll be visiting Argentina shortly after Easter. It was the Piazolla which I truly enjoyed, as it was an accordion concerto with virtuoso Hanzhi Wang from China, no less, playing the accordion, an instrument which originated in Germany!

That’s not to say, however, that the Beethoven was any less thrilling. The lady in front of me was screaming (with pleasure!) at the end of the concert!

We are so fortunate to have such high calibre musical performances in our community!