http://www.theatre.iastate.edu/fiddler-on-the-roof-iowa-state-university-theatre-production-2/

I’ve known David for more than 30 years now. He was my next door neighbor way back when; and his (ex) wife was my first classical guitar teacher. One of my favorite memories of those times was once circa 1982 or early 1983, where David spent the afternoon listening to Michael Jackson’s Thriller in his studio loft, evaluating it.

Fast forward 15 years later, I had taken up some brass instruments on the side, and was entering ISU as a music major. I was blessed to meet David again, and he served as my major professor for my BA and MA degrees. Throughout this time, I naturally fell into working with him on his History of Rock class, and some years down the line, we wrote the book!

John Briggs Sheeler died in Marshalltown at the age of 91 on March 13, 2013, after a long bout of leukemia at Iowa River Hospice.

Funeral services will be at 10:30 a.m. Saturday, March 16, at First Presbyterian Church of Marshalltown on Center Street. Visitation will be from 4 to 8 p.m. on Friday, March 15, at Mitchell Family Funeral Home at 1209 Iowa Avenue West, Marshalltown. Memorials should be directed to the Iowa River Hospice or the First Presbyterian Church of Marshalltown.

John was born in Anita, on Oct. 25, 1921. He graduated high school in Davenport in 1939, and St Ambrose College in 1941, and then enlisted in the Marine Corps.

John served in the South Pacific campaign as a Heavy Machinegunner with Company M, 3rd Battalion, 8th Marine Regiment and initially saw action during the campaign at Guadalcanal in 1942 and 1943. Later in 1943, he went ashore in the assault on Tarawa and in 1944, was in the lead assault in the invasion of Saipan. He was twice wounded in action against the enemy and counts among his decorations two Purple Hearts and two Presidential Unit Citations. He was also Marine Division boxing champion in 1944. Sergeant Sheeler was honorably discharged from the Marine Corps in 1947.

He returned to graduate studies at Iowa State University and earned his masters and doctorate in chemical and soils engineering in 1956. Dr. Sheeler joined the faculty that year and taught there until his retirement in 1986. He was awarded professor emeritus status. In addition to his academic duties, he coached the ISU NROTC pistol team for 36 years with the team being awarded 15 National Championships.

John and Irene Squire Kinney Sheeler were married on July 18, 1970, in Boone. They lived happily in Ames and later in Marshalltown. A previous marriage to Charlsee Pitt on Jan. 26, 1946, ended in divorce in 1961.

Dr. Sheeler was preceded in death by his parents, Dr. Ivan and Mildred Sheeler; his brother and sister-in-law, Max and Dorothy Sheeler, of Ames; and son, John R. (“Johnny”) Sheeler, of Colo.

He is survived by his wife of 43 years, Mary Irene Sheeler, and seven children: Daniel Sheeler, Anne Tiller (Larry), Robert Sheeler, William Sheeler (Jenny), Diana Hora (Randy), James Kinney (Felisa) and John Kinney. John and Irene have 21 grandchildren, 26 great-grandchildren and one great-great grandchild.

Life is hard, and there are days/weeks where it seems unbearable. How do I keep going? At risk of sounding like a a Hallmark card, it’s hope in God, faith in the future, and accepting myself for where I am. Just when I feel like everything is ok, something happens.

This past week a band that I was in broke up. Too be completely fair, it wouldn’t have lasted much longer anyway I don’t think, cuz there were creative and personal issues lurking that never got addressed, but that’s ok, because with all my other commitments in place, I couldn’t give it the right time. But it all came to a head this week, and that’s ok.

I’m writing for my 5th solo album and I am so excited — can’t wait to share these songs with you all! More cool stuff to come!

To other major events are on the horizon, the 3rd Edition of From Bakersfield to Beale Street (my rock textbook with Dr David Stuart), and I am in the preliminary writing stages for the 5th solo CD. Shooting for spring 2013 release. stay tuned.

Praying for God’s love and presence to become fuller in your life this season. Blessings, Ryan

1. TONIGHT – me solo at Cafe Milo in West Ames
https://www.facebook.com/events/497672566927433/

2. Saturday morning – Box Brothers will be out tailgating and rockin’ out with the crowd at the ISU Football Game tomorrow
morning. Catch us before the game — down by the ball diamond kitty corner to the Stadium and the Vet School!!!! 9AM-11AM approx — weather permitting!

3. Sunday night – KHOI 89.1 FM: I will be interviewed on the NEW “Local Hometown Music” show by James Rivera at 8PM. Check it out!!

(sorry for the bio…) LOL

All this leads up to what I’m about to say… For years and years, I’ve seen the music scene in Ames IA come and go, build and die away, year after year. But some guys and gals have taken it upon themselves to revive and rebuild the Ames Music Scene. I for one could NOT be happier!! Nate Logsdon, Chris Lyng, Patrick Tape Fleming, and a choice handful of other Ames up-and-comers, have come alongside some of us veterans and injected some serious new life.

Ames IA is a great town in a lot of ways with a lot of things going for it. There is no reason in the world why it shouldn’t have a great/fantastic/killer music scene. For whatever reason over the years, it never quite happened, and that’s cool. But I’m feeling like now is the time for it to really happen.

This next week, I am very honored to be a part of the 2nd annual Maximum Ames Festival. There will be 130 bands/playing at nearly every venue in town from Thursday-Sunday this weekend. I will be a part of two of the shows, including a brand-new “Ames Inter-generational Songwriter’s Circle” which I am seriously looking forward to being a part of.

Please make plans to join me and a whole slew of Ames and Central IA musicians this weekend. There are some surprises and some big name acts thrown into the mix as well (i.e. Wanda Jackson – rockabilly legend). You won’t regret it I promise, and the Ames music scene is worthy of supporting. Hope to see as many of you out there as possible this weekend! blessings, Ryan

http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/MSJNKKP

During our time together this weekend, he brought back a great Willow Creek song that he had written. How many of us take time to let the Lord love us?” — that concept hit me like a ton of bricks. We all put too much stuff in between God and ourselves; jobs, school, ambitions. Take a moment and let this settle into your heart.

(click title to play Mp3 of the song)

Let The Lord Love You

I cringe every time you cut yourself down;
You hide your pain like it doesn’t count.
So when I hear you laugh are you cryin’ deep inside,
‘Cause you fall below the standards in your mind?
Though you’d never deny our God’s a loving God
You feel He turns away when you make mistakes.
But our Heavenly Father nurtures His own,
To Him you matter more than you’ll ever know.

(Chorus:)
So let the Lord love you;
Let His voice be heard above the rest.
Hold on to what you know is true;
And let the Lord love you.

We may search for truth, but we listen more to lies.
Play them over and over in our minds;
Till we’re left with some distored point of view
That cripples who we are and all we do.
There are times you’ve gotta fight for all you’re worth;
Stand up to the voices from the past.
And as you draw close to Him the more moments you’ll have
When His love overwhelms and you know it’s true;

(Chorus)

© 1989 Rory Noland

But I had to tell Don I couldn’t jump in right away; as a music teacher and working solo artist, I had commitments I had to fulfill. As a freelance musician – I only take show offers they come in, and since my name is fairly well-known, I can kinda afford to pick and choose opportunities as they come in. My last musical show was in 2002- SOV’s production of “Grease”. While I loved that show, that particular production was wrought with bad production which really slowed down rehearsals. The band did a lot of waiting around for several days in pre-production. So I was really gunshy about doing another student-run musical. RENT was a big-change of pace from that. The show was very well-run and well-rehearsed, it made the rehearsals go so much easier.

Right away, I found out that I had joined a very talented group of musicians in the band. Simonson as director has a tremendous gift for knowing when to direct us vs. when to just let “the horses run” a little bit. I had never played a gig with Mike Giles before then; we had just known each other from traveling in the same circles. He is a great guy to work with and a fantastic musician – turns out we are both the same age and went to the U of I at the same time circa 1997-98. The main pianist, Johanna Sholar, is a fantastic musician. She was way fun to work with. She could play the entire show and all of our parts with no problem. ha ha! The other guitarist, Kyle Folvag, is a very promising kid who plays in the ISU jazz band. I really enjoyed working with him – we talked a lot about guitar stuff (it’s a disease!) and playing in bands, etc. The rhythm section of Rachel Petsche and Lee Plummer who were ISU music majors, was really solid. They added a lot, and were incredibly fun to work with. I saw my role is “ultilty guitarist” – I picked up all the rest of the guitar parts Kyle didn’t play – riffs here and there, doubled piano and strings parts, and also ended up putting a healthy amount of my own “Sheeler-isms” in there, just for fun

The cast themselves were all amazing musicians. I got to know some of the cast – Nick Prenger, Colin Morgan, Jonathan Brugioni, Heather Smith and several others. It turns out that many of them were Ankeny High School theater alums — as was my cousin Luke Sheeler, whom many of them knew. So that was a kinda cool “six degrees of separation” thing! But the cast blew me away with their vocal ability. Wow! They’re gonna go places!

As we started dress rehearsals 4 days before opening night – the band was allowed to just mess around before the show started each night. In fact, we were encouraged to come onstage 15-20 minutes before and warm-up etc. I started messing around, digging through my repertoire of rock tunes – I’ve been in bands since a young kid in the mid-1980s. Well, it started to catch on. Since the cast came onstage from the audience (more or less) this ended up being a great way to warm everyone up. We finally worked up a nice little jam/set of songs like “Smells Like Teen Spirit”,”Jump”, “Walk This Way”,”Purple Rain” and others, just for fun. We were really just messing around. It really got everyone fired up, and ended a great impromptu way to start the show!

The show itself was fantastic – full of great acting and great songs. My heart ached genuinely for the characters – spiritually and emotionally. It just reinforced for me, who much the world needs love and healing. I continually prayed to God every night for everyone involved, and the audience members, that He might speak through the performances, and that hearts would be moved.

Colin Morgan (Angel) sent me a YouTube clip of a version of “Contact” one of the (ahem…) “headier” numbers of the musical. This version of the tune that Colin sent me was a little more techno that original with a ripping guitar solo underneath of it that reminded me of the classic dance/metal shred tunes like “Beat It” (Michael Jackson and Eddie Van Halen), “King of Rock” (Run DMC with Eddie Martinez), “Black Cat” (Janet Jackson and Nuno Bettencourt). Colin thought it would be a great idea. I agreed, but I let it slide for several days, ‘cuz I didn’t want to surprise or upset the director, Simonson, or the sound guy. Ultimately, after a lot of prodding from Colin and Nick, I decided to go for it (what would they do, fire me?) and on the Saturday night show during the last run, I laid down some guitar heat on “Contact”, which IMO ended up being the best show of the entire run. I talked to the guys afterward, and they were blown away by “Contact” it somehow gave it a new edge. I was just doing what I do – and to think I almost left that part out.

Anyhow…despite my initial reticence… my time with SOV’s production of RENT was the most fun I’ve had in a musical. I was warmly received by the cast and crew, and I felt like I was an encouragement to the team, and hopefully I contributed to the overall product. Unfortunately, it seemed like the whole thing was over just as soon as it started, but I guess “time flies when you are having fun”! But I’m so glad I had the opportunity – and was able to work with an amazing group of talented, teachable, hard-working, and gifted people. I walked away very tired, but very humbled to have the experience.