My family got a piano when I was 5 years old. My mother told me that I could not take piano lessons until I was 7 years old. BUT, I was allowed to play the piano from the day it arrived at our house. So, since I could not read music, I made up songs (much to the agony of my family). I was writing songs before I could play and soon found myself in a world of freedom, where I could express everything that was inside of me. If I was happy the notes bounced; if I was sad, the notes would cry. If I was mad, the whole piano would shake with rage. I had found my outlet for expressing all of the things that I could not tell anyone else. So when I turned 7 I started taking piano lessons. Once I could read notes I had to write down the songs that I had created. “Bugle Call Of The Birds” was one of my first songs. I wrote out the notes…. made covers from construction paper…. and then sold them to my classmates for five cents a song. Carla Dunlop bought my first song. I have kept EVERY song that I ever wrote through the years, no matter how bad or embarrassing they may be. So, as a gesture of good faith I am now making one of my first songs available for free to everyone. :) Here is the original manuscript of, “Bugle Call Of The Birds.” Who would have thought that years later I would write songs with Garth Brooks and Kent Blazy. But we all have to start somewhere…RIGHT?