A Request I Couldn't Deny - From A Mother On Her Daughter's Wedding Day

Ciao a tutti,

I guess at the moment, my family is fresh out of weddings. Everyone in my extended family that is going to get married got married years ago and those that have children, they are still to young to entertain the thought. And contrary to popular belief, I have many friends that are non-Italian and so those that have gotten married, their weddings have not been Italian weddings.

And not that I am out there looking for Italian weddings, but when my friend Claire asked me to be her date at her cousin's wedding, I was quite delighted.

Of course I would have said yes, because it was my friends pleasure to have me there. On the other hand, her cousin's parents had been long standing fans of mine and don't miss the opportunity to tell me so each time they see me, which of course does make me feel good. On top of all of that, since I hadn't been to an Italian wedding in so long, I was actually looking forward to it.

And an Italian wedding it was, complete with real live, fresh Italians straight from Italy. Better yet, they were from Sicily. They had arrived there days before in droves, just for the wedding. And when I say droves, I mean 30 or so. And let me tell you, that is such an honor and a tribute to the family in the Italian tradition. Quite impressive I must say.

Claire had actually invited me a year or so ago to the engagement party and so I had met the bride and groom to be, at that time and gotten to know them as really nice people and seemingly a perfect couple. Although I have to say they seemed awfully young to me. Am I getting older?

So here they were getting married. And here I was at their wedding. And here I was, not the wedding singer. Come to think of it I was relishing in the fact that I wasn't singing, not in the church not at the reception. I have to say that in every wedding I sang at, everyone, I was never treated as the "wedding singer" but always as a guest. I don't know why exactly, it was other singers that brought that to my attention. Many times I was invited to sit at tables with other guests, I was always treated to the same food and party favors, or bonbonieri, etc. And even if I was only singing at the reception, I would often be invited to the church and be requested to attend.

Maybe because I always thought of people that I was singing for as family, after all, I was helping the most special day of their life be more special, I figured that they were honoring me too by asking me to be a part it all. You also hear of these horror stories about the bride's treating the band not so nicely. I usually ended up having a dance with the bride or her Mother who hired me.

I never experienced anything but kindness, except for one bride and one party in particular. I will never say who it was but I will tell the story someday because it is too funny. Yup, she was Italian, but I think her "meds" must have interfered with her "party drinking" or something. Of course I took it seriously, and it bothered me for a long time but she still loves me and if I look back it was a pretty funny situation.

So getting back to this beautiful couple and this wedding that wasn't my family and that I didn't have to sing at. I was enjoying myself just watching everything happen as I would expect it to happen in a typical Italian-American West Coast wedding. I make a distinction as West Coast, because I understand that the East Coast weddings are completely different. I have never been to an East Coast wedding. If someone wants to invite me to one, I just might come. I'd even blog about it, he, he.

All of a sudden out of no where Claire asks me a question that hits me like a ton of bricks. "Filippo, do you want to sing?" It was the last thing on my mind. For the first time ever I was actually at a wedding where I didn't have to sing. It had never happened before. Even if I wasn't the paid entertainer, I would always be asked by someone. But for some reason, maybe I have been in my Filippo and the Chef radio show host personality mode, I had forgotten that I was even a singer. As far as I was concerned I was just Claire's date.

So, being the good friend that I am, and I am a good friend, but I took her at her word, which is really interesting being that she is an attorney. Happily she didn't treat me as if I were on the stand because she could have gotten me good because she's good. But her words were "Do you want to sing." Well, the answer of course was, no. I didn't want to sing.

Now if she had asked me "Would you sing?" that is different, that is a question and a request on her part. Then it would have been harder for me to say no, if at all. Whew. I got through that. About an hour later, Claire's mother came up and asked me the same question, happily using the same wording. Now, yes, I knew what she meant, she meant, "Filippo would you sing for us?" But what she said was "Filippo, do you want to sing?" Again, my answer was "no, thank you." As if they were trying to do me a favor and satisfy my desire to sing or something.

Now, it is not as if I wasn't feeling the Italian guilt. Though they politely walked away after my answer, and I felt good on the outside, on the inside I was being eaten up alive. I knew I was going to hell for this but I wasn't sure why, because I truly didn't want to sing. But what I truly love to do is to make people happy and if that will do it, then I was considering it.

But what would I sing? I racked my brain and just decided, well, they accepted my answer so maybe I wouldn't have to sing after all. Until the bomb hit. It was a triple whammy actually. Within the span of about ten minutes, as if they had planned it, the bridal couple tell me how much of an honor it is for them to have me there. Then the bride's father comes up and tells me the same thing with tears in his eyes saying that my Uncle or someone in my family used to work with his brothers when they were all in Sicily and it was an honor to have me there.

Finally, the bride's mother comes up to me. Now she is the sweetest woman you ever want to meet, and her daughter takes after her. Actually, they are all nice people. She also stands four foot something, if that, so it felt like she was kneeling. She clasped her hands together as if she were praying to me and asked me how my mother was. My mother. You mention an Italian man's mother and you have him!

I told her she was fine and thanked her for asking and she told me how much she would have love my mother there. And after she had broken me, with love, she asked "WOULD you sing for my daughter?" "WOULD!" Oh no! She said "WOULD," while her hands were clasped in prayer and she looked like she was kneeling.

I said to myself. "Filippo, God has given you the gift that makes people happy, it is your duty to share it otherwise, now you will know why you will be going to hell!" "SI, SI, SI, of course I will sing for your daughter, IT WOULD BE MY PLEASURE!" But what would I sing?

So I thought about it for a little bit and I remembered that there were 30 Sicilians fresh from Sicily there, not to mention the ones that were not so fresh. What I mean by that is that they have been here awhile. There wasn't one Sicilian song represented that night and that just maybe it would be special if I sang them an old Sicilian song that my father had taught me.

Only, I couldn't remember all the words. So I excused myself and went outside and called my mother on the cell phone. Her first question to me was, "Did they ask you to sing yet?" I asked her how she knew. She replied with a question, "How could you not have expected it?" I guess she was right. I asked her the words of the Sicilian song "Sciuri, Sciuri," which for some reason I couldn't remember in the heat of the heat of the moment, and she helped me and then thanked me for singing for them. Boy I tell you, mother's know how to get you right in the heart.

I rushed back in the hall in time for the bride's father to introduce me with tears in his eyes. Not being in "the biz" he introduced me while half of the guests were still on the dance floor finishing up a dance.

So, in the middle of all these people I grab the mike and say a few words. A lady walking by stopped and looked at me and said, "I thought I recognized your voice." She proceeded to tell me how she had been at two of my shows in New York and she asked me how my mother was. Can you believe this. In that case I understand because I had brought my mother up on stage in my last show in New York.

In any case she proceeded to tell me many things, hug me, kiss me, all while people were watching and listening to all of this on the mike. It was really quite funny and very adorable. I spoke in Sicilian and in English and told them what I was going to sing and why and the next thing you know, since I was singing a Capella, without music, everyone clapped along and gave me the beat as the bride and groom looked on with glee. It ended up being so rewarding and the family came up and thanked me so profusely.

I was grateful for the opportunity to make a bright day even brighter and for have been given three chances to give the right answer.

Auguri a gli sposi, Bob and Crisitna! (Best wishes to the newlyweds!)

Filippo

P.S. Growing up Italian-American, weddings were always a special time. Among other things is was a time for families. Of course, I wasn't there at my parent's, or aunts' and uncles' weddings, but we had pictures, and we used to enjoy looking at them from time to time. Though all the pictures I looked at from Italy were in black and white, this video I found on Youtube.com of someone's Italian-American wedding reminded me of looking at those old pictures and of a time gone by. I thought it most appropriate to include it here. (In English)