The most famous no7 - Cantona, Ronaldo or Jack

I was standing in Kelvinbridge subway station the other day, and while waiting for a train noticed a poster for Jack Daniels Silver cornet band, I thought he was only famous for making his No7 brand, but apparently not. Infamous might be a better description of the band, as rumour has it they were not really that good. I was intrigued, advertising had prevailed, and I wanted to know more.

According to the Silvercornet website, the bands were made up of amateurs, townsmen like the banker, the hardware clerk, the feed merchant, the harness maker, and (in Lynchburg's [I presume a town in Tennessee] case) workers in Mr. Daniel's distillery. Their instruments were temperamental conical horns,­ a challenge for trained musicians, and nearly impossible to control and play in tune by the perspiring home grown players whose enthusiasm and energy was seldom matched by any technical skill or musical knowledge.

But play they did, at rallies, saloon openings, parades, funerals, picnics, and at regular concert appearances in the gazebo bandstand in the courthouse square. Their repertoire ranged from the raucous to the reverent, from music hall to battlefield, from the popular to the patriotic.
What gripped me was the fact that although these guys were lacking on the skills front, they still had a go. It’s now over 100 years since they came on to the scene, yet they have websites which attribute to the enthusiasm that they showed back in the day.

So what about enthusiasm? Generally it means great excitement for or interest in a subject or cause. The English word apparently first appeared in 1603, and fascinatingly (or maybe not) stemmed from the Greek adjective ‘entheos’, which means ‘having God within’. This made me think. The parallels and symbolism of great excitement and having God within were once upon a time very relevant, socially relevant enough to form language. It made me question how closely they are linked at present. If we were making up words today, what would we use to describe the feeling of being greatly excited about a subject or a cause?

Taking it further, Jacks cornet band has made me appreciate that just because you aren’t the best in the world, or even your town, or possibly even your office or classroom, at a particular activity, doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t pursue it. I haven’t even heard Jacks cornet band and in many ways they have influenced my thinking today. God can use us to impact his society in ways that we will never be able to understand, and truthfully perhaps we don’t need to understand in full, we just have to be willing to do what he asks.

“I pray that out of God’s glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge-that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God. Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.”

[the apostle Paul, Ephesians 3]