Green is Alive with the Sound of Music!

Go Green! That's the big fad these days. Many people advocate to save the environment.  But I'm not blogging about that. I'm talking about the one day everyone wears green...for the Irish! St. Patrick's Day. One Columbia woman doesn't just wear green on this day. She's a musician who brings her talents to senior citizens on St. Patty's Day. Another reporter, Kylie, and I went out to cover the holiday festivities and ended up with a great, little story. The executive producer at KOMU told us she passed by a house fully decorated in green. She thought it'd be worth stopping by and possibly talking to the owner.

 
When we got there, no one was home. We decided to get some video and head downtown and talk to people celebrating there. Just before we packed up our gear, Cookie Hagan pulled in her driveway. She was wearing this great black hat rimmed with green and green beads around her neck. "This is going to be great!" I thought to myself. We told her that we were doing a little story about St. Pat's Day. We said we loved her house and we'd love to talk to her if she didn't mind. She was more than willing. We began to set-up while she went inside. I shot most of the video while Kylie gave her thoughts. Since we were set-up in front of the house, Cookie came out her front door, so we had the perfect video of her to use. Turns out Cookie plays the harmonica and ukulele in several bands.
Photo Courtesy: thegift.com

We asked her questions like, "Why decorate on St. Pat's?" "Is there any special meaning?" "Are you Irish?" We got some great quotes from those questions. She said she's 'Cookie O'Hagan' every March 17th. What a crack up. I was having one of the best St. Pat's Days and I was working! Imagine that!

We asked if she'd be stopping by a senior center to play her harmonica and she said, "Sure! Why not?" We asked if she could play play her for us in her house in case we couldn't get in the senior center. This worked out perfectly because it provided us with more video. She played O' Danny Boy; an appropriate melody for the day. One thing I wish I did: get video of the boom box playing so the viewers could see music came from her playing and the CD player.

Luckily, we got in the senior center and got video of Cookie playing for her friend Sue. Sue was a bundle of joy. The expression on her face was priceless. I wish I had a different angle on the two of them. I eventually moved my camera angle, but didn't have very much time to get enough video from that view point.

Here's the story we put together at KOMU: An Irish Song.
                                                   
                                                                                                          Photo Courtesy: musicwithease.com