Music Has Always Been Her Life

When her mother was pregnant with her, she prayed that her next child would be musically inclined. Those prayers apparently worked since Mildred Bergstrom turned out to have a life in music – even to this very day.

“It was just one of those things. God answered her prayer,” said Bergstrom, now 96, who has lived at the Russell Residence for 20 years now. “As a result, I was an organist and a choir director for 76 years all over the place in the States and here.”

She can still recall the thrill that she felt when she received a small piano for Christmas at age 4. For a couple of years, she played on her own before a piano teacher was hired. While most children usually discontinue their musical training in their teens when other interests take over, at age 12 she even began teaching piano.

However, Bergstrom started lessons on the organ at age 15 in addition to her piano lessons. Within a year, she became so proficient at her new instrument that she was asked in her home-town of Pittsburgh to become the organ accompanist for the Westinghouse Quartet. Playing on that company’s radio station in 1925, it was the first time that music was sent out on the local airwaves that was quite newsworthy back then.

In 1928, she enrolled in the Carnegie-Mellon University School of Music, hoping to become a concert pianist. However, those ambitions were frustrated by the Great Depression when chances for success in such a profession weren’t so great. Bergstrom was obliged to switch to public-school music and became a music teacher.

Moving to Mount Royal in 1958, she continued her chosen profession at the Protestant School Board until her retirement 12 years later. “I especially loved teaching in high school since those kids were more serious about music.” She also privately taught many local children – at one time taking on as many as 40 students.

At the same time, Bergstrom was also the choir director and organist at the local United Church for about 30 years. Occasionally, she even filled in for Harrison Jones, the beloved music teacher at Mount Royal High who passed away four years ago, when he couldn’t make it at his Presbyterian Church. For all her volunteer efforts, the Town presented her with a Community Support Service award a dozen years ago.

Time has only slowed her down a little with arthritis in her hands and her eyesight decreasing her ability a bit to distinguish between sharp and flat notes. “I have to practice to keep those old bones mobile,” she remarked.

Bergstrom is still only too glad to play for whoever wants to hear her such as the lawn bowlers at the Country Club and her fellow residents at the Russell for holiday and seasonal sing-a-longs. “Music has always been my life and it will always be that way.”