BONNIE MONTGOMERY
BORN TO MAKE MUSIC
Step into the Texarkana Academy of Musical Arts (TAMA) in Central Mall and the wall art will immediately grab your attention.
Bonnie Montgomery, founder and director of TAMA, describes it: “On the right wall, you’ll see a beautiful large butterfly with a music staff flowing behind it, music notes and smaller butterflies flying around. Straight in front is a very big, cartoon-like piano going across the wall and around the corner. Jimmie Sinquefield painted it, and it’s really beautiful and fun.”
Music—especially gospel music—has danced through Bonnie’s life since childhood. Her father, a major in The Salvation Army, played bass horn. Both parents played piano. “And both of my parents had beautiful voices. They sang a lot,” Bonnie said. “Mother loved to sit and play piano.”
Bonnie inherited her parents’ music ability and their love for music. She started piano lessons when she was 6 years old. Her piano teacher told Bonnie’s mother wonderingly, “I tell her something and she just does it!” Piano was easy for the 6-year-old, who loved to play.
The Salvation Army moves their officers around, and Bonnie was separated from her piano teacher when her father was transferred.
Her father served large commands such as Houston and the Miami-Dade area. While Bonnie was growing up, she attended 12 different schools in 12 parts of the country.
But her father saw to it that she continued her music training. He gave her piano lessons himself. At her insistence, he also taught her cornet, but reluctantly. He explained to her that men played the cornet in The Salvation Army band, not women. But Bonnie insisted, so her father relented. “He didn’t want me to get hurt if the men resisted my cornet-playing,” she explained.
In high school, Bonnie played in the Dallas Youth Symphony Orchestra. She had an opportunity to play with the Dallas Symphony Orchestra for a concert, and unexpectedly, she experienced a life-changing moment during the concert.
The orchestra was playing “Finlandia.” She recalled, “I started to weep because I thought of the religious words I had learned to the same melody, ‘Be still, my soul, the Lord is on my side.’”
Bonnie knew the Lord was reassuring her about her own life, and that people could be touched through music. “Worship music is everything,” she said.
“Music touches and reaches people.” She said that during that part of her life, she would practice on her horn four hours a day.
In the 1950s, when Bonnie was 15, she met her future husband, John Montgomery, at a Salvation Army training camp. They married in 1969, after graduating from a Corps Officers Training School. John Montgomery had worked for the Christian Broadcasting Network, and after they married, Bonnie encouraged John to go back to CBN. Bonnie sang on the CBN programs and John worked first as a sound man and then as assistant to the network program director. After several years with CBN, the Montgomerys returned to The Salvation Army.
When the couple were in their mid-40s, John studied at Texas Christian University’s seminary. Bonnie studied in the Music Department of TCU. At that time, their son studied at a two-year college. “All three of us were in school at the same time,” Bonnie said. After John’s seminary work was completed, close Methodist friends offered him a pastoral appointment in Tyler, Texas. Bonnie said, “While we lived there, I sang a lot of solos with the Tyler Chorale—a lot of classical and Broadway songs. I also studied music at Tyler Junior College.”
After three years, the Methodist Church sent John to Texarkana, where he served Chapelwood United Methodist Church for nine years. Bonnie taught piano to about 60 students at the Music Warehouse in Texarkana. “When the Warehouse closed, I told John that it was time to start my own school,” she said. She started the Texarkana Academy of Musical Arts with the piano students she had been teaching. John had retired, and he helped Bonnie establish TAMA.
“John found the first building and named the Academy,” she said.
In 2003, her beloved husband died suddenly of a heart attack. Hanging on the wall of TAMA are two framed articles. “One is about the Academy and one is about my late husband, John,” she said. “There is a plaque below his article saying, ‘Partners in Ministry, Partners in Life.’”
Bonnie, who still misses her husband very much, has carried on the Academy and has seen it grow. TAMA offers lessons in any band or orchestra instrument. Bonnie teaches voice, brass instruments, beginner violin and piano. Other teachers at the Academy include Timothy Chung who teaches violin; Vicki Carr, piano; Robin Curtis, piano and voice; Larry Campbell, guitar; Frederick Hollowell, piano; and George Buckner, drums. Every Christmas, the Academy instructors add to the Christmas spirit by playing Christmas music in the mall, including a recital by their students.
Through the years, Bonnie has also served as music director at Hardy Memorial Methodist and she has sung at First Baptist, Texarkana, and other churches. Currently she is studying Bible at Regions Christian Center. On Sunday nights, she plays piano at Rhema Baptist Church. She also sings in choruses from time to time for the Texarkana Symphony Orchestra.
Bonnie has not forgotten her roots in The Salvation Army, and has taught children sent to her by The Salvation Army. She has also taught Salvation Army officers, and recently taught a band class at The Salvation Army. When The Salvation Army’s Perot Building was dedicated, she sang “Bless this house, O Lord, We Pray,” and her husband accompanied her on piano.
Texarkana holds a special place in Bonnie’s heart, for she has lived here longer than any other place in her life. Growing up, she said she moved so much that she never developed close friendships, knowing she would be moving.
“In Texarkana, I have developed friendships and have a sense of community that I’ve never had before,” she said. She shows her appreciation by volunteering in community projects such as United Way, Boys and Girls Clubs and many others. She also sings at many city events.
Bonnie believes music holds great power to touch people. She said she and her husband John were attending “The Phantom of the Opera” in Dallas one time, and their hearts sank when a group of noisy teenagers came in and sat right in front of them. They did not expect to be able to pay attention to the opera. “But once the music started, the teenagers became still and quiet,” she said. “That’s the effect music has on people.”
Speculating about how people will remember her after her death, Bonnie said, “Music touches many people and after I’m gone, people will remember me through my music—but I’d like to be remembered as a kind, compassionate person who made an impact on them.”
Bonnie Montgomery can be reached by calling 903-899-1443.