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ENGLEWOOD, Colo. –** Tuesday morning brought back a lot of memories for Nathan Palmer.
He joined Mrs. Lockwood's first grade music class at Fairview Elementary School for music class. A gifted musician, Palmer helped teach the students and participated in activities. After being there, he recalled his days in music class when he was a kid, when he first fell in love with music.
"There were times when I was little that my mom and dad would be like, 'You know what boy, you need to be quiet. Come off the porch, stop singing, you're waking up the neighbors, go sit down and play a video game or something,'" he said.
The Northern Illinois product plays piano, drums, bass guitar and dabbles in lead guitar.
With Mrs. Lockwood's class, he helped the students learn their scales through xylophones and other instruments while singing "The Hot Dog Song." Palmer said music has done a lot for him throughout his life and thinks music education is vital for students.
Wide receiver Nathan Palmer helped teach a music class at Fairview Elementary School on Tuesday morning.
"Being creative, it kind of takes a lot of stress out of things," Palmer said. "Football gets kind of stressful sometimes and that's such a high energy and high impact game. It's cool to kind of come home and be able to calm yourself down with a little bit of piano and soft ballads and things like that, some jazz. Music is just great overall."
He began singing in church and then his interest in performing took off when he was in college and he gained some fans after a successful performance in a talent show. When Palmer isn't playing football, he's creating music.
While music is important to him and it allows him to take a break from football and refocus, he always remembers the saying: "Don't quit your day job." He feels blessed to be passionate about both football and music.
"I like to explain it as, if you think back to one of your favorite songs, I bet you can tell me exactly what day you heard it, where you were when you heard it and what it does to you throughout life," Palmer said. "Music also, once that song comes up again in life, no matter what you're going through that day, you go back to how you were feeling the first time you heard it.
"So when I say that I say that music kind of goes hand in and with our life experiences… There's a quote that music is the art form of words that we can't speak."
