The music lives on

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    My wife, Jan and I, and our children, Amy and Nathan Starkey, lived near Battle Ground until the early 1990s. Our son, Nathan, was in 8th grade at Lewisville Middle School and our daughter, Amy, was a student at Battle Ground High School in 1988 when a serious auto accident fatally injured Nathan less than a mile from school. Amy was driving and pulled out without seeing a logging truck. Though injured, Amy, and two other children in the car survived. Nathan, age 13, was buried in the Venersborg Cemetery, east of Battle Ground, near our home.

    In 1992, I wrote a song for the 1993 graduating class of Battle Ground High School, in memory of my son, who would have graduated with that class, had he lived. I tried to interest the powers-that-be at the high school to include the song, perhaps as sung by students. My efforts to garner interest in the song at the high school were rejected.

    I just recorded a full production of that song, “Room at the Top,” here in Nashville under the moniker, “The Parakeetus Band.” It is really a song speaking for any high school senior. It can be heard and downloaded on iTunes or Amazon mp3. The band name is derived from our own Perkus S. Parakeetus, our beloved talking parakeet, Perky that we had for many years while living in Battle Ground. I hired some of the best singers and musicians in Nashville, TN for the project. The music lives on.



Randy Starkey

Kingston Springs, TN