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KORVA COLEMAN: From NPR News in Washington, I'm Korva Coleman. President Bush is continuing to criticize Iran over its nuclear program. The president is traveling in Europe. Today in Germany, he reiterated that all options are on the table to deal with Iran, including a military option. But he says diplomacy is key.

GEORGE BUSH: My first choice, of course, is to solve this diplomatically. All options are on the table. But the first choice is to solve this problem by working closely together.

KORVA COLEMAN: German Chancellor Angela Merkel says firmly, she is pinning her hopes on diplomatic efforts. She made no mention of military action.

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has ridiculed Mr. Bush's statements. He says Iran will continue its nuclear program, which he insists is to provide peaceful means for energy.

The British House of Commons will vote today on whether to extend the amount of time a terror suspect can be held without charge. The bill would lengthen that time from 28 to 42 days. Larry Miller reports from London.

LARRY MILLER: Opponents of extending detention without charge say, keeping someone in jail for up to six weeks, who may then be released, tramples on their civil liberties and cannot be justified by recent cases. In the lead up to the vote, Home Secretary Jacqui Smith argued for the extension.

JACQUI SMITH: Given the use of suicide methods, the police may well need to have to step in early to prevent a plot from actually coming to fruition. Police may need longer to get to the bottom of who and what is involved, and to then build a case.

LARRY MILLER: Although the Commons vote will be close, with many from the government's own Labor Party set to vote with the opposition, opinion polls suggest nearly 70% of the public want the detention limit raised from 28 days. For NPR news, I'm Larry Miller in London.

KORVA COLEMAN: New York officials have found an abandoned car belonging to a hedge fund manager convicted of fraud. He was supposed to begin a 20-year prison sentence, but a note on the car indicated he may have jumped from a nearby bridge. NPR's Dina Temple-Raston reports.

DINA TEMPLE-RASTON: Samuel Israel III was out on bail and was supposed to surrender himself to federal prison authorities on Monday. He'd been found guilty of fraud, but he didn't show up as scheduled.

Instead, police found his SUV abandoned on a Hudson River Bridge with the words "suicide is painless" scrawled on the dusty hood of the car. Law enforcement officials believe the car and the note are a ruse.

The car was found at the Bear Mountain Bridge, a 156-foot high span about 40 miles North of New York City. A jump would have meant certain death, and the authorities can't find a body. That's why US Marshals and the FBI have launched a manhunt. Dina Temple-Raston, NPR News, New York.

KORVA COLEMAN: On Wall Street, the Dow Jones Industrials are down 159 points at 12,129. The NASDAQ is down 39 points. It's at 2,411. You're listening to NPR News from Washington.

ANNOUNCER: Support for news comes from lendingtree.com, where you can choose from up to four customized loan offers, 1-800-553. When banks compete, you win. Lendingtree.com.

STEPHEN JOHN: From Minnesota Public Radio News, I'm Stephen John. High winds are knocking over semis and causing power outages in Fergus Falls. The State Patrol says two semis were blown over on Interstate 94 this morning in West Central Minnesota. No one was hurt.

The Fergus Falls police chief says the winds caused some scattered power outages and toppled tree branches, but no major property damage has been reported. Winds gusted to more than 50 miles an hour at the Fergus Falls Airport. the National Weather Service says winds will gust to 60mph in West Central Minnesota through early Wednesday, early this afternoon.

Some Twin Cities motorists say $4 a gallon gas is going to change how they drive. The statewide average is still slightly less than $4. But this week, Twin Cities pump prices went over the $4 mark for the first time.

Saint Paul resident, Mary Mangan, says she was getting used to the high price at the pump in recent months. But when gas went over $4 a gallon, she took notice.

MARY MANGAN: Because we had been hovering around the $3 a gallon mark for so long, that I was getting used to it. It's a terrible thing to say, but I was getting used to it. And I was budgeting it. And the $4 a gallon mark just really seemed out there. I didn't think it would come.

STEPHEN JOHN: Mangan says she is taking a bus to her job in Minneapolis and is also adjusting her household budget to deal with the high cost of gasoline.

Authorities in Southwestern Minnesota are investigating a home invasion, where an unidentified intruder ended up with a gunshot wound. A woman called police last night to report the intruder was attacking her husband. The woman suffered a broken arm during the incident. Her husband was taken to the hospital. The intruder was shot in the leg.

Showers and thunderstorms likely for much of the state today. This is NPR News.

MIKE EDGERLY: Thank you, Stephen. It's 12:06.

SPEAKER: Can you tell me, do you think the--

MIKE EDGERLY: This is Midday coming to you on Minnesota Public Radio News. I'm Mike Edgerly in today for Gary Eichten.

Today on Midday, we hear from two Minnesota musicians famous beyond our own borders. Minnesota gospel singer, Tom Tipton, is a frequent soloist on the Reverend Robert Schuller's Hour of Power television broadcast from the Crystal Cathedral in California. And Laura McKenzie is an internationally known performer of traditional Celtic music.

This is an event-filled week for both artists. 75-year-old Tom Tipton is on stage Thursday night in Minneapolis, celebrating 50 years in music. Laura McKenzie is in England, where she's a featured artist at a major international traditional music festival.

Today on Midday, we hear from both of them in a special music edition of our Voices of Minnesota series. Here's Minnesota Public Radio's Dan Olson.

DAN OLSON: This is the Tom Tipton known by millions of Hour of Power television viewers.

[TOM TIPTON, "EVERY TIME I FEEL THE SPIRIT"] Well, every time I feel the spirit

Moving in my heart

I would pray

Well every time I feel the spirit

Moving in my heart

I would pray

DAN OLSON: Tom Tipton's upbeat version of the traditional William Dawson spiritual, "Every Time I Feel the Spirit." It's a toe-tapping, hand-clapping, crowd-pleasing favorite at Reverend Robert Schuller's Crystal Cathedral in Garden Grove, California.

Tipton has performed on the Hour of Power television broadcasts for more than 20 years. The big voice comes out of a big man. An accomplished athlete as a youth, Tipton is well over 6 feet tall. He greets people with a broad smile and big hands that bestow a gentle handshake. So it's arresting to hear this tall fella with the booming voice deliver a delicate version of "Motherless Child."

[TOM TIPTON, "SOMETIMES I FEEL LIKE A MOTHERLESS CHILD"] Sometimes I feel

Like a motherless child

A long way from home

A long way from home

DAN OLSON: Tom Tipton was not motherless. To the contrary, he points out he was born and raised in Washington, DC, under the watchful eye of his mother, Lucille Banks Robinson Miller, an accomplished music teacher and choir director. The house was filled with music and with famous or soon to be famous African-American artists.

Tom Tipton moved to Minnesota 40 years ago. I talked with him in the church choir rehearsal room at the Lord of Life Lutheran Church in Plymouth recently. Lord of Life Lutheran is Tipton's spiritual home and base of operations in Minnesota. It is a world away from the segregated existence of Tom Tipton's youth in Washington, DC. You grew up in segregation.

TOM TIPTON: Did I grew up in segregation, and I was born in 1933. By the way, gas was $0.23 a gallon when I was born. But the nation's capital was segregated. My first memories was at nine years old. I was a shoeshine boy helping my mother come from a broken home. But I loved my father and shoe shine shoes every day. They helped my mother get along and sell newspapers. I went to school.

DAN OLSON: When did you know that you could not circulate in white society?

TOM TIPTON: That's an excellent question. In Washington, DC, in a segregated society, naturally the schools were Black and the theaters were Black and the restaurants were Black. But we didn't mind so much. I didn't want to eat cottage cheese downtown. No way. So we were happy.

But it really hit me when I went to the White House on Easter Monday and to not shine shoes, but to go in and roll Easter eggs with the little kids. And I dressed up like I'm supposed to.

That's the way we were raised in the Baptist church at the time. We had to wear a shirt and tie. There was no t-shirts in those days.

So I went there and went into the gate. And the guard looked at me and he said, I'm sorry, but you can't come in. Now, I just been shining shoes on Friday and Saturday at the White House to Monument and the Capitol, and Lincoln Memorial. So I knew where the money was.

And I looked at him strange. And he said, I'm sorry, but we don't allow your kind, which hit me.

DAN OLSON: He said, you're kind.

TOM TIPTON: You're kind. So I went back home, and I was crying. And I said--

DAN OLSON: How old were you?

TOM TIPTON: I was nine.

DAN OLSON: So this was a nine-year-old coming to terms with the fact that you now knew you were not allowed.

TOM TIPTON: Now, I knew that because of the color of my skin, I could not go, nor could my parents, nor could anybody Black go anywhere in the nation's capital where the President of the United States resided at the White House.

DAN OLSON: What did you say to your mother? What did she say to you?

TOM TIPTON: I said, Mother, they wouldn't let me in the roll of Easter eggs, very innocently. And she said, Junior, she called me Junior, which I didn't like, but I couldn't help that, that's the way it goes. And she said, don't worry about that. She never dealt with the color. She said, just love everybody.

DAN OLSON: How corrosive was it, though, to you as a nine-year-old? What did it do to your soul, to your psyche to--

TOM TIPTON: It hit my psyche-- I didn't realize what psyche meant at the time. But you got the correct word there. It hit me in that I decided that one of these days, inside of me, I think God was speaking to me. He said, don't worry about it. I will bless the Lord, oh my soul, and all that is within you, Junior.

And so I didn't understand that things were happening in me. And I stopped crying. My father, I called him up. And he said, Junior, don't you worry about that. You just be the best shoeshine boy you can be.

DAN OLSON: Over the years, growing into teenager status and then young adult, how have you dealt with the anger of this country's persistent racism?

TOM TIPTON: Well, if I may say this, I went back down to the White House the next day. And I stood at the gate and I looked and I said, one of these days, I'll walk into that White House, and they'll call me Mr. Tipton.

And so at nine years old, I'm shining shoes outside the White House. But at 59 years old, I was singing in the White House. So you call that shining in and shining out.

DAN OLSON: I want to know how Tom Tipton as a teenager and then as a young African-American man growing up in what is a white culture in this country, how you came to peace, make peace with being excluded, with not having as wide a range of opportunity as some.

TOM TIPTON: I would be remiss if I didn't tell you that I was not angry. But I also looked at other young, angry brothers like me at the time. And I had to make a decision.

I can't tell you that I was any better than them. I just knew that it was because of sports, basketball, football, and track that saved me. Because if I didn't do that, I would have been in jail because I would have been stealing, and I'd have been hating white people, and I would have been upset with white people.

But my grandfather was a head waiter at a country club, where there were rich white people there, who also called me Junior, but who found out that, gee, he is polite. [? Ed Lewis' ?] grandson is polite, and we like him. And these white people liked me. And of course, they had no hangups, they had no reason.

DAN OLSON: So when you counsel young African-American men who are excluded, who don't have some of the same opportunities as young white men, what do you say to them? Do you try to pass along your mother and father's advice? What do you say to them?

TOM TIPTON: I tell them to look inside themselves and realize that regardless as to what color they are, if they don't get an education, they can't get off the ground, that athletics just won't get it by itself. You have to be able to not split verbs. You have to be able to use your manners, have politeness about you, have integrity and character well built within you. From that, you have a shot at it regardless as to what color you are.

DAN OLSON: Gospel singer Tom Tipton. You're listening to Voices of Minnesota from Minnesota Public Radio. I'm Dan Olson. Later this hour, we talk with Laura MacKenzie, one of the country's best known traditional Celtic music artists. And we'll hear some of her music as well.

Tom Tipton has been singing since he was five years old. He credits athletics in high school, college and the military with helping him stay out of trouble. As a young adult, he was active in a Democratic party youth group. Senator Hubert Humphrey invited Tipton to come to Minnesota to work for the organization.

Tipton stayed in Minnesota, started a business. And on the side, sang and raised money for a variety of causes, including TCOIC, the former Twin Cities Opportunities Industrialization Center. Here's more of my conversation with Tom Tipton.

When did you start singing? When did you know you had a voice?

TOM TIPTON: I started singing when I was five years old. I started singing in a Baptist church, community and Baptist church. And my mother had me to sing a song called "I'm Working on the Building." It's a true foundation. I'm holding up the bloodstream banner for my Lord.

So I sung the song. I was sitting next to my six-year-old girlfriend. I'm 5 years old. And I did well. And the choir was happy. And the church was happy.

But the next Sunday, she said, the minister said, Lucille, my mother, that's her first name. I never called her by her first name, ask Junior to sing that song again. And for some strange, unholy reason, I said, no! And my mother slapped me from about here till about 20 feet over to that wall. And I've been singing the old hymns ever since.

DAN OLSON: Were your mother and father musical?

TOM TIPTON: My mother was a music teacher. She was a choir director. She knew and brought Mahalia Jackson into town when she first started. She brought Lou Rawls to town when he was still singing with the Pilgrim Travelers. She brought the Soul Stirrers to town when Sam Cooke was still with them. And she brought Ray Charles to town when he was still with the Five Blind Boys.

DAN OLSON: So you knew these legends?

TOM TIPTON: I knew these legends and Mahalia and many of James Cleveland and long after that. I knew the legends. I've slept in the lap of these legends. We had a quartet called the Golden Jubilaires.

So I couldn't help. Music was all around me, but I knew the legends. You name them from the old school, and I knew them.

DAN OLSON: So that was the musical outlet. You've stuck with sacred music. Or have you wandered into jazz?

TOM TIPTON: I sung jazz at the top of the Hilton in Saint Paul, Minnesota.

DAN OLSON: The devil's music?

TOM TIPTON: The devil's music? Yes, I did. I sung that with my pianist named Billy Wallace, a world-renowned pianist who played for Miles Davis and Dinah Washington.

And I own an agency at the time called Vanguard, advertising agency with clients like Pillsbury, Land O'Lakes, 3M, Control Data, Honeywell. I had been very fortunate because of a man named George Masco who allowed me to compete against BBDO, New York City, and the third largest Black-owned agency in America at the time.

And people said, well, why would you have a Black-owned agency in Minnesota? Well, this is where the business is. There were no Black people here, but Black people were across the country.

I was very fortunate. I lasted for 20 years in the business. I had 14 people on staff. And then the calling came when Hubert Humphrey passed away.

DAN OLSON: What brought you to Minnesota, Tom Tipton? How did you get here?

TOM TIPTON: I was working in the '68 campaign. I was president of the young Democrats. And I met Hubert in '72 again. And he asked me if I would come out to Minneapolis to help start an OIC program with the late Harry David Senior and Cecil Newman, who owned the Spokesman and Recorder newspaper. And I said, Senator, it's too cold. He said, you get some long underwear, and you come anyway.

And so I came out here. I was only going to stay one year. Then I was going to go back to Washington to run for Congress against Walter Fauntroy, who was my classmate at Dunbar High School. Fauntroy was lucky I didn't come back because my mother had a lock on all the Black churches.

Fauntroy was very happy because I told him, I said, Minnesota, there's something about this place. And the people, I said, they speak to you here, and they mean it. And it's cold. But there was a culture here of kindness, a culture of integrity, all the things that I had hoped for as a child that I would gain from that gate at the White House, so that I wouldn't hate and just love.

And so I came here in '72-- no, I came here in '68. And I stayed with my family here and my daughters. I have four grandsons now, by the way. But I fell in love with Minnesota. I fell in love with my two favorite mentors. One is Hubert Humphrey and the other Wheelock Whitney.

DAN OLSON: I'm sure white Minnesotans are very pleased to hear that you found a welcoming and warm and civil environment. You know better than I that-- perhaps Harry Davis, perhaps Cecil Newman and some of the others, maybe they found the same welcome, but maybe they also had other concerns about life as African-Americans in Minnesota.

TOM TIPTON: Well, I came here in '68 during the riots. And Dr. King had just been assassinated. There were riots on Plymouth Avenue, but it was like a little small torch compared to the rest of the country.

But I found that the business constituency here, the Daytons, the Pillsburys, these were families who cared. When I came here, General Mills--

DAN OLSON: Do you think that's still the case?

TOM TIPTON: No, it's changed.

DAN OLSON: What's changed?

TOM TIPTON: Well, what's changed is that they're no longer family-owned, as you well know. And so I'm not saying that they care any less. I just know that I was involved. The urban coalition was very heavy in those days, and they cared. And it's not so much putting their money where their mouth is, but they spoke about it and they talked about it.

And when I talk about the people, some names may escape me, the Kennedys from General Mills, I could give you 10 names, but they cared and they wanted to see change. And change was affected by their influence as white people in Wayzata.

When I put on the first big fundraiser for TCOIC, gospel music was being sung in the Black churches. I said, wait a minute, let's go to the white churches. So I went out to the Wayzata and asked the white folks, come on downtown to Dayton's. First time in history, came downtown and found out the tickets cost $15. They were glad to pay it.

I went to the Guthrie Theater, put on the play you probably heard of called Arturo Uy. Well, listen, the tickets were $10. I charged $25. They were glad. We raised $20,000.

White people care not so much because of their money, but because if they saw that you were trying, they tried and they cared. So we put on many gospel programs, gospel events, and OIC survived.

DAN OLSON: Tom Tipton, he sings many different styles of music, including some with lush orchestral arrangements in a pop mode when he's singing at the Crystal Cathedral in California, Tipton's other voice is that of a jazz stylist. Here he is singing an arrangement of the Thomas Dorsey gospel tune, "Precious Lord."

[TOM TIPTON, "PRECIOUS LORD"] Precious Lord take my hand

Lead me on let me stand

I'm so tired I am weak

And I am worn

Through the storm through the night

Lead me on to the light

Just take my. hand precious Lord Jesus

Lead you to dream on

DAN OLSON: 75-year-old gospel vocalist Tom Tipton is celebrating 50 years of performing with an event in Minneapolis this week. The Washington, D.C native has lived in Minnesota for 40 years.

One of Tom Tipton's big breaks came when the wife of televangelist, Robert Schuller, heard him sing in 1978 at Hubert Humphrey's funeral. She invited him to visit California, and Tipton has become a frequent performer on Schuller's Hour of Power broadcast.

Tom Tipton is active in Prison Fellowship Ministry, the group founded in 1976 by Chuck Colson, former presidential aide to Richard Nixon and a convicted Watergate conspirator. Before being sent to prison, Colson became a Christian. After being released from seven months behind bars, Colson founded the Prison Fellowship Ministry to help prisoners and their families. Here's more of my conversation with Tom Tipton.

How big a tool, how big a force has music been for you as an African-American man to strike up relationships with people? How big a force is it?

TOM TIPTON: Well, when Hubert Humphrey passed away, I had the honor of singing at his funeral, as you know, and that changed my life. I sat next to a lady named Arvella Schuller. And she said, if you're ever on the West Coast, would you come to be on my husband's program? Well, he happen to have been the speaker of that day with Nixon and Kissinger and Mondale and the whole bunch of folks there. And I said, yes, expecting to go up just one time to have a lot to tell my grandsons.

Well, just last Sunday, I was there for the Memorial service for next year. And that was my 105th television appearance in 29 years. Only one that has been there longer is Roger Williams. I've been affected by good people, most who happen to be white.

DAN OLSON: This is in the Crystal Cathedral.

TOM TIPTON: The Crystal Cathedral, Robert H. Schuller.

DAN OLSON: Yeah. And everyone, almost everyone likes music. And we all like to be in the presence of people making music. And then how much beyond that does it go? Have you found that your music has also been a pathway to establish real relationships? You mentioned the fundraisers for Twin Cities Opportunities Industrial Center. And that, of course, was a real bridge.

TOM TIPTON: Last night, I was at Maple Grove Junior High School. Last year, I was at Maple Grove Senior High School. I've been to many central Lutheran High schools, to private school. I take to those kids who see me and can see through me, to let them know that if I can get up off of my knees, you can too, to do whatever you want to do.

Music has been a huge part of my life because it has kept me alive. It has kept me with dignity. It has kept me with being able to pass on to my children the need to know that it's about caring and sharing.

DAN OLSON: Why did you get involved in prison fellowship?

TOM TIPTON: Chuck Colson. My god, look where he came from. Look where he went and look where he came back to. I've been involved with Chuck Colson for many, many years. We went to many prisons together.

I must tell you one quick story. I went to one prison. I don't know whether it was Folsom, but it was in California. And so the warden was only going to allow two people. He had his whole board of directors there. And I stood at the end of the line of 15 people. And the Reverend said, Chuck, you can only bring yourself and one other person in. I assumed he'd take in his chairman of the board. He looked all the way in the back and said, Tom, come on up here. I went into the prison with Chuck Colson.

And in the place where the people who are on death row for a good time had these bars and these mesh screens. And Chuck and I were there to minister to these people. He was going to preach, as I do, behind Billy Graham and Robert Schuller and what have you, and Peter Lindgren, my pastor here at Lord of Life. And I was going to maybe hum a hymn.

As we went down the jail cells, one by one, we were ministered to. They had more quotes from the Bible given to us than we could think of. When we finished walking out, as they had to carry Chuck out of the prison, he almost collapsed. And so did I. We were so touched by how these death row inmates-- Chuck would come to-- well, I hope I finished that. We were just touched by them.

I had been a part of several dinners for Chuck Colson, several here in Minnesota for fundraisers. I love and have a deep respect for him for one main reason. He knows the Lord, in spite of Watergate and in spite of what have you. He's a servant, incredible speaker. And I'd give my right arm for him any time.

DAN OLSON: We are at a record rate of imprisonment in this country. And there's some evidence that has brought crime down and maybe made many of us safer in our homes and communities. But it has also been really tough on a generation of people, disproportionately African-American. What are your thoughts about the money we're investing in prisons compared to money that could have been invested other ways?

TOM TIPTON: My thoughts are as follows. I have found that my brothers-- and I am a brother. Black as a pit from pole to pole with a Lutheran heart. My brothers, they have to go to school. You don't go to school, you're going to jail. Now. that's just cut and dry.

Now, we're filling up prisons, we're filling up prisons, and we're filling up more prisons. Some of my brothers don't seem to or want to understand, life is not going to give you anything that you don't earn. That's just common sense that my mother and father taught me. If you're going to steal or kill somebody, guess what? It's going to catch up with you sooner or later.

You can't live a life of drugs. The Cadillac, the Mercedes and the whole 9 yards, eventually will go away. To be a pimp is for a short time because you cannot-- God didn't create a body to be sold.

So therefore, what I'm saying to answer your question, and I guess I'm long-winded about it, is that my heart goes out to my brothers, on one hand, who are in the jails. But on the other hand, what did my father say to me? You cut your own bail, and you have to live with it. And I'm sorry. I regret that. But the songwriter says, the truth shall set you free.

DAN OLSON: Gospel vocalist Tom Tipton. You're listening to Voices of Minnesota on Minnesota Public Radio. I'm Dan Olson. Later this hour, a conversation with Laura MacKenzie, a Northfield native who is one of this country's foremost Celtic music artists.

Tom Tipton says his work these days is his ministry. Born a Baptist in Washington, DC 75 years ago, Tipton has lived in Minnesota for four decades. His spiritual and performing home is Lord of Life Lutheran Church in the Twin Cities suburb of Plymouth. Tipton performs before all kinds of groups, including young people and nursing home residents. Here's more of our conversation.

Are you pretty optimistic about the way things are going in the country, specifically for the country's youth? You were singing with young people last night. And you deal a lot with young people. Are you pretty satisfied or worried?

TOM TIPTON: I've been looking for an answer. I'm optimistic if they get an education. If they don't get an education, I'm not optimistic.

DAN OLSON: How are we doing on our ability as a culture and economy to supply the education that young people need?

TOM TIPTON: Well, I think we're slipping. I think we're slipping on it somewhat. I'm not going to try to talk about when I was growing up. When I was growing up, you had to go to school. You had to-- teachers, well, handled you!

But that's changed today. And I regret that. Now you can't say nothing out of the way to a teacher, and you get a lawsuit. Well, I think that's a problem. I think that's a challenge. I think teachers maybe need to get a little pay raise so you can get some of the better teachers.

I think that unless parents get glued to the children, and the teachers together, and build a stronger PTA, it won't get much better. And I'm talking all across the board. I'm not talking about just Black. I'm extremely proud. Even though I live in Maple Grove, I've been to 90 schools, I've been to Wayzata schools. And I'm not talking about because they're white. And in the city, there are some wonderful schools in the city. But they're tied to the parents and the PTA and the teachers. If that doesn't happen, you've got a problem.

I taught school for a year and gave it up right after I came out to Army. I said, no, this won't work because I was spending half my time kicking, spanking kids because they had no control. You know, as well as I do, Dan, that kids will take advantage if you let them.

But today, I think that we are too light on children. I think that we treat them too sweet to spoil. And I think that the goodness of the spoiling them is going to have reflection on how they respect their parents in years to come.

My mother was-- I'm 75 years old. And this day, I know she's looking down. And I still never called her Lucille. And my father, he came to my [? two ?] school one day when I wasn't acting right. Called me out at the room and said, Tom-- he used Thomas. And when he said, Thomas, I knew something was wrong. Please come down to the bathroom. And I said, yes, and then you kindly pull your pants down. I have a message for you. And he just tore me up. Best whipping I ever got in my life.

Now I do not agree with parents whipping their children. That's old time. That's old fashioned. But I think we've lost the discipline in many schools and homes across America. And we're going to have to pay for it in the long run.

DAN OLSON: Tom Tipton is willing to talk about any topic, raising children, religion, politics, you name it. His first love clearly is music. A couple of Tom Tipton CDs reflect what he says his mother, the music teacher, taught him, the old hymns. Here's a sampling of two of them.

[TOM TIPTON, "AND HE WALKS WITH ME"] And He walks with me

And He talks with me

And He tells me that I am his own

And the joy we share

As we tarry there

None ever has ever known

[TOM TIPTON, "SWEET HOUR OF PRAYER"] In seasons of distress and grief

My soul has often found relief

And oft escaped

The tempter's snare

By thy return, sweet hour of prayer

DAN OLSON: At 75, Tom Tipton keeps a busy performance schedule. When we talked, he had just returned from singing at the Crystal Cathedral Memorial Day service in California, which will be broadcast on the Hour of Power for next year's Memorial Day observance. Tipton says he has no plans to retire.

TOM TIPTON: I have decided in my life that if God has allowed me to live this long at 75 years old, that there must be a continuing calling upon me. And that calling is to never stop singing until he calls me home.

The calling upon me is to reach out and touch somebody. The calling upon me is to continue to serve. And as Martin, Dr. King said, if I can help somebody along the way, then my living shall not have been in vain.

DAN OLSON: Tom Tipton, thanks so much. What a pleasure to speak with you.

TOM TIPTON: It's been a pleasure to be with NPR, with you and my friend today. And I thank God that he's allowed me to live this long, that my grandchildren will be able to look back and say, our granddaddy was cool.

[TOM TIPTON, "HIS EYE IS ON THE SPARROW"] I sing because I'm happy Lord Jesus

And I sing because I'm free

His eye is on the sparrow

And I know, mother, I know

You told me

Son, our Lord

He watches me.

DAN OLSON: Gospel vocalist Tom Tipton singing "His Eye is on the Sparrow." You can see a photo of Tom Tipton and a video of him performing at minnesotapublicradio.org. You're listening to a special music edition of Voices of Minnesota from Minnesota Public Radio. I'm Dan Olson.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

It is going from church-based gospel music to pub-based traditional Irish music. A switch from the sacred to the profane? Maybe. However, many agree that Laura MacKenzie is a kind of high priestess of Celtic music. The Minnesota native and Saint Paul resident plays bagpipes, flute, whistle, and she sings.

As we speak, Laura MacKenzie is in England performing as a featured artist at a major traditional Celtic music festival. More on that in a bit. First, a sampling of Laura MacKenzie playing the whistle on a medley. "Jackson's", "The Queen of May" and "Sherlock's."

[WHISTLE PLAYING]

Laura MacKenzie was born and raised a town kid in Northfield, south of the Twin Cities. She is the youngest of three MacKenzie daughters.

LAURA MACKENZIE: My parents had a shop downtown on the Main Street, on Division Street. So they were small town shopkeepers, and we all helped out at the store.

DAN OLSON: What was the store? What did the store sell?

LAURA MACKENZIE: MacKenzie's Gifts. And it was a wonderful variety of everything, from tea and spices and candles to fine China.

DAN OLSON: Is it still there?

LAURA MACKENZIE: No, it's not. I think it's a subway shop now or something. [LAUGHS]

DAN OLSON: Laura MacKenzie says the family was not especially musical. She had a talent for flute in high school, discovered she also had a fine singing voice, and in college developed a deep affinity for traditional Irish and Scottish music. Here's a sample of MacKenzie's vocal talents as she applies them to "Dear Irish Boy."

[LAURA MACKENZIE, "DEAR IRISH BOY"] The soft, tuneful lark

Her notes change to morning

The dark screaming owl

Now impedes my night sleep

While lonely I walk in the shade of the evening

Till my Connor returns

I will never cease to weep

Smiling beguiling and cheering endearing

Together walked over

The mountains we strayed

With each other delighted

And fondly united

I have listened all day

To my dear Irish boy

DAN OLSON: Besides voice, flute, whistle and concertina, Laura MacKenzie is a bagpiper. In fact, she's not just any piper. MacKenzie is a featured artist at the International Bagpipe Blowout this week near Birmingham, in England. For the grand sounding name, international, truth is, it's mostly a British Isles event. However, to be invited is a big deal. It all started, MacKenzie says, with a gift from her late father.

LAURA MACKENZIE: One Christmas, I think it was when I was a senior in high school, there was an envelope on the tree with my name on it. And I opened it up, and there was $50 in it. From my dad, that was a lot of money. And it said, for bagpipes.

Now, we had never discussed this ever, never talked about bagpipes. Or I had never said I wanted to play them. I really had no interest at all. But I accepted it politely and graciously and thanked him and thought, boy, this is odd.

Well, he passed away a couple of years after that. And within a year's time after his passing, something flipped deep within me. And now I play a half a dozen different types of bagpipes.

DAN OLSON: Here's Laura MacKenzie in a bagpipe duet. The group Piper's Crow is just finishing up "Niel Gow's Lament for the Death of his Second Wife." And coming into "All the Night, I Lay with Jackie," where Laura is heard with another Minnesota bagpiper, Dick Hensold, in a duet with the artists playing Northumbrian smallpipes and the Scottish smallpipes.

[PIPER'S CROW, "NIEL GOW'S LAMENT FOR THE DEATH OF HIS SECOND WIFE/ALL THE NIGHT"]

You're listening to a special music edition of Voices of Minnesota from Minnesota Public Radio. I'm Dan Olson. Here's how Laura McKenzie developed her deep love of traditional Irish and Scottish music.

While attending Beloit College in Wisconsin, MacKenzie studied music and anthropology. To meet a college requirement, MacKenzie studied abroad. She landed in Edinburgh, Scotland, in the basement of a big university library. Her job was to listen to sound recordings of musicians playing traditional Scottish music and write down notes to music that in most cases had never been put to paper. Here's more of our conversation.

LAURA MACKENZIE: I got myself set up at the School of Scottish Studies in Edinburgh at the Edinburgh University. Worked in the archives, spent four months doing that. And there is where I met not only the academics in traditional music, but actual real players of traditional music. And it just took me, it took me completely.

And I got back to Beloit, and I did not have the heart to continue with my classical studies. I canceled my recitals and very quickly got together all the credits to finish in anthropology, and I left the music department. I couldn't do classical, staged music any longer.

DAN OLSON: What do you think it was about the traditional Scottish music that caught you?

LAURA MACKENZIE: Well, it was the music itself, the nuance, and the intricacies of it, were of interest in a challenging way. But also, it was the culture that held it that appealed to me so much.

DAN OLSON: When Laura MacKenzie was sitting in that basement room at the library in Edinburgh, listening to all of those sound recordings of traditional Scottish musicians and making musical scores, she already knew that writing down the notes for traditional Celtic music doesn't mean that's how the tunes are played. Here's more of our conversation.

LAURA MACKENZIE: I would have to half-speed the tapes to understand the ornamentation. Actually, that's what got me hooked. I did that in order to transcribe the music, and I saw the incredible beauty and also the patterns emerging. And I understood how this was done. And that's what really got me hooked.

DAN OLSON: So not to get too deep into the ethnomusicology here, Laura, because I'm already way over my head, but how would you explain the Scottish system of the music you were notating as compared to, well, some other Western European classical music we might be familiar with?

LAURA MACKENZIE: There is no theory telling you how to play it. You just do it. You learn it by listening and watching, not from a piece of paper. Much of the music is made up of different types of dance tunes. And in Scotland, the particularly Scottish one is the strathspey. And of course, there's reels and jigs as well.

And then there are the slow airs. And the slow airs can have any kind of form imaginable. But the dance tunes do have very regular forms. And it's like the Irish, sort of eight-bar phrases.

I'm going to pick up the tin whistle here. I'll leave the flute for a minute. I will just show you, if I may, I'll play a bit of an Irish dance tune, as if, say, you didn't know anything about the music, but you loved it. And you picked up a book of transcriptions, and you were reading this out of the book. The notes you're reading, and you it might just sound like this.

[WHISTLE PLAYING]

Which is a sweet little tune. But that to me isn't something that would make me want to get up and dance. You know what I mean. That's a slip jig known as "The Honeybee." But here it is if I add some Irish style ornamentation and see if you think it sounds a little more buoyant, like it would make you want to do a step.

[WHISTLE PLAYING]

Anyway.

DAN OLSON: I'm watching your fingers, and can you just do that a little bit more then?

[WHISTLE PLAYING]

And I'm looking. This is now about a 12 or 13-inch long piece. It's tapered slightly, Laura.

LAURA MACKENZIE: Yes.

DAN OLSON: What else would you say about it? How many holes?

LAURA MACKENZIE: Six holes.

DAN OLSON: Six holes.

LAURA MACKENZIE: Uh-huh. Only on the front. No thumb holes. So it's not like a recorder. You can only get a really basic scale.

DAN OLSON: And your fingers are pretty tight there. There's not a lot of room for fooling around.

LAURA MACKENZIE: No.

DAN OLSON: You're jammed in.

LAURA MACKENZIE: That's right.

DAN OLSON: So in the hierarchy of Irish and Scottish and traditional musicians from the Isles, who are the king and queen? Are the fiddlers the kings and queens? Are the flute players, the whistle players the kings and queens?

LAURA MACKENZIE: Hmm. That changes over time. I think when I was first learning Irish music, fiddle was the king or queen. But in the last, I don't know, decade or so, the flute has been coming up strong. And now, the internationally famous touring trad bands are often flute-driven, more so than fiddle-driven.

DAN OLSON: Well, see, there you were again at the leading edge of a trend. I can't resist asking you if you care to do something on the wooden flute, that beautiful piece of wood.

LAURA MACKENZIE: Sure.

[FLUTE PLAYING]

That's just a little taste of a slow air.

DAN OLSON: Laura MacKenzie. You're listening to a special music edition of Voices of Minnesota on Minnesota Public Radio. I'm Dan Olson. The Minnesota State Arts Board has bestowed on MacKenzie the title of Master Folk Artist. And she's won a coveted McKnight Foundation Performing Fellowship. She's traveled and performed with many of the world's best known traditional Celtic music groups.

In a departure from traditional Celtic music, Laura MacKenzie toured and played nine years with another famous Minnesotan pianist, Lorie Line. The Lorie Line tours took MacKenzie to a different city every night in big shows with lights and multiple costume changes, in front of audiences numbering in the thousands.

LAURA MACKENZIE: I believe she initially invited me to play or to join in because of the great rise in interest in Celtic music, driven by the Riverdance show, which a lot of people were interested in. And so I joined in on flute and pipes and such.

And it didn't take long before I was incorporated into the larger show. And I was able to do the dancing and the choreographies and all the other fun stuff and the 15 costume changes during the show and the six weeks on the road, different city every night. And once I figured out how to manage the road life, I thrived on it.

DAN OLSON: A lot of sequins and dazzling stuff?

LAURA MACKENZIE: Lots of amazing stuff, incredibly complex costumes. I think the last tour I was on, I think I changed costume six or seven times, including shoes and jewelry and hair. Each of those changes involved hair changes as well.

So it was a busy show. Not only were you playing music all night, but you were just literally running backstage to change costumes and shoes.

DAN OLSON: Lots of Velcro.

LAURA MACKENZIE: No!

DAN OLSON: No?

LAURA MACKENZIE: Very little Velcro.

DAN OLSON: Oh my god.

LAURA MACKENZIE: No, her costume people really didn't believe much in Velcro. Lots of zippers, and we had to manage our own. And so it was really fun. I enjoyed that. It was a very-- it was athletic doing those shows, and they were great fun. I enjoyed it.

I'm a bit unusual making a living, which is amazing, be playing mainly traditional music. So the way I've gone about it is really different than someone who's trying to make it in a little more defined fields, like pop music or classical music.

My favorite things to do are kind of smallish town concert series, small town renovated auditoriums with the greatest audiences on earth. And then I get to do lots of studio work. People call me in as a guest artist on various projects, be they personal art statements or commercial projects.

DAN OLSON: Do you mean like advertising jingles or things like that? Do you remember one where we would hear Laura MacKenzie? Are you free to talk about it? Or are you under contract to silence? You must not speak.

LAURA MACKENZIE: No. Sometimes when you go in and do those jobs, you're never quite sure where they end up.

DAN OLSON: Right. But potato chips, ice cream--

LAURA MACKENZIE: We did something for-- it was a coffee creamer. [LAUGHS] They had an Irish-flavored one and a French-flavored one and that sort of thing.

DAN OLSON: So somewhere North America on some TV or radio station, we can hear you.

LAURA MACKENZIE: Yeah.

DAN OLSON: That's a great story. Were you playing flute or whistle? Do you remember?

LAURA MACKENZIE: Let's see. I might have been playing concertina and whistle. Yeah. But I've even done some singing on commercial things because I could sort of-- I favor the Sean Nos, we call the old style of singing, which is unaccompanied and again, ornamented.

DAN OLSON: Laura Mackenzie says she loved the glamor and the rush of being on tour. However, she says her most transporting musical experience was not part of any big show or major stage performance. It was with one other player, a traditional Irish flute player she met years ago. MacKenzie got a tape of his music, learned the tunes, and then traveled to Ireland to find him and play with him.

LAURA MACKENZIE: It was with one of my heroes of Irish flute playing, an older fellow in County Sligo, Packie Duignan, who'd been a coal miner all his life. And he was retired and just going around playing the flute at sessions in pubs.

And I had, with my little cassette recorder, taped some of his tunes one year. And the next year, I went over, and I somehow got into cahoots with him and was rambling around the countryside, playing in pubs just for fun with him.

And he didn't talk much at all. He had very, very few words. But he understood that I knew his music. And he'd be asked to-- say, Packie, give us a tune. And he'd start one. And he'd give me a little nod, and I'd start playing with him. And then he'd go into the next tune. These tunes are usually played in medleys, a string of several. And I would know which tune he was going to go into. And we laid into it together with no rehearsal, as we call it.

And I just felt like I was just flying above the planet. And it didn't matter who was there or who heard, but it just meant so much to me that I could do that with him and that he appreciated it and knew how deeply grateful I was to him for his music.

DAN OLSON: Laura MacKenzie, thanks so much for coming in. Appreciate your time. What a privilege to speak with you.

LAURA MACKENZIE: Thank you.

[LAURA MACKENZIE, "PIPER ON HORSEBACK"]

DAN OLSON: Traditional Celtic vocalist, bagpiper, whistle and flute and concertina player, Laura MacKenzie. You can see a picture of MacKenzie and learn more about her career at minnesotapublicradio.org. And at the same web address, you'll also find a photo and a video of Tom Tipton, who we heard from earlier this hour.

You've been listening to a special music edition of Voices of Minnesota. I'm Dan Olson, Minnesota Public Radio News, Saint Paul.

[CELTIC MUSIC]

MIKE EDGERLY: And one final note, by the way, that event for Tom Tipton, celebrating 50 years in music and his 75th birthday, is tomorrow night at DeLaSalle high school in Downtown Minneapolis.

You can visit minnesotapublicradio.org for our link to learn more. And you can find the link to Laura MacKenzie's web page for her performing schedule at minnesotapublicradio.org.

[CELTIC MUSIC]

And you are listening to Minnesota Public Radio News, including KNWF 91.5 in Fergus Falls. A wet day all across the region today. Flooding, a possibility throughout the state of Minnesota.