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USS Dwight D. Eisenhower’s (CVN 69) talent show “Ike’s Got Talent” started with nearly 30 competitors in its first round in March—aiming to showcase the plethora of gifts and abilities aboard the aircraft carrier.
Among the singers, dancers and musicians who were voted off in the first three rounds, three competitors remained to sing their hearts out to the judges and win over the closely-packed crowd of Sailors on the mess decks. One of the final contestants who had a chance to win the competition was Aviation Electrician’s Mate Airman Corbin Stroup.
After hearing Stroup sing, one might believe he’s been singing his whole life. However, he has only been singing since his sophomore year of high school when his brother-in-law, who has been singing his whole life, wanted him to sing along while he played the piano. Stroup said he gave in to his brother-in-law’s pressure and started singing and realized he sounded decent.
“We entered a talent show a couple weeks later,” said Stroup. “We did a Shinedown song and we won. After that I started singing a bunch, and I started singing a lot in church.”
Even though Stroup didn’t start singing until he was older, he dipped his toes into the musical world when he started playing the drums in church when he was seven years old. After he saw other people playing guitar he said he felt the need to learn guitar next.
“I started learning it, and I got frustrated,” said Stroup. “Obviously as a 14-year-old kid I’d get upset every single time I couldn’t play well. I took six months of lessons and was like I don’t want to do this anymore.”
After quitting guitar lessons, he eventually started back up teaching himself to play. Stroup said he thinks it came down to the people he was surrounded by and because there was a lot of music around the house due to his sister playing the piano and singing and his younger sister playing violin. Music eventually evolved into a way for Stroup to relieve stress playing music from bands like AC/DC and Mötley Crüe for around four hours a day.
Stroup said he doesn’t really listen or play that much music anymore aside from songs he memorizes for church, but “Ike’s Got Talent” shined a different light on his outlook about music.
“This kind of brought an aspect of maybe I have something to say,” said Stroup.
Stroup said he decided to participate in the talent show because he’s competitive, but also believes that everyone’s been given a gift.
“I think God makes everyone with certain abilities and gifts, and I think it’s our job to steward those things,” said Stroup. “As I observed people around me in my life, you see the outcome of people who have gifts and neglect them, and people who have them and they steward them.”
Even though not all Stroup’s songs have a story behind them, bringing people into a story and using music to break down an emotional barrier is something that Stroup loves to do.
“It’s not just singing a song but what’s my mindset around the song?” said Stroup. “Why am I singing it? You put these words into a melody and for some reason it starts working in people, versus if I got up there and I just read off the lyrics from a piece of paper. I think it’d be a huge disservice if I didn’t use that gift to bring other people joy and show other people the love that’s been shown to me.”
Stroup’s performances, even if just for a few minutes, offered up an opportunity to take listeners’ minds off of work or other stressors in their life, especially with the coronavirus going on back home.
“People get to enjoy the moment and they forget everything else that’s going on because they’re focused on what I’m singing or what the song’s saying; I think that’s what brings me the most joy. It’s not just about me, or me winning—it’s about what I can give to people in a short amount of time.”
Stroup said he thought that winning “Ike’s Got Talent” would be great, but at the end of the day, winning would help give him a platform to speak and build relationships with other people
Performing in the talent show and connecting with the audience was something small that Stroup could look forward to every few weeks during his performances. In the final round of the talent show, Stroup performed an original song—the first time he ever completed a song fully. He said it was more special because he felt like it spoke to people.
Stroup wrote the chorus of his song last year while he was away from his wife on temporarily assigned duty in Virginia for six months and recently completed the rest of the lyrics because the judges wanted to see something that was more of himself.
“It’s funny how the song has been written predominately when I’ve been away from her because it’s easy,” said Stroup. “At the end of the day I realized I was just missing the small things. Just coming home and having her there. We love dancing and having little romantic nights, so it wasn’t hard for me [to write]. The words just kind of came together, and I threw the chorus in there that I wrote last year and I thought it was perfect.”
Stroup said he told his wife that he never thought about doing music as a side gig until deployment, and never thought about singing outside of church. However, upon return from deployment he’s considering recording his original song to steward his gift and connect with others.
| Date Taken: | 04.16.2020 |
| Date Posted: | 12.31.2020 17:28 |
| Story ID: | 386317 |
| Location: | US |
| Web Views: | 59 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
This work, A Man With a Message, by PO1 Sophie Pinkham, identified by DVIDS, must comply with the restrictions shown on https://www.dvidshub.net/about/copyright.
