Words and music by David LaMotte
© 2004, Lower Dryad Music/ASCAP
December 28, 2004, Alamogordo, NM
Tuning: G G D G B D, capo fourth fret
This song was originally recorded on David LaMotte’s 2006 album “Change.”
To buy this song from CD Baby, click here: Change
To buy this song from iTunes, click here: Change
To listen to this song, click here: History Teacher
High school basketball, Friday night
Little kids playing under the bleachers
And the coach is a history teacher
Nothing looks great under fluorescent lights
But the home team’s looking half-decent tonight
That one’s my nephew, which boy is yours?
Number twelve, he’s one of the new guys
And his age is the same as his shoe size
Little boys watching their brothers
Strutting and trying to look tougher
Hoping they’ll grow tall enough for
High school basketball, Friday night
And we can’t understand the gym speakers
But the coach is a history teacher
Do you see 23? That whole row is his relatives
His Mom looks sad, sitting over there next to his
Red-faced Dad, trying to hold back the expletives
The kid’s not bad, but he’s not resurrecting his
Dad’s old broken dreams
See how he screams
Three generations in tow
His grandfather almost went pro
And it looks like the roots will take hold
So it’s root, root, root for the home team
‘Cause if they don’t win he’ll be shamed
It’s not only a game
It’s high school basketball Friday night
Hear the shouts and the squeaks of the sneakers
And the coach is a history teacher
Yeah, the coach is a history teacher
And by the way…
This song began with the realization that my nephew Nate had rendered meaningless the old admonition to “act your age, not your shoe size” by wearing size fifteen shoes at age fifteen. The song certainly isn’t about him, though, or his wonderfully supportive parents.