Music provides the bridge: My interview with pianist Rule Beasley

Rule Beasley life long Jazz and Classical Pianist and teacher at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church on April 28.

Editor’s Note - Our Aaron Girdham pulls his Almost Famous move by scoring an interview with Rule Beasley just before a May 2 Tribute Concert to the American Composer living right here in The Dalles. Taylor Carrell, a Master of Music student recently uncovered a copy of Beasley’s handwritten manuscript of “Concerto for Tuba and Band” and performed it at Northwestern State University on March 7.

By Aaron Girdham and photos by Ann Marie Woolsey

The Dalles, Ore., April 30, 2026 — I usually take evening walks past St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in The Dalles, but on a few slow mornings I’ve passed by as well. I would always have to stop on the morning walks though, when I reached the church.

In the air, the breeze carried the sound of slow, methodical, and soulful piano music. I would take a few minutes to listen next to the small rose garden outside, then proceed with my walk.

I never really wondered who was playing those slow pieces.

I should have…

Meeting Rule Beasley

When I was scheduled to interview Rule Beasley, a jazz pianist, this week at St. Paul’s, I had a hunch I knew exactly who it would be—at least by his music. I was excited to see the face behind the morning songs. The church was again surrounded by loose piano notes as I walked up. In a dim corner of the sanctuary, a single light spotted the piano as swaying hymns filled the room of stained glass windows.

A Jazz jam over a few of the classic songs taught me some fluid essentials of the music. - Aaron Girdham

I brought my acoustic guitar in a magnetic musical curiosity. Hearing the music, I knew there was an endless road of rhythmic intellect conveyed through the piano keys. Rule and I sat down to play a few songs before we talked, including: Laura in the key of C, What Is This Thing Called Love in C as well, and ’S Wonderful in E-flat—an interview in blue.

Rule Raids the Record Store

Rule Beasley is 94, and lives a life in orbit around music.

It seems it was always so.

Starting with piano lessons at age six, he picked up jazz at fifteen, then saxophone for high school marching band, and clarinet and bassoon a short time after that.

Rule’s father owned an all-purpose music shop in Texarkana, AR, to which Rule was “free to raid for jazz records”, he said. Out of those records Rule found inspiration from musicians Lenny Tristano, Oscar Peterson, Bud Powell, Dave Brubeck, and George Shearing.

But Rule said his main inspiration came from his mother, who taught him classical piano, and from his high school band teacher Raymond Brandon who showed him how to play in a large band setting.

This left him, as he said, with “one foot in the jazz world and the other in the classical world. I kind of go back and forth between them, then other times both at the same time.”

College, Man

Out of high school, Rule studied music at three separate colleges: Southern Methodist University, University of Illinois, and the Juilliard School in New York.

His career started during his service in the US Army, where he played with the Fourth Army Band. He said he would arrange the jazz pieces for the unit. After his discharge, Rule was hired by Centenary College in Shreveport, Louisiana as a music professor from 1958-1965. During this time, Rule said he would play at jazz gigs, jazz clubs, formal dinner settings, big bands, and dance halls in his spare time. He was also invited to play stage performances with high level musicians Buddy DeFranco, Phil Woods, Al Cohn, and Tex Beneke.

He moved to to the University of North Texas to teach from 1965-1975 and then Santa Monica College, 1975-1993.

Rule taught jazz standards, improvisation, classical, music theory, and counterpoint - a way of writing music where two or more independent melodies are played at the same time, and they still sound good together.

Rule the Composer

It was fun to watch these two musicians jam. The maestro was very fluid and even had a few tips for the new kid on the block. In turn, Aaron amazed him with the trove of music that could be pulled up on an Iphone! Decades apart, they were one with the music!- Ann Marie Woolsey

Rule started arranging and composing many pieces while he was a professor at the University of North Texas.

“I was really a self-taught arranger, I just watched what the other guys were doing…” he said. “It’s just a life of being in music. Teaching music, analyzing music. It all goes into your brain then comes out as a composition.”

When he moved to The Dalles twenty-five years ago to be closer to son Paul and his wife Lida, Rule started arranging the music for St. Paul’s Episcopal Church each Sunday. He said, “St. Paul’s is my second home… I come here every morning to play piano.”

Rule was able to pass the torch of jazz to his son, John Beasley who has won two Grammy Awards for his compositions Donna Lee and Bird Lives. John played with artists like Miles Davis, Chaka Khan, Sergio Mendes, and Freddie Hubbard. He now tours worldwide with his ensemble Monk’estra and several other jazz groups and big bands from around the world.

When I asked Rule how he would describe music, he quickly smiled and thought for a moment. “Well, music is the sound that God makes. He puts it into people, but God makes it.”

This Saturday, May 2nd Rule Beasley will be giving a piano concert dinner party at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, 4 to 6 p.m. I would suggest attending this performance. Rule continues to be a music inspiration each day, mastering and knowing his instrument in an intimate and wondrous style.