Music is an incredible connector during all phases of life, including tragedy. In June, our community lost Minnesota state Rep. Melissa Hortman and her husband Mark in a senseless act of violence.

More about the Hortmans from MPR News

• Read more: DFL Leader Melissa Hortman: A political force known for ambitious goals, adept ways
• Read more: ‘Always had Melissa’s back’: Friends, family remember Mark Hortman as smart, funny, fierce protector

The Hortmans were also music lovers. Mark was a devoted fan of The Current, and he introduced the station to his children. He loved discovering new artists like King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard alongside his favorites, like Cake, Soul Coughing, and Led Zeppelin. Melissa’s favorite band was ABBA. 

At 8 a.m. on the morning of Wednesday, Aug. 6, the Hortmans’ children, Colin and Sophie, joined The Current’s Morning Show to share songs and stories that embody their parents’ spirit and memory. (Listen to the full program using the audio player above.)

In June, a representative for the Hortmans reached out to MPR. In the note they stated, “I don’t know if you watched any of the funeral, but the family friend who spoke at the end talked about their different tastes in music: ‘I thought to close my remarks today with a quote from a song, but Melissa liked ABBA and Mark liked Led Zeppelin, and it takes a smarter person than I am to reconcile those two musical traditions.’ Colin told me that if there are any people who can reconcile those two things, it’s the brilliant people at The Current.”

During Colin and Sophie’s visit, they shared many of their musical memories and the songs that accompany those memories. Colin and Sophie also discussed what The Current meant to their dad and to them. The result is an eight-song playlist interwoven with memories from the Hortman family.

Gotye “Somebody that I Used to Know”

Colin Hortman: We wanted to celebrate our parents' memory, Mark and Melissa Hortman, through music, and talk about what it means to us and how much The Current has influenced our life.

Sophie Hortman: We grew up in a really musical house. I think every time I would go over to my parents' house, there was something playing over the radio. I think Dad started listening to The Current, I mean, must have been like 2010s.

Colin Hortman: Earlier than that, probably. I don't remember a time when The Current wasn't the one thing that was dialed or locked in on the radio station. He had 89.3 and only 89.3 on his car radio.

Sophie Hortman: Yeah, he would listen to it a lot. I think he loved The Current because he felt like it kept him in touch with what was happening in our local music scene. And he loved going to see live music, so discovering people who were playing locally and what was cool around us, I think, was something really special for him.

Colin Hortman: And what was going on, too, because The Current always talks about what shows you can see, how to get to them, and where tickets are, and he even won a pair of tickets one time.

Sophie Hortman: I love that. One of the coolest things that I remember about him listening to The Current was, oh, gosh, I don't remember what year it was. I was in high school. He came into my room. I was hanging out with my best friend, and he said, "You guys, I have to show you this cool song." And he played Gotye, "Somebody That I Used to Know." He pulled it up for us, and he played it. And I was like, "This is so weird and funky." And sure enough, like, a month later, it was on the charts. And I thought, "Oh, this is cool now, now that it's gaining traction, love it." But he was ahead of the curve on that one, for sure.

Colin Hortman: I think you definitely learned that song from The Current. And then I think when he showed us, one of the reasons we thought it was kind of funky and kind of fun was the music video. Because I think he showed it with the music video.

Sophie Hortman: Very strange.

Led Zeppelin “Rock and Roll”

Colin Hortman: I think music, like, really connected [my dad] and I, and like, our music interests were nearly perfectly aligned. All my memories with my dad of listening to music together were in the car or at a live music show, a concert.

The next song that's coming up is "Rock and Roll" by Led Zeppelin. It was definitely his favorite band. And my dad loved his speaker systems. And with his first paycheck, he went out and bought a pair of speakers and spent his whole paycheck on it, and struggled pay rent the next month. Those speakers are what Sophie and I are listening on now. I remember one of the reasons why he loves "Rock and Roll" is that there's so many different musical instruments, and that's something he really cared about in his speaker setup, that you could hear the highs and the lows and the mids, and the speakers did a great job of clarifying it all.

Soul Coughing “Buddha Rhubarb Butter”

Sophie Hortman: My mom and dad met when they were both living in Washington, D.C. They had signed up to mentor a student, and they both were in the waiting room, waiting to be assigned to a student to tutor. And apparently my father calculated this. When my mom stood up to turn in her form, he strategically stood up right after her, so that their forms would be next to each other, and they were paired up to mentor the same young student. They actually met while volunteering. And if I'm not mistaken, their first date was at a comedy club in Washington, D.C., which is amazing.

Colin Hortman: I do know Dad rushed. He saw how they were pairing people up, and he saw "that cute girl over there," and that was Melissa. And so Mark rushed to do his whole application. And so he did calculate it, but he rushed it. He might not have finished it, but he was paired up with her.

Sophie Hortman: He timed it. We're really excited to listen to "Buddha Rhubarb Butter" by Soul Coughing. My dad loved Soul Coughing. I think it was, for sure, one of his favorite bands. And I think that this song especially reminds me of riding in the back of the car. A song would start on the radio, and he would turn around and he would say, "I'll give you a quarter if you can tell me who sings this." And I would always, always get Soul Coughing wrong. I don't know why. I feel like I should have gotten that one right.

Colin Hortman: Another reason I know my dad loved this song is how much he loved rhubarb and growing rhubarb and cooking rhubarb custard pies. “Rhubarb” — it is a good word. I think also some of the funky noises in the song and the vocals, Dad was really into the funky flows through this whole song.

Cake “The Distance”

Colin Hortman: My dad, Mark Hortman, loved "The Distance" by Cake. Cake was the band that he saw the most in concert of any band out of all of his favorites. He got to see them the most this year. We saw Cake at the Vetter Stone Amphitheater in Mankato in May.

I got my dad to go to this concert because it was a free ticket to Cake. We were going to be a vendor for kettle corn for Auntie Wendy's Kettle Corn. And that's my fiancée's family business. I told him that he could go and we'd just give him a shirt so that he'd just be let into the venue. But we made him work the whole time because we couldn't stop popping kettle corn. We couldn't sell it fast enough, and we got front, basically front row seats at the the top, so we had a line of sight on them the whole time. So I lived up to my promise that you got to see Cake the whole time we were working.

Sophie Hortman: I feel like Cake is one of the bands that he could actually sing along to. He really couldn't sing. But I feel like with Cake, you can kind of just speak the lyrics. So this song in particular, I feel like I can see him singing along.

Colin Hortman: Can see him bobbing his head. He's like, sitting back there, "going the distance." Whether he was in the back of the car or driving, he was singing along to the songs, for sure.

ABBA “Dancing Queen”

Sophie Hortman: When I think of my mom, I think of her dancing. She was so happy and full of joy. And I think being able to move her body and feel in tune with music and let go, she loved it. She would listen to music when she would cross-country ski in the mornings. She would go on what she called disco walks, just walking around the block and listening to disco. She was constantly listening to music and singing along. And it was just joy.

Colin Hortman: I think the disco walks, but it was also disco skiing, too; like, she would go out for disco skis sometimes.

Sophie Hortman: Yeah, one of my mom's favorite songs was "Dancing Queen" by ABBA. She loved ABBA [Gold: Greatest Hits]. Top album of all time. But dancing to this song, I remember when I turned 17. At my birthday, she made a point to play this song, and we danced in the living room to "Dancing Queen." I couldn't wait to be 17 because of this song. I thought it was very cool.

Colin Hortman: I think another memory I have of "Dancing Queen" is every single wedding pretty much plays this song. She would drag us out, no matter if we were sitting down or in the back, she'd come find us. 

Sophie Hortman: She was a dancer at weddings.

Colin Hortman: Yeah, a big dancer. And she got us into it, too.

Prince “Raspberry Beret”

Colin Hortman: One of our mom's favorite artists was Prince. The next song we're gonna be listening to is "Raspberry Beret."

Sophie Hortman: Prince was her first crush. I don't think you could be a teenager in the '80s without having a crush on Prince. So this song, I hear her singing, she also could not sing. Neither of them could sing very well.

Colin Hortman: I don't think any of us can.

Sophie Hortman: No, no one can sing. But I think this song in the car, it's very fun to drive to this song. I think I can picture her in the blue minivan singing really loud to "Raspberry Beret."

Yaz “Situation”

Colin Hortman: I had actually just heard this story for the first time from my sister. One of the reasons this song reminds us of our mom, Melissa, was that she used to clean her apartment in D.C. [to this song], and I had never heard this.

Sophie Hortman: Yeah, so my mom lived in Washington, D.C., after college, and she would put on Upstairs at Eric's by Yaz, and she would clean her apartment. And it's such a great album, and you can totally see cleaning to this. It's the perfect beat to get you moving.

Van Morrison “Moondance”

Colin Hortman: We wanted to celebrate the memory of our parents, Mark and Melissa Hortman, through music. All the love and joy that they brought into the world — and in how my mom listened to music and how my dad listened to music — it would always put a smile on their faces. We're trying to do things that put a smile on other people's faces and remember them by the things that brought smiles to people's faces. That's how they lived their whole lives, bringing smiles to other people's faces.

Sophie Hortman: I think they were also very intentional. We were really lucky and really happy. They were really careful about making sure that they did, you know, magic with what they could offer the world. So I think being purposeful and being careful about bringing joy to the people around you. I think something that's really important is protecting joy and protecting beauty. I think public radio and stations like The Current are so important to make sure that we all have chances to dance, we all have chances to sing, and celebrate what brings us together. When I think about Mom and Dad, that's what I think about, is community, connecting with your neighbors, and turning on the radio to some really good music.

Colin Hortman: It was kind of how they knew to give back to the community. And they both had such large communities on their own, and such large communities together, and music brought them together.

Sophie Hortman: You can't have a party without music. This song, "Moondance," by Van Morrison, was important to my parents because they loved to dance with each other. And I think this song is exactly about that. They had a great CD collection. I remember this CD being put on and my parents dancing to "Moondance" in our basement together.

Colin Hortman: I think across all of their musical differences, they could always come together on Van Morrison. That was always something that they could listen to and dance together.

Credits

Executive Producer – Lindsay Kimball
Producer – Derrick Stevens
Host – Jill Riley
Digital Production – Reed Fischer, Natalia Toledo, Luke Taylor
Special thanks to Ted Modrich, Senior Advisor to the Speaker Emerita, and to Minnesota state Rep. Zack Stephenson