Singer still belts out tunes
<p>Nyla Prosser is 90 years young and is still singing. Prosser said she has been singing ever since she was a small child. </p>
SUPERIOR - Ever since she was a young girl, Nyla Prosser has been singing along with her sister Rita.
Together, the two have been singing duets as part of the Sweethearts of Harmony since the 1930s.
That is until Rita died at the age of 97 in early April. Since then, Prosser has been forced to sing solo for the first time in her life.
Prosser grew up in North Dakota living in a log cabin with her two brothers and three sisters.
She didn’t come from a musically challenged family. Her father used to play the fiddle and accordion. She said no one in her family ever had special training; they just practiced balancing out harmony with each other.
Growing up, Prosser recalls living like pioneers since her family had no electricity. For entertainment, she and her siblings would sing while doing household chores.
“Everyone in the 1920s and 1930s before World War II lived the same,” Prosser said. “We grew everything we ate.”
As a child, the Grand Ole Opry and western style music inspired her, as did church hymns.
“We didn’t have radio or anything so we made our own music,” Prosser said.
Without a musical family that encouraged singing, there is no telling if Prosser would be able to share her gift with everyone around her.
Prosser and Rita’s big break came in the 1930s after they had contacted a radio station in their native state of North Dakota for an audition. After being invited down, they ended up being broadcast over the radio.
Ever since they were deemed the Sweethearts of Harmony, a name that was given to them after a radio contest.
“It was fun and we never got paid for it,” Prosser said. “It’s a God-given gift.”
The girls didn’t write their own songs, but performed regularly during a half-hour radio program singing at least five different songs.
In 1963, Prosser’s doctor feared she would never talk again after a tumor was removed from her vocal cords.
“I couldn’t really sing for a lot of years,” Prosser said. “It wasn’t cancer, but I had a high voice and a low voice with nothing in between.”
Prosser said that one day she was singing in church and all of a sudden she could sing again. She took that as a sign from the heavens that she was meant to continue with her singing.
One of her favorite singing performances came during a Christmas concert at the church.
She sang Come All Ye Faithful, and remembered watching everyone’s faces in the crowd and saw they were singing along.
“You couldn’t have given them a better Christmas gift than to sing like that,” Prosser said.
These days Prosser has grown a fan base at her church, the Superior Assembly of God. She has been actively recording CDs in Chuck Seward’s home studio. Seward was recruited by other churchgoers for his musical expertise. Between Prosser, Seward and pianist Lorraine Moyer, the group plays together regularly in the studio. Prosser said she has a list of at least 25 people who already want a recording.
When not recording, Prosser also sings and plays the organ at church every Sunday during offering.
“To me, my sister is always standing with me even when I’m singing alone,” Prosser said. “Me and my sister had so many habits when we were singing. Sometimes we would grin at each other. But it felt like she was with me when I sang at her funeral. It felt like closure for me because we were both the Sweethearts of Harmony.”