PERRY: Elijah McClain became a melody for change on Sunday

Elijah McClain’s family, friends and a few hundred supporters he never met while he was alive gathered Sunday on a football field to mix some joy and sorrow.

After a year filled with millions of words, tweets and tears, Sunday called for an evening of music, family friend Candice Bailey told the couple hundred of people who turned out for A Gathering in Gratitude behind the Montbello Recreation Center in Denver. 

It’s been an increasingly tumultuous 12 months since Elijah’s Aug. 24 encounter with Aurora police turned deadly. On Sunday, Elijah’s family wanted a tribute to their son and their cause.

A much larger protest had been planned to begin at a massive Aurora soccer complex. It was canceled last week by Elijah’s mother, Sheneen McClain. Sheneen said Elijah’s memory and cause had been hijacked by the callous and the violent who were capitalizing on Elijah’s tragic fate and the plight of Black Americans. She said the relentless social media memes repeating the last words of Elijah captured on police officer body cameras were fruitless.

“It’s not okay to repeat my son’s dying words because that’s all you can think to do,” Sheneen wrote in a Facebook post. “Think harder,” she wrote, calling the memes hurtful.

She said Aurora Police were using justifiable anger about Elijah’s death to strike fear in Aurora. After supportive organizations planned for a large protest moving from east Aurora to the site where Elijah was attacked by officers, Aurora police issued warnings to businesses along the route to prepare and protect themselves from vandalism and looting.

So the protest was called off.

Instead, supporters of Black Lives Matter and the push to extract justice for Elijah’s death were mesmerized Sunday on a green field by string musicians, an opera accompanist, and then a concert-level dance playlist that raised everyone to their feet.

Denver phenom violinist Monique Brooks Roberts, opened the evening of music by embellishing “Some Day We Will All Be Free” with her signature stamp of jazz-classical fusion.

Elija’s legend has been bronzed in millions of social media posts with images of his love for playing the violin, even to stray cats at area animal shelters.

His gentleness and eccentric artfulness have appealed to millions, including celebrities, making the contrast of his brutal death at the hands of police a national icon in the Black Lives Matter movement.

It certainly appealed to violist Helen McDermott. McDermott, a violist with the Colorado Symphony, is no stranger to carrying the mantle for social justice. She’s taught students in Haiti, marched a million miles for causes like this one. She recently appeared with her trademark Non Violins Marching Band to deliver a “violagram” to Sen. Cory Gardner. That singing, stringing, stinging “gram” demanded he support the Senate pandemic Heroes Act to extend unemployment benefits.

She’d heard about the tragedy of Elijah’s death last year, but it didn’t become clear to her what had really happened until after the George Floyd murder shone a light on the rash of death’s like Elijah’s.

She marched. She appeared at the now infamous June 27 event at Aurora City Hall when a violin vigil in Elijah’s honor was interrupted by Aurora police battling with nearby protesters who’d pressed police lines.

McDermott had been one of many performing “Pachelbel’s Canon” when chaos broke out in June. They finished the iconic piece Sunday.

They played the soulful paragon “Dora Nobis Pacem,” a trio stamping the evening with the night’s theme “Give us Peace.”  

The classical infusion into the night gave way to a boisterous club vibe as a DJ threw new and old hits to the crowd, with “Cupid’s Shuffle” bringing everyone to their feet for an impromptu line dance.

It was the antithesis of the tantrum anarchists inflicted on Downtown Denver just hours before as supposed protesters broke windows and lighted fires near Denver City Hall.

Sunday’s event, however, was no less a demand for change. Amid a tidal wave of new investigations, new reviews and new laws circling around Elijah’s death, it’s hard to point to concrete change or justice — yet.

There’s no doubt that political leaders have rallied to the idea that police wrongly treated Elijah, causing his death.

“…how we lost Elijah makes it more than a tragedy, it is an injustice,” Aurora Democratic Congressman Jason Crow said in a statement Sunday. “We failed him. That failure is something that we must reckon with…We must work to reform the broken system that has allowed racial injustice, police brutality, and widespread inequality to go unchecked for far too long.” 

He was joined by Colorado Gov. Jared Polis in rendering a judgment about the case that just months ago had been dismissed by so many as just another unfortunate set of circumstances that led to a needless death.

“Together we not only remember and celebrate the life of #ElijahMcClain, but redouble our efforts for justice and an end to systemic racism in his name,” Polis said in a tweet.

One year later, at an event where music was offered as a salve for so much pain and frustration, it’s clear that, at least in Aurora and Colorado, the tide has turned. It’s not clear, yet, though, what this wave of change will leave behind. 

Follow @EditorDavePerry on Twitter and Facebook or reach him at 303-750-7555 or dperry@SentinelColorado.com