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Local music scene loses 'One big beautiful song'

Courtey Katie Evans

For about 40 years on the central Kenai Peninsula, walking into a local music event, it was obvious if Vickie Tinker was around. If she was performing, her steady alto voice was immediately recognizable, even when blended in three-part harmony. If she was in the audience, she was the most likely culprit for the laughter that was inevitably involved.

“There was this innocent, child-like quality to Vickie where she wasn’t afraid to just let loose and say whatever she thought or dance with wild abandon. She was just a lot of fun,” said Bonnie Nichols, bandmates with Vickie and Suzanne Little in Food For The Soul.

Vickie’s death on Dec. 26, after a three-and-a-half-year battle with complications of ovarian cancer, irrevocably changes the music landscape for many in the area. Little says the sadness of the moment is balanced with the lifetime of joy Vickie shared.

“I feel like we’re all holding sorrow in one hand and gratitude in the other for having known this incredible person,” Little said.

Food For The Soul formed around 1995 in a moment of nonchalance that was so very Vickie.

Little and Nichols were rehearsing for a duo gig in a conference room at Central Peninsula Hospital, where Nichols works. Vickie worked there, too, at the time, and happened to be outside the conference room.

“She just walked by and casually threw in a third harmony. And both of our necks just about snapped off. We went, ‘Wait a minute, come back here!’ From that moment on, she was with us. Everything was so easy. We never had a lot of time to practice but the harmonies just were always there,” Nichols said.

“And we had so many fun moments with Vickie. Like, we played with her for, like, 25 years and all of a sudden discovered that she could play bass. And she had never told us that. And one day, Suzanne, she was going to need to change instruments, and all of a sudden, Vickie said, ‘Oh, I can play bass.’ And we said, ‘What? You can play bass and you haven’t told us that for all these years? ‘She was like, ‘Oh, yeah, I took string bass in junior high’ or something like that. And she was so casual about picking up instruments and learning then. But, yeah, she was amazing.”

Even though all three are songwriters, pulling from their own observations and experiences, Little says they found a shared musical sensibility.

“We wanted to sing songs that made people think or feel something or improve themselves, improve their community,” Little said. “We wanted to sing community music. And, so, what she brought was the same fervor for singing songs that might change people, and then people might change the world for the better.”

One of their favorites to perform was “The Bramble and the Rose,” by Mary McCaslin and Jim Ringer, with Vickie singing lead.

SFX music

Vickie tried to make the world better, in big ways and small. From her career and volunteer pursuits, working as the fetal alcohol specialist for Frontier Community Services, teaching tai chi at Kenai Peninsula College and being a board member for Love, Inc., the Kenai Peninsula Youth Facility and the Children’s Action Committee. She was a fan of public radio, hosting a weekly DJ show on KDLL called, “All the Diamonds.” She even marched in parades for Pickle Hill Public Broadcasting wearing a pickle suit. 

She was the music worship leader for various churches over the years, went on international mission trips and started the Fifth Sunday music ministry, an interdenominational worship service.

“And I think the goal was to take everybody she could from every church, every religion, and create a way for everybody to play together, instead of being these little, tiny groups. That was that thing that she did, she took pieces from everywhere and all the places that she went and created something really beautiful out of it,” said Katie Evans.

Evans met Vickie and her husband, Glenn Tinker, as a young teenager spending summers in Kenai, getting into the local music scene. Before long, the Tinkers became her Alaska parents.

“She treated everyone like family. And she would consider musical events like church," Evans said. "To her, the musical community, the people she mentored, the people who looked up to her or played music alongside her, she considered them her people, her family. And I think that’s how Vickie created such a beautiful thing, because she just loved everybody so much.”

Evans says Vickie’s presence just made things better. She always made time — to listen, to work on a song, to help solve a problem. Here’s one of the songs they co-wrote, "Rise."

SFX music

At the very least, Vickie could add levity to any situation.

“There was the time Glenn made us butcher the goose. I came over for some meal and there were geese that needed, like, plucked, or the thing you do after you kill them, I guess," Evans said. "And this one goose, we plunged it into the hot water and it honked without a head. … And I ran for my life. She just laughed, because I guess it was, like, air coming up through like its trachea or something. But me being, like, 14 and a goose honking that didn’t have a head, it was scary. It was, like, ‘What the hell?’ But, again, she just laughed, because that’s what she does.”

Here she is at a True Tales, Told Live storytelling event, sharing about the time she and Evans volunteered to be greeters at a Halloween carnival at the church they had just joined.

SFX: Storytelling

Vickie had a serious side. Nichols says ego never got in the way with Vickie, and it better not get in your way, either. She could receive honest feedback and give it.    

“Her ability to be so neutral and so loving but outspoken at the same time,” Nichols said. “She was really an advocate for being Christlike and not being snarky, and she would call people out for it. She would say, ‘Hey, you know, the kingdom of God is about the kingdom of God. It’s not about being a Republican or a Democrat.’ So, I loved that about her. I loved how she could walk that line and she could actually just call people out, because she lived it.”

Shannon Darling started playing with Vickie in 1982, not long after Vickie moved to the Kenai. They wrote and performed mostly worship music together, but lots of other stuff, too. Darling also used to own Veronica’s Coffee House in Kenai, the longtime staple venue for live local music. Of all Vickie’s originals, her most-requested song was “Blue-Eyed Boy,” written about Vickie’s grandparents in Washington, which Darling helped set to music.

“And it’s so Vickie. The lyrics are just so Vickie," Darling said. It’s just a wonderful song and we’ll continue to play it for, you know, forever, I’m sure. It’s not going to be the same. Nothing’s going to be the same, no music is going to be the same, that’s for sure. It all surrounds music, but that was her. That was her whole life, you know. She was just one big, beautiful song.”

A celebration of life for Vickie Tinker will be held at 4 p.m. Jan. 8 at Soldotna Creek Park.

 

Credit Courtey Bonnie Nichols
Vickie Tinker

Vickie Lorraine Tinker

May 5, 1958 - Dec. 26, 2021

Vickie Lorraine Tinker transitioned from this world on December 26, 2021, after a three-and-a-half-year battle with Ovarian Cancer and associated Paraneoplastic Syndrome.

She was born in Seattle, WA, on May 5, 1958, to Joe and Margie Malinowski. She is survived by her husband Glenn Tinker, stepdaughter Temperance Tinker, son-in-law Matt Kays, granddaughter Reed Kays and grandson Bo Kays, son-in-law Tom Head, grandson Hudson Head, stepdaughter Jessica Walzer, step-daughters Karen Brooker Ammons and Kelli Brooker Rodgers and step grandchildren John Harley and Harley Ray Ammons and Jordon Wilson and Christian James Rodgers, sister Ginny Cossio, brother-in-law Salvador Cossio, nephews Joe and Jake Cossio, and “adopted daughter” Katie Evans. Vickie was preceded in death by her parents, Joe and Margie Malinowski, her first husband, Leroy Brooker, and stepdaughter Joslyn Head.

Anyone who knew Vickie experienced the warmth she radiated through authentic nonjudgmental Christian love, the music she wrote and performed, and a deep appreciation of nature, books, and real, enduring friendships. Vickie’s musical evolution was beset by obstacles as she sang in a lower octave than everyone else in elementary school, and she was kicked out of choir. She could not sing the high notes and never performed in choir throughout her school years but was musically hungry and wanted to play everything. She started with violin in the fourth grade, and by sixth grade, she took private classical lessons in violin, guitar, and string bass. She listened to opera music at home and taught herself how to play mandolin in her twenties. She was a music worship leader for Peninsula Bible Fellowship (for twenty-six years) and Abundant Life Church, and she started nondenominational Fifth Sunday Worship. Her worship songs have been incorporated into church services in Wales, Argentina (Patagonia), Australia, Oregon, and of course, locally.

Vickie performed and co-wrote with the local group, Food for the Soul for three decades at community events, festivals, and celebrations of life. She mentored many young singer/songwriters. Vickie had no biological children, so she became a “second mother” to Katie Evans for the last 20 years. They co-wrote more than twenty songs and performed them throughout Alaska. Though her musical background was diverse, she had limits and set clear musical boundaries. Once while on a date driving to Homer, she pulled her car over and ordered her date to “get out” when he (a Barry Manilow fan) could not identify Bob Dylan on the radio.

Vickie worked at Central Peninsula Hospital for 10 years as the Administrative Secretary and then as the Medical Staff Coordinator and spent eighteen years at Frontier Community Services as the Fetal Alcohol Specialist. Vickie lived for twenty-seven years on the McCord homestead, where she enjoyed rowing, gardening, growing flowers, cooking, befriending sandhill cranes, raising chickens, geese, dogs, cats, and a ferret named Freddy who liked high heels. Vickie and Glenn hosted many musical gatherings around the campfire at Tinkerville. She always lived life in a big way. As legend goes, she woke up early one morning in the fall, dropped a moose from her deck, and then left to go to work while Glenn went to work dressing the meat.

Vickie taught Tai Chi for thirteen semesters at KPC. She was a Board member of LOVE, Inc., the Kenai Peninsula Youth Facility, and the Children’s Action Committee. She hosted “All the Diamonds,” a weekly radio show on KDLL. Vickie had a heart for social justice, mission work, and cross-country skiing. She traveled to Cambodia, India, and Sri Lanka on church missions. And she instituted annual naked skiing at Tinkerville on the last sunny skiable day of spring (however, she only ever invited Glenn).

Vickie emulated real love, respect, comfort, laughter, companionship and could be counted on for truthful feedback. May we all follow in her example. A celebration of life will be held at Soldotna Creek Park on January 8, 2022, starting at 4pm. No food or flowers donations to Glenn (he could accept gift cards to local food and drink establishments), and food to share would be great at the celebration of life.

Memorial donations in Vickie’s memory may be made to Let Every Woman Know – Alaska leteverywomanknow.org/

— Obituary courtesy Bonnie Nichols

Jenny Neyman has been the general manager of KDLL since 2017. Before that she was a reporter and the Morning Edition host at KDLL.
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