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Driving down from Logan to North Salt Lake to sing in front of six apostles at her former mission president’s funeral, Rebecca López Peñailillo said she was “tempted to be nervous.”
She had performed in front of leaders of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints before, but this was different.
She worried she would break down crying while singing the Christian classic “I Know That My Redeemer Lives” for the family of Elder W. Mark Bassett, who died May 11 at age 59 of complications from a traumatic brain injury.
While they drove, her husband shared the perfect advice.
“Don’t think about how people are going to receive it,” Pablo Peñailillo said. “Just think about the testimony you’re bearing. You don’t have control over how people receive it, but you do have control over what you are feeling as you sing.”
The couple agreed the overall message she wanted to convey was the Latter-day Saint doctrine embedded in the hymn’s line, “Oh, sweet the joy the sentence gives: I know that my Redeemer lives!”
The advice settled López Peñailillo.
“I didn’t think of it as a performance at all,” she said. “I thought of it as my testimony with music.”
She didn’t feel — or show — any nerves. She sang with such power and reverence that it evoked emotional reactions in those around her on the stand that ranged from tears and thoughtfulness to joyful smiles and nodded agreement.
“As I was singing,” López Peñailillo said, “I just focused completely on my testimony, and I also was focused on President Bassett’s testimony, because I knew that he knew those things. I knew that that’s how he felt, and I knew that he had great love for the Savior and dedicated his whole life to him.”
Other former missionaries who served with her said her commitment to testifying was obvious to them.
“Your voice is beautiful, and you did a beautiful job,” they told her, “but what rang through more clearly and more beautifully was that we know that you believed every single word that you sang, that you felt every single word you sang.”
“I really liked that because that was my intention,” López Peñailillo said.
She sang so genuinely and passionately that Elder Bassett’s son, who extended the invitation for her to sing at the funeral, knew exactly what many of the hundreds in attendance were thinking.
“There will be a sign-up sheet in the foyer if you’d like her to sing at your funeral,” he said to laughter and more nods. “My name is at the top of the list.”
The joke reminded the Peñailillos of Elder Bassett.
“That is exactly something he would have said,” Pablo told his wife.
“He just sounds exactly like him,” she said, “the same humor, same serious expression when you know he’s kidding. It was so funny.”
López Peñailillo interrupted a singing career that already had produced an album to serve as a Spanish-speaking missionary under Elder Bassett when he was president of the church’s Arizona Mesa Mission from 2008 to 2009.
She produced another album three years ago and continues to perform but is chiefly very busy as a mother of five children ages 5 to 14.
I interviewed her Wednesday, the day after the funeral.
Tad Walch: What did Elder Bassett mean to you?
López Peñailillo: I really love him and love his wife and his whole family. His whole family was beautiful and was a good example of what I want. I was always quick to observe them.
That time in my life serving a mission was really important and special. I didn’t even think I’d serve a mission but the call to serve came to my heart. I actually was going to be releasing more music with Sounds of Zion, but then I told them I felt really strongly I needed to serve a mission and that got put on hold.
When I got into Mesa, Arizona, and I saw the Bassetts for the first time welcoming the new missionaries, I felt like I’d seen them before, like I knew them, that I was close to them already.
He gave me opportunities in the mission that showed me that I could do hard things, and that he trusted me. He also gave me opportunities to grow and develop in important ways emotionally. He gave me opportunities to sing in firesides and to put on concerts with other missionaries.
President Bassett taught me to love the scriptures, to use them in teaching, and he inspired me to study them and refer to them often. When I think of President Bassett speaking to us as missionaries or Elder Bassett speaking to my stake in Logan, I can only picture him standing with scriptures in one hand and his fingers turning the pages with his other hand.
I know he considers Jesus Christ his greatest friend. It was evident in his teaching, and in the way he blessed my life and many others.
TW: Had you kept in touch?
LP: He was very busy, but we saw him at some mission reunions and went to a couple of his kids’ weddings. The last time I saw him was especially meaningful, last fall, when he spoke in my stake in the Logan Tabernacle.
It was so amazing because he took time out to talk to me and my husband. He took the time to talk to all my kids and learn their names and ages and get to know us as a growing family he hadn’t seen in a while. We took pictures together.
He even said some really encouraging words to me in front of everyone from the pulpit. I wasn’t really expecting that.
The fact he took the time to talk to me over the pulpit and talk to my kids afterward and my husband before during a priesthood meeting was a confirmation to me that I am seen and I am noticed and cared about and loved. He was such a busy man, but he took the time to help people feel seen.
TW: How did you receive the invitation to sing at the funeral?
LP: Elder Bassett’s son Taylor reached out. When he called me, I felt like I was talking to his dad, because he sounded just like his dad. He even had the same manners, the same personality. I almost cried, because I felt like I was talking to Elder Bassett. ...
He just was so nice. It was just really special.
The family was just so, so kind and loving. They really wanted to see all the missionaries. Sister Bassett was very adamant about getting the missionaries over to the funeral. She said she wished that this reunion hadn’t happened this way, but she was so glad to see us.
TW: What did you experience while you sang?
LP: I was tempted to be, to be nervous and think about these great people behind me and share my testimony when they all could say it so much better than me, or they have a fire within them so much brighter.
But I chose not to think those thoughts. I chose to think, “The Savior is pleased with anybody’s faith that they show when they testify of him. He’s pleased with them, so I don’t need to think about comparing myself to anybody or trying to please anybody in that room. I just want to please the Savior, and I just want to testify.”
TW: You sang part of the song in Spanish. Why?
LP: Taylor actually asked me to sing it in English and Spanish. I would not have thought of doing that if it weren’t for him. He asked me to use the version I did once in the mission.
I realized it was very important to do because Spanish was a big part of Elder Bassett’s life. He served a mission as a young man in Guatemala, and then he served as a mission president over Spanish- and English-speaking missionaries in Arizona.
Sister Andrea Muñoz Spannaus (second counselor in the Young Women general presidency) was there and she is from Argentina. She came up to me afterward and said she loved hearing that part in Spanish.
It’s part of my heritage, too. I’m half Mexican and my husband’s from Chile; we met at BYU. Spanish is a big part of my life, too.
And the sister who accompanied me on the piano, Marie Epps Erickson, was one of my Spanish-speaking companions on my mission, and she was also part of those concerts, so there was a special bond there, too.
My husband said he could hear her testimony, too, through the piano.
Note: You can watch López Peñailillo sing a song written with her husband on the church’s official website. A full, Spanish-only version of “I Know That My Redeemer Lives” is also available there.
My recent stories
- Apostles attend funeral for Elder W. Mark Bassett, who helped lead record-breaking missionary work (May 19)
- New video takes viewers inside a Latter-day Saint missionary training center (May 17)
About the church
- A new temple was announced in Otavalo, Ecuador.
- The church donated $25 million to UNICEF to support global child nutrition.
- The First Presidency announced open house and dedication dates set for new temples in Wyoming and Kansas.
- On Monday, the church officially opened the new Temple Square Visitors’ Center.
- Church leaders held the groundbreaking for the Coeur d’Alene Idaho Temple.
- In era of misrepresentation, Latter-day Saint women can turn to "Zion’s Poetess."
What I’m reading
- How four Latter-day Saint young single adults live and share their faith through Banana Ball.
- How Christianity took center stage on the National Mall.
- This is a nice feature about a thoughtful baseball player who just did a very rare thing: He returned to pitching after a third Tommy John surgery on his elbow.
Behind the scenes
