One of the pleasures of the area where I reside is being able to just go walking down the street for a wonderful free of charge evening of wonderful music by our Municipal Band. This band has been in existence for 101 years, the longest on-going Municipal Band in the united states. The music director and conductor Larry has been doing his thing for the band for just over eighteen years at this point, and I have seen almost every performance he has been taking part in for the period of those years. So of course it is understandable if I am feeling sad currently to learn that our city just cannot afford to continue on with the band and this year is the last performance for our once-a-year Summer Music Concert Series.
In our town we have a variety of free music, free movies on the beach and loads of little free rock concerts that occur all summer. But probably none of these equate to the attendance at the Municipal Band Concerts. They are very famous, with overflow crowds’ at all four significant city parks where they hold them. In fact, it is so swarmed that I have been doing what quite a few in our town do on concert day. I have been heading out to the park right off the bat in the morning hours to stake out my spot on the lawn with a blanket and chair to mark my spot until I return in the evening. I reckon it shows something good about our town that fifty people can abandon their chairs and blankets seated on a lawn all day and they are all still there when we come back to the park at 6Pm that night to sit and delight in the concert.
By the time the concert commences each week, there are typically around 200 people sitting at the lawn, most with picnic baskets of fantastic goodies and the positively illegal wine to drink. I do find it funny that they without exception announce at the beginning of each show that it is against the law to consume alcohol on park premises while everyone within earshot of the statement is uncorking their wine bottles and serving them into wine glasses to pass around. But not a soul has ever gotten rowdy, we are a quite calm lot who sit and munch our cold chicken, drink our wine and listen to Star and Stripes Forever. The wildest anyone gets is when every Fourth of July show the band asks participants of the assorted armed forces to stand when the band plays the theme for their particular branch of the military. Some get very teary-eyed and many sing along very loudly, even if they are tone deaf. But if is very small-town and sweet to see.
My girlfriend and I have been going to these concerts with each other for approximately five years now, from the time we met and recognized we both treasured these concerts. She doesn’t always get out of work in time to be there at the beginning, so I will put the food together in the afternoon while I am writing and take it to the park as she is closing up her store and heading out our way. We meet in the park, with her little dog Susie securely in check, and smile at the delight this performance provides to our lives.
So I am sad to think that with next week’s performance this delightful ritual of summer in our town will be ending. The town declared last year that they would be cutting back because of tight finances and when the bucket went around for contributions absolutely everyone ponied up in a major way. We raised twice the amount we generally do, but it still wasn’t good enough. High schools did car washes and little old ladies held rummage sales, but it nonetheless wasn’t enough. They talked about it for three months at town hall gatherings, but the musicians are all top performing artists, most of them are session artists in Hollywood studios when they aren’t at the Municipal Concert performances. Despite the fact that they wanted to come down in their fees, they are all union and are not able to bring it down any more than they have. So this is the end of an era. And we will be all the poorer to be without it.
When Deni isn’t lamenting the loss of her Municipal Band, she is writing blogs about many different and entertaining things. Some of those include a blog about how to use metal bandsaw blades correctly, the best way to build a brick retaining wall for your garden and what the real estate market is like in Monroe County in Southern Florida.