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Concert with Motor City Brass Band

To: "Brass Band List" <brass-band@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: Concert with Motor City Brass Band
From: "mlathrop" <mlathrop@xxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 1999 22:09:25 -0400
Priority: low
Reply-to: brass-band@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Hi All!

The Cuyahoga Valley Brass Band had a wonderful time as the guests of Motor
City Brass Band yesterday.  We did a joint concert in the Southfield Centre
for the Arts, a former synagogue which is being converted to a cultural
center.

We travelled to the Detroit area by bus - the first actual band trip I have
been on since college.  I had forgotten the "charms" of group bus travel:
breathing deisel exhaust, trying to figure out how to safely pack the tubas
(not to mention their horns!), 40 people trying to navigate for the bus
driver (we didn't find ANYTHING on the first try all day), figuring out who
was driving and who was taking the bus, making sure we left no one at rest
areas, etc.

The time with Motor City was really fun.  It was our musical director, Keith
Wilkinson's, birthday.  MCBB helped us arrange a surprise cake - and an even
bigger surprise towards the end of the concert.  We were grouped for the
massed band numbers, and were going to play "Stars and Stripes" as a closer.
When Keith hit the downbeat, we hit the pick-up to "Happy Birthday" instead.
Keith got about half way to the second beat, and just froze.  He recovered
almost instantly, but the look of momentary panic on his face was priceless.
I'm sure he we will make us pay for our amusement though - we have
sectionals coming up soon!

We got to hear most of Motor City's performance before we had to get ready
for our part, and I especially enjoyed Bill Himes arrangement of Civil War
Fantasy by Bilik.  I'm sorry we missed their closing number, which was a
Motown medly arranged by their director Craig Strain - the bits I could hear
as we lined up sounded like fun.

The acoustics in the arts center were really amazing, though not always
amazingly good.  I'm not sure what the name is for the sanctuary area of a
synagogue, but that is where the concert was held.  It was a round structure
with a high domed ceiling.  The higher brass seemed to ring quite a while,
and I thought it sometimes made the lower band sound a little muddy.  It was
perfect for the middle band though.   "Over the Rainbow", an alto horn solo
piece played by Debbie Wilkinson, sounded fantastic.  She has a lilting tone
that made the melody fill the whole place - it was the nicest I've heard it
done.

We also had another member of our band distinguish himself.  Circumstances
left us with only one percussionist able to make the trip, a high school
junior named Adam Wolf.  He did triple duty back there, switching from place
to place, covering more parts than I would have thought possible.  It was
truly impressive - especially for someone that young.

Thanks to any MCBB members on the list for hosting us for such a nice day!

Mary Ellen Lathrop
2nd horn
Cuyahoga Valley Brass Band


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