Posted by Graham Smith on July 05, 2002 at 16:37:08:
In Reply to: Marine band posted by Tony on July 05, 2002 at 09:54:56:
I thought the piece was great! It convinced me why openings in that band are so hotly-pursued. I had a good friend who was a clarinetist in the Navy music program (went to school at Little Creek, VA) and got around a good bit, and the director of our Lafayette Concert Band (our community band) was in the Army program, but I don't think either of them had an experience like what I saw last night.
As for myself, I was in the Navy on active duty '69-'71 and played here and there when there was an opportunity and an available horn. I spent some time working for NAVSECGRU on a communications base in the Philippines and later for Armed Forces Radio at the same place, and the most I can say about the base band was that it was fun, that we had a somewhat "loose" organization (we had an E-5 electronics guy as the director and two officers' wives playing with the rest of us to fill out instrumentation), and -- best of all -- because the skipper wanted "live" music for base inspections we had an understanding: we showed up to play, and in return we didn't stand inspections. That had its advantages.
With the applied music degree I had at the time, last night's show made me think of missed opportunities! (Or at least missed auditions!)