Posted by Randy Mac iver on March 01, 2001 at 23:53:09:
Hey all,
I had the pleasure of attending the US Navy Bands first stop concert on their 2001 spring tour tonight at Arcola Intermediate School in Arcola Pa. Wow what a wonderful group. Highlights of the concert, Rolling Thunder and boy was it rolling quick. Celebrations by John Zdechlik was a tonal frenzy. Sen.Chief Roger Behrend offered up an extremely artistic rendition of Ermanno Picchi's Fantasie Original for Euphonium and Band. Excellent singing tone. This was segued into a fantastic encore Tuba Quartet with drums of the ST. James Infermary and it was much better than the doccumentary 'Jazz'. MU1 Andrew Oppenheim gave a truely inspiring performance in the peice that made me wish they would do another. Strauss' Til eulenspiegel was done with total mastery of ensemble sound. The Band was joined by a group of seven local outstanding musicians on the National Emblem March and it will be a march they will probably never forget. After a breif intermission the band offered up another march called In Storm and Sushine by J. C. Reed. Chief Scott Ragsdale sung the popular Ballad from The Godfarther Movie to show the breadth of the bands abilities. The band did a fantastic arrangement of cop show themes called Cops and Robbers and Spies(Oh My!)It included such tunes as Peter Gun, Hawaii 5 O, the Pink panther and car 54 where are you and man the Bari sax can wail. The Carnival from "La Fiesta Mexicana" rounded out the program and then the traditional Armed forces on parade got the Vets on their feet. An encore of Stars and Stripes got everyone clapping with a standing "O". Oh and by the way the F horn section was Fantastic and may not have needed the sound deflectors (Great Job Farah). It is too bad that the Band couldn't play around here more often. Mission accomplished and carry on!
Randy Mac Iver