One of the most pleasant memories I have from so long ago, is my time in the Sikeston High School band. In the early 1950’s the 8th grade was housed in the same building as the high school, so 8th graders were allowed to be in the band. I had studied the trumpet since the third grade, seeing myself as a future Harry James….who, by the way, was married to Betty Grable, so why shouldn’t I have such aspirations? “Do you want to be in the band?” Mr. Collins asked, when the time came. “Well, yes, sir, that’s sort of what I had in mind,” I replied, wondering why he had even asked. “Good. I have too many cornet players who are better than you, so you are going to have to switch from the cornet to the French Horn.” The French Horn? I had never even heard of a French Horn player. But I did want in the band, so I agreed. When we started playing marches, getting ready for the marching band season, I started going through my music. “You don’t need music,” Eddie Webb told me. Eddie was a junior, who sat beside me. “What do you mean I don’t need music?” “Listen to the base horn. When the base goes boom, you go deet. Marches are like this: Boom deet, boom deet, boom deet, deet. That’s all you have to know.” Well, there was very little musical about that, but it did make playing march music very easy. The band trips were fun, especially the ones where you were gone all day long, such as…the Soybean Festival in Portageville, the Cotton Picking Contest in Blytheville, and the Band Festival in Jackson. And, as I got older, I discovered a secret that ONLY THOSE OF US IN THE BAND KNEW. If you sat next to a girl on the bus….you smooched for the whole trip back. It didn’t matter if she was going steady, or even who she was going steady with. When I was a freshman the steady girlfriend of the starting quarterback, who was a senior, took great delight in teaching me how to kiss. Is it any wonder that now, 62 years later….I can still remember that? I liked the concert season the most, though, because then the French Horns actually did contribute to the music, much more than boom, deet, boom deet, boom deet, deet. And, it introduced me to classical music….and classical music is still a huge part of my life. I listen to it as I write. Mr. Collins always let the seniors have a “moment” during the concert season…and I got to play a passage from Pavane For a Dead Princess. The key valves on a French Horn were operated by string…and just before I stood for my 12 measure passage…the strings broke. I should have checked them before the concert of course, but I didn’t. When I stood to play, rather than holding the French Horn as it should be held, with the right hand in the bell of the horn…my right hand was wrapped around the valves. Mr. Collins knew exactly what happened . . . and today I can still remember the expression on his face. It was one of absolute horror, and after the concert, he “suggested” that perhaps I should have checked the strings beforehand. On the night of graduation the chairs of the graduating seniors were set up in the band, and left empty. It was sort of a fitting tribute. There are people we encounter along the way whose impact on our lives last for a long time. For me, and I know for many others who were in the band under him, Mr. Keith Collins, was one of those people.
Posted on: Thu, 11 Jul 2013 16:22:22 +0000
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