July 29: Patriotic Medley

In both the Rockport Legion Band and the Cape Ann Community Band, we are playing a song called "Patriotic Medley." It was written by a guy named Bob Puff, a music legend in Gloucester (he was a music teacher and involved with lots of community musical endeavors for decades). Apparently when he was a grad student, he wrote this medley of patriotic songs, including the songs of the Army, Navy, Marines, and Air Force. He hand wrote the parts and they have been photocopied over and over again for local bands to play. 

I first played the tune in the Rockport band a few weeks ago, where I play alto sax. But then I played it again at the Cape Ann band, where I am playing bari sax, and discovered there is no bari sax part for the song; instead I was given the tuba part. In general, an Eb treble clef instrument (like a bari sax) can actually pretty easily read and play a C bass clef instrument (tuba)'s part, EXCEPT when it comes to accidentals (notes that are flat or sharp), and of course the fact that the tuba can play notes much lower than a sax can, so I found myself constantly transposing and putting notes up an octave, which was super difficult and frustrating. So I went home after that  rehearsal and wrote up the whole song in my music writing software (I use MuseScore) and then had the program automatically transpose all the notes to notes I could actually read and play. (Also, there is something about handwritten music that makes it super difficult to read so having a computer generated part was just so much cleaner to read.) I had basically created a brand new bari sax part for the song. I printed two copies; one for me to use in the Cape Ann band, and one for the bari sax player in the Rockport band to play, because I thought he would appreciate it as much as I knew I would. On Monday, I played the new part at the Cape Ann band, and it was delightful. And on Thursday I gave the new part to the bari player (a Rockport High School student) and he loved it. It was delightful to give him the new part to make it easier for him to play the song. I very much delight in delighting others (and in making life easier for all!)!

With delight,

♥Jamie