California!
Our family took that fun drive from West Texas to San Jose, California the summer of 1973. We lived at my aunt’s home in east end of town. We saw the ocean for the first time. We went to San Fransisco’s Fisherman’s Wharf. For some reason I felt as if I had always lived there. It must have been because I so desperately wanted to live in a big city. Quite a difference from the rural area we came from.
I started the 6th grade that fall and easily stepped into the advanced band where there were only a handful of 6th graders. I met some pretty cool people and eventually started playing the saxophone because my band director wanted me to audition for the district honor jazz band. Later in the 7th grade, I made the position of baritone sax in that jazz band. I was a pretty small kid so they had the instrument on a stand with wheels. It was quite a sight. Funny, when we returned the fall of my 8th grade year, I was tall enough not to use the sax stand. We had a great year and became very good friend of the bass trombone player. He was in this summer marching group called DRUM CORPS. I was intrigued and he told me that they only played brass instruments, so.... onto learning how to play the tuba.
I auditioned the day after school let out that year and made the Santa Clara Vanguard “B” Corps. Talk about a place where every person competed to be better than the person next to them. We performed at a lot of parades that summer, and the highlight of the summer was performing at the 1975 Pacific Procession which was held at Spartan Stadium where San Jose State plays their football games. I remember seeing the 27th Lancers from Massachusetts and literally was blown away!! Then to the Blue Devils with their royal blue satin shirts, black pants, and a shako with a tall white plume. They played music that was so cool and reminded me of the education I got from Jr HS jazz band. They played Chuck Mangione music and they had a mellophone soloist that after playing the solo, a shako came off revealing it was a woman playing that powerful solo. I was so star struck when later in my drum corps years I got to meet her. Her name was Bonnie Ott. As the night went on, the headliner came on... The Santa Clara Vanguard!
That was at a level unimaginable, where the music from Fiddler on the Roof was brought to the football field. The finale had what was to be the traditional SCV trademark...the BOTTLE DANCE! I will never forget my dad picking me up from the performance. I must have talked his ear off and told him that the following summer that I will be on tour with some corps; I just didn’t know where just yet.
California was and is my home after all. Thank you, Dad. Off to the next chapter of my life. High school. Drum corps. Driving. And a ton of practice, practice, practice.