Just one of the pleasures of the town where I live is having the ability to to simply go walking down the street for a superb free of charge evening of terrific music by our Municipal Band. This band has been in existence for 101 years, the longest on-going Municipal Band in the united states. The music director and conductor Larry has been doing his thing for the band for approximately eighteen years currently, and I have seen more or less every performance he has been engaged in for the period of those years. So naturally it is logical if I am feeling sad right now to learn that our city just cannot afford to continue with the band and this year is the end performance for our once-a-year Summer Music Concert Series.

In our town we have an amazing array of free music, free movies on the beach and lots of little free rock concerts that occur all summer. But not one of these match up against the attendance at the Municipal Band Concerts. They are very sought after, with overflow crowds’ at all four significant city parks where they hold them. In fact, it is so packed that I have been doing what many in our town do on concert day. I have been heading out to the park very first thing in the morning hours to stake out my place on the lawn with a blanket and chair to tag my spot until I return in the evening. I imagine it says something good about our town that fifty people can abandon their chairs and blankets seated on a lawn all day and they are all still there when we return to the park at 6Pm that night to take a seat and take pleasure in the concert.

By the time the concert commences each week, there are generally around 200 people sitting at the lawn, many with picnic baskets of splendid goodies and the very illegal wine to drink. I do find it funny that they never fail to announce at the outset of each show that it is illegal to consume alcohol on park premises while everyone within earshot of the announcement is uncorking their wine bottles and pouring them into wine glasses to pass around. But no-one has ever gotten rowdy, we are a fairly calm group who sit and munch our cold chicken, drink our wine and listen to Star and Stripes Forever. The craziest anyone gets is when every Fourth of July show the band asks participants of the various armed forces to stand when the band plays the theme for their specific branch of the military. Some get very teary-eyed and many sing along quite loudly, even if they are tone deaf. But if is very small-town and fairly sweet to see.

My girlfriend and I have been traveling to these concerts jointly for approximately five years now, since that time we met and recognized we both adored these concerts. She doesn’t always get out of work in time to be there at the start, so I will put the food together in the afternoon while I am writing and take it to the park as she is closing up her shop and venturing out our way. We meet in the park, with her little dog Susie firmly in check, and smile at the joy this performance gives to our lives.

So I am sorry to think that with next week’s performance this delightful ritual of summer in our town will be no more. The town announced last year that they would be reducing because of limited finances and when the bucket went around for contributions everybody ponied up big time. We raised twice the amount we commonly do, but it still wasn’t sufficient. High schools did car washes and little old ladies organised rummage sales, but it still wasn’t enough. They discussed it for three months at town hall conferences, but the musicians are all top performers, a lot of them are session artists in Hollywood studios when they aren’t at the Municipal Concert performances. Though they wanted to go down in their fees, they are all union and can’t bring it down further than they have. So this is the end of an era. And we will be all the poorer to be without it.

When Deni isn’t lamenting the loss of her Municipal Band, she is writing blogs about many distinctive and enjoyable things. Some of those include a blog about how to use metal bandsaw blades correctly, the best way to build a brick retaining wall for your garden and what the real estate market is like in Monroe County in Southern Florida.