KHS65 MAKIN' MUSIC THEN & NOW

This week Dave Beardsley, one of our stellar KHS65 musicians, attended a concert at Meramec Community College at which he had the pleasure of seeing & hearing Clancy Newell on drums and Pat Moisio on violin. At any rate, I wanted to share some information Dave sent me in response to my question about who plays in what orchestra around town. Dave plays in the Florissant Community Orchestra, the concert he attended was at Meramec CC, and I didn't know who/what/why this concert took place:

"The orchestras at Meramec and Florissant Valley are open to anybody who shows up and who can play and is accepted, be they a student or an adult who played before and wants to get back into the music for the love of it. I can't speak for Meramec, but at Flo Valley, which I'm familiar with and am president of the 501(c)(3) Friends of the Florissant Symphony Orchestra, there are several CC students, an occasional high school student, and a bunch of adults from their 30's to their 80's who are either music teachers, doctors, dentists, engineers, cops, drop-outs, ordinary civilians and of course, the lowest of the low, liberal arts majors, who played when they were in school and who could never get it out of their system, even if they had stopped for a few years during their career-building and family-building years. At Flo Valley, the adult members (not students) are even assessed $35 dues per semester. The 501(c)(3) does what it can to raise contributions and corporate matching grants, and Flo Valley CC contributes roughly $2,000 per year and pays the director's salary. It costs a lot to run the orchestra, because our rehearsal space is rented from a nearby church (Flo kicked the orchestra off campus several years ago when they got State money to change the orchestra room into some other function), and some of the music people like to hear is not in the public domain and has to be rented from New York or Detroit for anywhere from $100 to $500 for a concert, and we can't charge admission."

ON ANOTHER SUBJECT, Alan Yount has been sharing some memories of his KHS dance band and our late classmate Doug McKelvy. Herewith some of Alan's thoughts, with his permission:

" So sad to hear about Doug. We were great friends in high school ... through the high school band, and of course in my dance band. Doug was a really great tenor sax player and was one of the main supporters of the band. I remember he never missed a job. There were several of us in the band who really wanted to play stage band music, and he was one of them.
Very nice touch that Jack played Taps [at Doug's burial]. I did that several times when I was in the Air Force in San Antonio. Some very grim afternoons during the Viet Nam era. I remember one particular afternoon ... it was cold and pouring down rain. We were all soaked. Only myself and the funeral detail were there ... no parents or friends."
And a bit later:
"Our band played 6 dances our senior year. The kids kept asking for us and many teachers, and I remember Mr. George Beltz especially, liked the band. Doug played all 6 of those dances. Also, after discussion, Doug and all the rest volunteered to play at the last dance, the Coronation Prom. Some of us wanted to go to the dance, but we had so many requests to play. Doug and the rest of us were very pleased to have an article and picture of the band in the Kirkwood paper, talking about its being our "last dance to be played as a band." The band also had a nice write-up in Prom Magazine. [I own some of those but I don't remember this article; next time I am at the Library I'll find this and scan it.] THANKS Alan for sharing these great memories.