With one swoop of the baton, Bob Williams magically transforms some four dozen individual musicians into a single, harmonious force, producing inspirational music as the Pleasanton Community Concert Band. No magician’s wand has greater power than the baton of a talented conductor–and Williams certainly belongs in that category.
In fact, Williams has led the local concert band for 21 of its 31 years of existence. He joined the group as a horn player the very first year. Members of Pleasanton’s Bicentennial Committee had approved construction of the Chan Henderson Memorial Bandstand in Lions Wayside Park in 1975, noting a band was needed to make use of it. Under the auspices of Amador Valley Adult and Community Education, the band was formed, first conducted by Jerry Lapinski, a local educator who has since moved away. Several of the original musicians still perform in the 20 concerts the group provides annually for our community–all of them free of charge. The band members are a talented group, but sadly, there are often empty seats for their indoor concerts.
Band members range in age from 14 to 84. “Anyone is welcome to come if they have an instrument and they play at a level of maturity that fits in with the group and they are comfortable there,” said Williams. “It’s a self-auditioning process.” Those interested can call membership chair Pat Wheeler at 443-5526, Williams at 846-5897 “or show up at 7:30 p.m. on a Thursday,” added Bob. The band uses the Pleasanton Middle School music room at 5001 Case Avenue for weekly two-hour practice sessions.
The Pleasanton Community Concert Band began with 40 members and has doubled since then, although about 50 perform at each concert. The group has a repertoire of about 150 pieces. “We pull out what is appropriate for the venue we’ve been asked to play,” explained Williams, whose home is also the repository for the vast library of sheet music owned by the group. Although the band voted some years back to give Williams a salary, he invests that and considerably more in music, practice room rental and other needs of the group. “We belong to the Association of Concert Bands,” said Williams, “and their international guidelines state that ‘community bands serve the community by giving free concerts.’”
Those concerts range from Saturday morning music at the local farmers’ market (next one is Sept. 16) to the musical accompaniment to the spring graduation ceremonies at Las Positas Community College. After the parade down Main Street to honor Veterans’ Day a few days early, the band will be in concert on Nov. 5 at the Veterans Park on Peters Avenue. Three of their concerts are afternoon performances (2 p.m.) in the 600-seat Amador Theater on the high school campus at 1155 Santa Rita Road. The Sunday performances will include one that’s geared toward families on Nov. 19; a holiday special on Dec. 10 and a spring concert on March 18. For updates, visit www.pleasantonband.org.
Perhaps their largest concert takes place back where it all began: Each Fourth of July, the band returns to Lions Wayside Park’s bandstand, where the musicians perform patriotic music as the key element of the all-volunteer program, “Celebrating Freedom and its Evolution since the Revolution.” This year’s event drew more than 700 people to the afternoon concert and old-fashioned family picnic.
Planning for the community’s Fourth of July celebration begins in early March for the small band of volunteers who have produced the event for eight years. However, Williams begins much earlier, researching appropriate musical works for new themes each year. His training from the Eastman School of Music at the University of Rochester in New York shows in the depth of knowledge and experience he brings to the planning process. Fellow committee members joke about his “bottomless attaché case” from which he never fails to pull out an appropriate selection of music.
For example, Williams suggested that this year’s event could honor the Liberty Bell and he had on hand “Let Freedom Ring!”–a number the band performed along with local bell choir the Pleasanton Family Bells. In past years, Williams has set the theme to honor the Declaration of Independence, Constitution and Bill of Rights. He already has looked years ahead for new musical selections. For next year’s bash, the celebration will focus on “[Thomas] Jefferson’s Vision.”
Anyone who has attended a Pleasanton Community Concert Band event may have noticed that the printed program often includes a mini-lesson in the history of each piece to be performed. “My music study has always been kind of as a musicologist,” said Williams. “I’m interested in the history as well as in the sound that comes out.” He researches and personally writes all of the program notes–frequently tying in the lives of the people and current events of the era in which the music was composed.
Williams and his wife Bernie–also a horn player in the band–have amassed a personal musical library of more than 200 compact disks and 1,000 records, each instantly accessible through their cataloguing system. Their home also is the band’s office and library, where 75 sets of sheet music for more than 5,000 pieces are carefully filed away for fast retrieval–as is every program from every concert the band has performed. The sheet music library fills three double-door cabinets, plus a series of pull-out shelves–each weighing 750 pounds.
Music has always been an integral part of Williams’ life. “My mother was a church organist,” he explained. “I grew up in the choir loft.” By age five, the music man was taking piano lessons, which he continued through high school. He remembers the band director visited his class to recruit new members when he was in fifth grade. At that time, Williams began playing trumpet–an instrument he had to return to the school when he graduated to junior high school. In seventh grade, his new band director was looking for someone to play the horn. “It used to be called French horn, erroneously,” Williams said. “I think I was genetically blessed with a mouth structure that was well fitted to the horn,” he added with a smile.
Born in Norristown, Pa. (“The Gateway to Valley Forge”) in 1932, Williams went on to Westchester State Teachers College and began what was to be a 22-year teaching career. When he served in the Army’s 101st Airborne Division, he was assigned to Fort Jackson, S.C., where he trained Army band members “every eight weeks, 30 new recruits.”
The federal G.I. Bill enabled Williams to return to Eastman School of Music for his doctoral studies. He taught third to eighth graders in Webster, N.Y. before moving west to Albuquerque and then locally to Oakland where he concluded his teaching career in 1979–just before Oakland schools’ budget cuts forced the cancellation of all music programs.
“I came to band practice and announced, ‘I’m out of a job. Does anyone have any suggestions?’” Williams said. Someone did, and that led to Williams’ next 17-year career with the General Electric Vallecitos Nuclear Center, first as a radioactive materials technician and ultimately as a metallographer.
Even when his days were spent as a scientist, Williams kept music in his life through his involvement with the community band and the Livermore-Amador Symphony. “My life has always been intertwined with music,” he said. “Music is my heartbeat. It means I am alive and well…and motivates me to keep breathing.” [NOTE: Use THAT line as pull-out quote?]
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HOW TO HELP
The nonprofit Pleasanton Community Concert Band depends entirely on grants and donations. Those who wish to make a tax-deductible donation can send a check to P.O. Box 135, Pleasanton, CA 94566, or bring a cash donation to one of their concerts. Donations will help pay for the $55/hour cost of their practice room, plus music and sound equipment.
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MEMBERS OF THE PLEASANTON COMMUNITY CONCERT BAND
Conductor: Bob Williams
Flute: Jennifer Burlingame, Myra Downs, Sheila Sherman, Pat Wheeler,
Stephanie Wolfe
Oboe: Larry George, Tui Hedstrom, Doug Manatt
Bassoon: Lisa Ennis, Madeliene Ward
Clarinet: Don Chalmers, Donna Crawford, Matt Felver, Yvonne Greilich, Jim
Nelson, Tim Rickey, Rich Woll, Cyndy Salmon
Alto Sax: Les Duman,
Jon Elliott
Tenor Sax: Ken Salomon, Gordon Williams
Baritone Sax: Jeff Elliott,
Don Lambert
Horn: Mary Ann Butler, Pat Frizzell, Chris Immesoete, Bernie Williams
Trumpet: Bob Bryant, Bob Crawford, Bob Gast, Richard Hedges, Sally
Johnson, Carlos Mendes, Don Veca
Trombone: Francis Chew, Bill Nemoyten, Chuck Smith
Euphonium: Andrew Rudiak, Jerry Fredgren, Bob Olmos
Tuba: Dan Calderwood, George Downs Jr., Bud Engel
Percussion: Bob Butler,
Gerry Hedstrom, April Nissen, Walt Nissen, Jason Noffsinger
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OPPORTUNITIES TO HEAR THE BAND – Free!
Saturday, Sept. 16 – farmers’ market, 9 a.m. to noon
Sunday, Nov. 5 – Veterans Park, Peters Avenue, after the parade
Sunday, Nov. 19 – Family Concert, Amador Theater, 2 p.m.
Sunday, Dec. 10 – Holiday Concert, Amador Theater, 2 p.m.
Sunday, March 18 – Spring Concert, Amador Theater, 2 p.m.
Fourth of July 2007 – Lions Wayside Park, 1-2:30 p.m.
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