Given the darkness of U.S. news lately, and that I am a media freak, the column I was writing began to sound dreary, too. I started to write about great musicians with no fame to cash in on, who live in poverty, and how some with other skills need to have a fulltime “day job,” so they can afford to have a music career. I complained that some clubs and booking offices still pay players and singers (singers are musicians, too) what they might have been paid 35 years ago; and how a privileged few make it to stardom. (The column started to sound pathetic and getting worse by the paragraph.)
I wrote about things that consumers of music couldn’t possibly know or understand unless they walked (or kept time) in a musicians shoes. How local bands are still expected to sell tickets to their shows to pay themselves for performing; and that gender inequality in music goes way back. How as a bandleader for entertainment offices, I was unaware that I was being paid a lot less than the male bandleaders. And people still think it’s ok to ask pro musicians to play for their events for nothing but “exposure.” Ask musicians to donate their services for a worthy cause, but don’t insult them by offering exposure. A person could die from exposure! And on…and on…and on I went.
9:00pm – 11:00pm:
Starting to feel depressed, and needing a break from writing, I tuned in to the Presidential Debate. It was not uplifting.
11:05pm:
Channel surfing, I stumbled upon local access Ch. 32, and found an 18-piece band that was so good, I couldn’t believe my ears. It kept me from sinking to the depths! It was the Somers Dream Orchestra. They played big band classics, Nelson Riddle arrangements, original arrangements by their sax player Larry Puentes and other great stuff. The band was as tight as tight could be, and featured a dynamite female singer, Keaton Douglas, and the elderly Vince Torrell, who singing to the Riddell arrangements sounded…I swear…like a 40ish Sinatra! The whole thing was delightful and just what my musical soul needed at that moment.
Was I in the Twilight Zone? Why had I not heard of this band? Why were these musicians so happy and appearing as a single positive ego? I couldn’t pull myself from the TV. The musicians smiled and some danced in position, and laughed joyfully in support of a tickling line played by a soloist. Each member of the high-energy band had an impressive resume which the leader, trumpet player John Somers memorized and announced as he introduced each player. What’s this? A leader so generous to treat the musicians so kindly?
They could have been playing at the Hollywood Bowl, but this video was shot at the Somerset County Summer Concert in the Park Series, where the Somers band treated the audience to a bowl-level show.
The band was as “entertaining” as it was perfection in music. A trumpet player was also the World Champion Conch Player, and he soloed on several size conch shells during Woody Herman’s Woodchopper’s Ball. He won the conch playing competition while on vacation in Key West where conch playing originated with boatmen. Man, these players even took vacations! They are blessed! Besides their having a fair and skilled leader with a good sense of humor, what is it that the musicians had in common that they should be so blessed---successful, and happy?
I recalled that in his introductions, John Somers named the schools where 10 of the musicians were teachers. Some were band directors in the schools. The piano player was a retired school teacher. I got to thinking that the key to their happiness might easily be that the players had secure, good paying jobs, and the summer off to tour, and that their minds were peaceful enough to enjoy life. I think John Somers himself was a big happy factor. As the credits rolled I noted that the concert footage was shot 14 years ago. Where is this band now? Will I ever hear them again?
Mon. 1:20am:
Music had soothed me, and I could sleep.
11:00am:
I hit the computer and “tore up” the column I started the day before. And I began researching Somers Dream Orchestra. Turns out I know some of the musicians. And why I didn’t know about the band was because I live at the Jersey Shore---Rock n Roll Heaven! North Jersey has always been Jazz Heaven. And the years I worked up north, they hadn’t yet organized.
There is a nostalgia Facebook page where you’ll find a message from John Somers that a neurological condition had forced his retirement from music. He’s had to put away his trumpet, and after 19 years with the band that grew to be like family and made good money, Somers Dream Orchestra has played its last gig. Looking at the nostalgia page and the link below, it’s clear that the band had become an “institution” via its charitable work, high profile shows and eye-popping stage sets--- with props and costumes that recall elaborate Hollywood musicals. I’ve never seen anything like it except the Radio City Music Hall holiday productions! Check out the photos here.
7:42 pm:
I’ve been searching the net for Somers so I could interview him, and at the last minute we connect, but can’t talk long, as I must get this copy to publisher Gary Wien ASAP. There was time enough, though, to learn that he now lives in Matawan, a about a mile away from me! We will chat again…about the music biz. I’m looking forward to the stories he has accumulated from his years leading the band he calls the love of his life---that popular, world-class, happy band. I would bet that Jazz musicians who were in the Buddy Rich Band, or who know of the infamous tapes from BR band bus, would find this well-travelled band and John Somers a dream in comparison!
