LEWISTON – High school health teacher Norma Gardner says she simply stumbled into the role of concert promoter. He is working with the Air Force to bring Airmen of Note, the service’s ensemble jazz band, to Lewiston for a free Nov. 17 concert.
“When you have an amazing band like this and they offer to play for free, you have to say, Yes,'” Gardner said. The jazz ensemble is touring New England in November.
“We knew that Lewiston had other Air Force bands play, so we called them to see if they were interested,” said Tech. Sgt. Joseph Grasso Jr., tour manager for the ensemble.
Gardner got a call because she’d helped bring the Air Force’s rock band “Max Impact” to Lewiston High School last year.
“They had my name and called to see if I might be interested,” Gardner said. She scrambled to find a place for them to play before calling back and saying yes.
The Lewiston concert is scheduled for Nov. 17 in the Lewiston Middle School auditorium. The free tickets will be available beginning mid-October. Gardner said they’ll only be available by mailing a coupon to the school. The coupons, show programs and promotional posters haven’t even been printed yet, she said.
“We’re going to enlist as many of the kids as possible in this,” she said. Members of Lewiston’s ROTC program will be ushers for the show, and she hopes to enlist other LHS students in managing and promoting it.
“It’s a good way for them to give back to the community, kind of community service,” Gardner said. “If you think about it, it’s not the kids’ kind of music. It’s a little more adult-oriented.”
World tours
Airmen of Note got its start in 1950, a successor to Glenn Miller’s Army Air Corps swing band. The musicians regularly make the rounds of jazz festivals throughout the globe and tour different regions of the United States twice yearly.
“This fall, it’s our turn to go up to your area,” Grasso said.
The band starts its tour on Nov. 15 in Vermont. It has a show scheduled on the 16th in Concord, N.H., the 18th in Bangor and the 19th in Presque Isle. They wrap up their tour in Caribou on Nov. 20.
“We’re going up there supporting the (Defense Finance Accounting Service) center,” Grasso said. That center was spared closing last week by the Base Realignment and Closure Commission.
“We understand they have some things to celebrate up there, so we’re going to help them,” Grasso said.
Comments are no longer available on this story