Page 44 - Memories of the Maestro 9.11.21

. . . Cool

My first week of college up at Western in Bellingham, I walked into
the dining hall one morning for breakfast. It was maybe my second or
third day there. I saw a seat open at one of the long tables, walked
over, asked if I could sit down, and the guy to my right half stood up
and politely said, "Please," and gestured at the chair. As he sat down,
his necklace fell out of his shirt. It was a pewter trumpet on a silver
chain.

"Hey, you play trumpet?" I asked.

"Yeah, how? ... "

I gestured at his necklace and said, "Our lead trumpet player in my
high school stage band had one just like it."

"Really!? Where'd you go to school?"

"Fort Vancouver High School in Vancouver Washington-"
"You're kidding!? You went to Fort Vancouver?!" Everyone at the
table fell silent and was now staring at me. "I went to Tsawwassen

High. We used to compete every year at the New Westminster Jazz
Fes�val."
"Oh yeah. We used to come up to that every year, and-"

"Yeah, I know. I have never, ever seen a jazz band as good as you guys
in 1977. Not even close."

At this point, everyone at the table got up and started introducing
themselves and shook my hand. They were all freshman music majors
and every one of them were in various school bands in the greater
Vancouver area and every one of them played at the New
Westminster Fes�val.

I became friends with most of them, which led to many late nights of
arguing Miles versus Dizzy, Bird versus Coltrane, Cedar versus Horace
etc etc etc, but I'll never forget that day I walked into the dining hall
as a kid looking for a place to sit down and ended up feeling like a
celebrity. I would have had less of an impact if I had said, "Our lead
trumpet player in my high school stage band had one just like it. My
name's Charlie Mingus, I play bass."

I never told that story to anyone else, because well, who else would
have got it, you know?

Tony Borroz
Class of ‘78