Thursday, April 16, 2009

Bill Elder And The Blue Dukes

I love music and it's no wonder I'm drawn to musicians and what they do. Matt, who is a fellow YouTube poster and friend, plays trombone. So when his signature picture had him playing trombone this story came flooding back. It's one that I'll probably never do a video about so I thought it would be fun to post it here.

My uncle passed this along after my dad died in 1986. William Elder Jr. had to leave Duke University to serve in World War II as a pilot. While he was at Duke, he had a band. You see, he played trombone. His band was pretty popular they tell me. It seems dad had assembled some great musicians. When he left to fly his former band was needing a new leader. An underclassman took them on. According to my uncle, his name was Les Brown. And that was the band that became the "Band of Renown." That's right. Les Brown And His Band Of Renown who played for Bob Hope for almost 50 years. I have to admit I get a lump in my throat when I see this video.

BTW, my nephew, Chris, also played that same trombone in his high school band and still has it today.

Thanks, Matt, for reminding me of this. Keep playing, dude!

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