The Band Aids Jazz Band will be wailing away this weekend at the free concert for the Pedernales Creative Arts Alliance at MarktPlatz. These Hill Country favorites are mostly musicians who are involved in medical professions. Photo by Phil Houseal
Details:
The Band Aids Jazz Band performs this Sunday on Markplatz for the next Pedernales Creative Arts Alliance Summer Concert. The concert is free and open to the public. Bring a lawn chair. More information is available at 997-9307.
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Band Aids: Good Medicine
by Phil Houseal
June 20, 2007
I have yet to meet a musician who practices medicine on the weekends. But I have found a group of doctors who play music every chance they get. They call themselves the Band Aids Jazz Band.
My abiding memory of this personable group lingers from an early, stormy Oktoberfest. Just as festivities reached their peak, a bolt of lightning struck the transformer. Hundreds of revelers were plunged into darkness under the wind-blown tents. The music died. But one band played on. It was the Band Aids. Since they played horns and unamplified instruments, the lack of power made no difference. They literally did not miss a beat. As soon as the crowd realized they were safe, everyone gravitated toward the stage to dance.
Neil Walsdorf still laughs when he recalls that night.
"We said, 'Y'all keep dancing and have a good time.' And we played for another hour and a half in the dark."
The Band Aids formed in 1973, with almost the entire current lineup. In addition to Walsdorf, who plays clarinet and tenor sax, that includes Dr. Jerry Linder on trumpet, Dr. Arthur Richardson on drums, Dr. Dan Bacon on trombone, Bill Chapman on tuba, and Walsdorf's wife, Beverly, on piano. This year, the band lost its original banjo player, Fred Polansky.
The members met while they were playing in an 18-piece dance band. But performing in such a structured group just wasn't satisfying.
"They wanted everyone to play as written from the charts," Walsdorf told me. "I don't give a damn about an eight-bar break - you can't do anything in eight bars! I couldn't stand playing in that band another minute, because all of us were capable of so much more."
So they formed the Band Aid Jazz Band, and 35 years later, they still play music they way they want to play it.
"We have no leader; we don't rehearse; we don't use music," he stated. "If somebody comes up to us and asks 'Do you know this song?' and they hum a few bars, we say, yeah, we know it, and we'll play it."
Of course, they'll never play it the same way twice, and that's something they are proud of.
"If you heard us play last weekend, and we played the same piece of music this weekend, I guarantee it will not be the same. If we play the song five times in one day, every single version will be notably different."
Their repertoire is so extensive, they once challenged themselves to see if they could complete two four-hour gigs in one weekend without repeating a song.
"If not for one nice little lady who wanted us to play What a Wonderful World twice, we would have done it," Walsdorf recalled.
While admitting that playing music is a great way to get away from the stress that comes with working in the medical profession, the Band Aids Jazz Band do what they do simply because they love doing it.
"We try to pick numbers you can whistle on the way home, fall in love with, and remember the next day," Walsdorf said. "We want to see the crowd dancing and singing and having fun."
Even at those stormy performances where they can't actually "see" the crowd.
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