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Old Timers’ Day spotlight is on Down Home Band
By Danna Webster
KP News
The Down Home Band will be the
feature entertainment at this year’s Old Timers’ Day on
Aug. 19. The band will play traditional brass band music
with hearts that love the traditions and heritage of
times gone by on the Key Peninsula.
Since 1990, the Down Home Band has
delighted KP residents from its first appearance in the
Pioneer Day parades and year after year performing at
Old Timers’ Day. Just as Old Timers’ Day honors the
traditions and heritage of the peninsula, so, too, does
the Down Home Band. The band replicates the original
Home Band Association that played for dances on the
peninsula about 100 years ago. The Down Home Band is a
brass band of 15 to 20 musicians who play music that was
popular with their predecessors.
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The original Home Band Association, which
the Down Home Band
directed by Dr. Roes replicates. Photo
courtesy William Roes |
“I wanted kids to have the
opportunity to hear that music,” says Dr. William Roes,
director and founder of the Down Home Band. He believes
it is important for today’s audiences to hear and
recognize Souza marches like “Stars and Stripes
Forever.” He thinks there is little opportunity for
today’s kids to hear that music.
Two doctors of the Key Peninsula
started the first Down Home Band that played in a
Pioneer Day parade. Dr. John Olsson, Key Center dentist,
helped Dr. Roes organize some kids to march in the
parade. They wore tie-dye shirts and played kazoos. By
the second parade, the band acquired some older members
and more traditional instruments. They built floats and
changed their name occasionally to reflect the theme of
their events. They have been known on occasion as the
Down Home Slug Band, the Down Home Pirate Band and the
Down Home Keep Clam Band.
Today, the band members include
doctors, teachers, high school students and retired
seniors. But a showcase member of the band is its huge
bass drum, modeled after the one featured in pictures of
the original Home Band Association.
Having a large drum for the band
was recognized as an essential ingredient by Tom and
Edie Morgan, who happened to have such a drum serving as
a coffee table in their living room. Because the drum
was missing the part beat with the drum sticks, a band
member traded her violin for some skins. Once the skins
were in place, the band painted the name on its face,
just like the old Home Band Association.
The Down Home Band is just one
example of the musical entertainment at Old Timers’ Day;
others include the Key Singers and the High Plains
Drifters. There will be music in the air, while loggers
compete and demonstrate their skills felling trees and
bucking up loads of wood. There will also be plenty of
prizes to be won at the raffle, auctions and for kids at
their games. The theme for the day is “down home fun
with simple good food, good music and good times.”
The proceeds from the event benefit
the Key Peninsula Community Services, which provides a
food bank and senior citizens’ programs. Many of the
seniors volunteer for this event. Executive Director
Linda Hubbard says, “It is always a special time for us
and for those who go there, too. The people that have
been going to it over the years keep coming back. It has
become a tradition for families.”
Hubbard says each year they try to
make interesting additions, but mostly people come to
have an old-fashion good time and to see their
neighbors. “They come to see their doctor play a musical
instrument,” Hubbard says.
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News, all rights reserved.
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