Air Force band blends heritage, brass in musical salute

Concerts by Heritage Brass amount to so much more than horns, melodies and sounds. It’s hitting the right notes in reminders to celebrate what service personnel do in their mission stateside and around the world, and saluting everyone who has made the ultimate sacrifice.

This group of a dozen musicians – including a percussionist and vocalist, and one of six ensembles under the U.S. Air Force Heritage of America Band umbrella – will give a free concert with a variety of tunes at 4 p.m. Saturday at Beach Church, 557 George Bishop Parkway, just west of Myrtle Beach, between U.S. 501 and U.S. 17 Bypass. Admission is free, but with tickets – available at Myrtle Beach City Hall, 937 Broadway St., or Myrtle Beach Area Chamber of Commerce, 1200 N. Oak St. As of Monday morning, more than 1,500 had been given away, with less than 350 left.

In a phone call from home in Hampton Roads, Va., Staff Sgt. Michael Mannella, a trombonist with Heritage Brass, spoke last week amid several days of rehearsals before a tour with various concerts across South Carolina, the southern boundary of the group’s Eastern Seaboard territory stretching all the way to Maine. Ten years as an active duty Air Force musician have given Mannella, a Detroit native, the ultimate way represent the United States around the world.

Question | When did you find your calling to muse music and serving our nation?

Answer | It was a family affair. My dad was a music lover, and my grandfather came from Italy, so we always had music playing in the house, always big-band jazz music and standard orchestra stuff. When I first joined band in grade school, I started playing trombone... and I later found that music would take me places that would be really exciting and interesting. In the Air Force family of bands, I started off performing based in Boston, and that included 2 1/2 years with tours in Russia, Kazakhstan, and all of Europe.

Q. | What is that special attraction that military bands and marches have woven into our culture, and kept alive, through generations and centuries, not only here in the United States, but worldwide?

A. | When we play concerts overseas, we play for people who might not have met an American before, and they might not have a positive view of what the United States is doing in the world. They meet us and hear us, ... and they might not speak the same language, but with music, we can make inroads where diplomacy and other steps might not have been as effective. ...

As an American in the military, it took me playing in concerts in Russia, Kazakhstan, and for children and orphanages in poor areas to see a real impact of what we do with the uniform on. ... The kids we meet ... leading us, they walk around and tell us about their culture, food and different things. We go there as ambassadors. ...

Before television and radio, military bands provided music to give hope, to be a reminder for loved ones who were serving overseas. ...

When we go overseas and play, we play not only for civilians, but for our military members, to remind them about loved ones through music, especially since Glenn Miller went overseas in the 1940s. ...

We have the joy that music brings them. In a dark place, something as beautiful as music brings hope to people in harm’s way. One of the Air Force groups came back from Iraq and Afghanistan. They traveled to remote places where USO shows can’t go.

Q. | In seeing other famous brass ensembles, how does that only deepen your devotion to your profession? Have you caught acts such as the Canadian Brass through the years?

A. | When I was in high school, I went to an all-state music festival, and I did my undergraduate work at the University of Michigan. Back then, the Canadian Brass was the premier quintet. For me, they were like the Beatles. When I was a doctorate student at the University of Texas, I sat in for one of their performances – The professor had some of us students sit in with them. ...

It’s hard to get a full-time job playing music; I’m so lucky and blessed. It’s neat to be in the club to hang out with great artists such as the Canadian Brass, Empire Brass, and Wynton Marsalis.

Q. | Performing with Heritage Brass along the East Coast, how do the settings – maybe autumn in Vermont, summer in Maine, and the mid-Atlantic and Southeast beaches – add to the memories, not just for crowds, but you as a working traveler?

A. | Last June, we performed in Portland, Maine; I love that city. We went up to Bangor for that tour. ...

You see so many different parts of the country. The joy for me in the music is we get to play in places where American composers came from ... and reflect upon what they were thinking when they were writing the music.

Traveling north and south, we see incredible Americans everywhere, ... and they’re patriotic. They celebrate America in different ways, whether decorating in, or wearing, red, white and blue. When we meet World War II veterans, we remind everyone that they are a part of a special community.

Q. | Can some key attributes about the trombone – an instrument given extra limelight thanks to such individuals such as James Pankow of Chicago, Fred Wesley from James Brown’s heyday, and the late Tommy Dorsey and Glenn Miller – be shared, with all your notes and pitches coming from sliding? Must this instrument really take a innate feel and touch?

A. | You certainly have to measure certain distances, like a violinist, or a guitarist, with frets, does. . ... The farther out the slide goes, it makes the notes go lower. The shorter the slide, the higher the notes. The bell amplifies the sound, and we have one long valve we mess around with, whereas trumpets have three, and tubas have four.

Q. | How special is seeing the trombone command its own attention, besides being such a vital supporting sound in an ensemble?

A. | About 100 years ago, there was a famous trombone player, Arthur Pryor. He was a soloist in John Philp Sousa’s band, then he left the Sousa Band and started his own military band. ... The trombone, in the classical world, has not been prominent, but people have kept writing music for the instrument, with its range of sound and being very expressive. We have fun doing jazzy numbers and swing melodies. ... A lot of women now are playing brass instruments; some of the more prominent trombonists in the world are women.

Q. | What songs have remained standards for Heritage Brass?

A. | With military bands in general, people come to expect certain things, such as maybe wanting to hear some Glenn Miller “In the Mood” or Benny Goodman “Sing, Sing Sing” ... and Sousa’s “The Washington Post” and “Stars and Stripes Forever.” ...

We have an opportunity to play some really flashy music to get the people excited, and we like to play “America the Beautiful” and “God Bless America.” Some of the most beautiful moments are near the end of a show ... especially during the Fourth of July, when we start “God Bless America” ... and you hear the crowds singing along.

This story was originally published February 9, 2016 at 12:00 AM with the headline "Air Force band blends heritage, brass in musical salute."