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History of the Airmen of NoteTable of Contents • Airmen of Note Home |
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| Dave
Steinmeyer's Later Band
(1984-1989)
Ken
Smukal or |
Airmen of Note at the Montreux Detroit Kool Jazz Festival |
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In
May of 1984, Dave took a three-month leave of absence from the Note.
Guitarist Rick Whitehead fronted the band during this period,
and Larry Trautman was appointed non-commissioned officer-in-charge
(NCOIC). Rick Lillard
played lead trombone, and Paul Rawlins returned to the Note to bring
the trombone section up to full strength.
About this time Gene Gaydos retired.
This served as the catalyst for some reshuffling of the sax
section. Pete
BarenBregge was moved back to jazz tenor saxophone, and Saul Miller
shifted to jazz alto saxophone.
Tenor saxophonist Don New and baritone saxophonist Doug
Gately traded places, and After
Dave Steinmeyer returned, the band’s personnel remained constant
for the next three years, except for the retirement of Kenny Smukal
with The Note continued to do their twice-annual concert tours, but as the 1980’s progressed, the effects of canceling the Serenade in Blue radio series began to really be felt. When the program was being aired on more than 2,000 stations all around the country, people were familiar with the Airmen of Note, and they were on hand when the band hit town. By the mid-1980’s, however, the band hadn’t had any regular media exposure for ten years. The Note continued to have a big following among jazz enthusiasts, but the concert tours also took the band out to small town America, where the Airmen of Note were not quite as well known. Then too, musical tastes were changing. Many young people weren’t interested in jazz, and the older audiences were frequently expecting either a nostalgia trip or a concert band program. As a result of these factors, as well as an ever-tightening travel budget, the spring of 1988 saw the discontinuation of the regular concert tours, at least as they had been conducted for the past 20 years. Some interesting new activities were introduced to take their place on the band’s calendar. |
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Dave Steinmeyer leads the Note |
In 1985, Col. Gabriel had retired as Commander of the
Air Force Band and was replaced by the Band’s Deputy Commander,
then-Maj. James Bankhead. During
1989-90 Lt. Col. Bankhead reconstituted the Symphony in Blue, which
was one of the featured attractions of the old Serenade
in Blue radio series. The
Symphony in Blue was made up of the Airmen of Note augmented by a
string section, French horns, and additional percussion.
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Vocalists also played an important role on these broadcasts, and well-known guest artists were often featured. |
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To
recapture the musical excellence and variety of the old Serenade in Blue radio series in concert format, the staff created a
showband performance featuring a mix of jazz, popular and show
music. For the tour
ensemble, a team of singer-dancers was drawn from the Singing
Sergeants and other units of the Air Force Band.
Arrangements were prepared by Mike Crotty, Gil Cray, and Air
Force Band staff arranger Mike Davis, based on the theme of American
popular music. The
59-member Serenade in Blue
ensemble toured the southeast states in the fall of 1988 and the
Midwest in the spring of 1989. Selections
from the show were recorded in 1988 on the LP The
United States Air Force Presents Serenade in Blue. However,
nothing could quite replace the exposure that both the Air Force and
the Airmen of Note had gained from a regular radio series such as Serenade in Blue. So
Dave, Rick Whitehead, and the audio section worked up a proposal for
a new Air Force radio series featuring the Airmen of Note.
National Public Radio was interested, and the band started
doing some recording, but due to budget limitations and other
factors, the programs never got off the ground. Summer
evenings still found the Airmen of Note performing at Other
notable jobs in the middle and late 1980’s included Constitution
Hall concerts with Carmen McRae, Carole Lawrence, Clint Holmes,
Larry Carlton, and Dianne Schuur; benefit performances in Florida
with Bob Hope for the Air Force Widow’s Village in 1985 and 1987;
the 1984 International Trumpet Guild convention with Bobby Shew; a
1986 concert at Glenn Miller’s birthplace in Clarinda, Iowa; the
Air Force Association’s Gathering
of Eagles in Las Vegas in 1986 with Jimmy Stewart, Tennessee
Ernie Ford, and Chuck Yeager; and with J.J. Johnson at the 1988
National Association of Jazz Educators Convention in Detroit. Mike Crotty joined the Airmen of Note as chief arranger in early 1973. His impact wasn’t felt at first, in part because of demands on this highly talented arranger by other elements of the Air Force Band, especially the newly formed Mach One pop-rock group. Another problem was that the Note wasn’t quite ready for Mike’s creative but rather challenging big band charts when he did have time to write them. Ernie Hensley began featuring more of Mike’s work, but it wasn’t until Dave became leader that Mike’s awesome talent began to be fully utilized. To the credit of Dave and Air Force Band Commander Arnald Gabriel, Mike was given tremendous latitude in his writing activity. Over the remaining nineteen years he was on the band, he contributed some of the finest work that was ever performed by big bands or service bands anywhere. Mike has a distinctive arranging style, and from the 1980’s on, it came to define the “Airmen of Note sound.” |
