Klarinet Archive - Posting 000192.txt from 2002/05

From: MVinquist@-----.com
Subj: [kl] Worst Gig
Date: Tue, 7 May 2002 20:59:03 -0400

Two from the West Point Band:

The most uncomfortable: A mid-winter honor guard for some visiting general,
temperature in the single digits. The band was in medium-weight jackets and
fancy 25-pound overcoats that had the sides and skirts pulled back so they
gave no protection. For your hands, only light-weight kid gloves with the
fingers cut off. The Big Mugwump delayed his arrival by half an hour to take
a drive around the campus in his limo, while we froze. By the time he got
there, everybody was numb up to the elbows and knees, and the keys and brass
valves had frozen up. The Nabob arrived at last, did a full inspection of
the honor guard and then chatted with the base commander for 10 minutes until
the cold started to get through his heavy gloves and wool glove liners. They
gave us the rest of the day off to thaw out.

The worst, however, was an honor guard for the dictator of Paraguay. It was
a late fall day, temperature around 33, so the overcoats were illegal. As we
started up the hill to the "point" where the ceremony was to be held, the
skies opened. It must have rained 2 inches in the first 10 minutes, and
continued coming down in sheets. We stood around at the top of the hill for
about half an hour, with the dictator sitting in his limo, until somebody
decided to hold the ceremony in the (unheated) field house half a mile away.
We marched down the hill, with the water cascading 6 inches deep on the
pavement, and into the field house. The dictator gave a 30 minute speech in
Spanish, followed by a consecutive translation. Then the dictator's son gave
a 30 minute speech plus translation. By that time, about 10% of the cadet
honor guard had fainted, and even a few of the band members got queasy.

They're all war stories now, of course.

Ken Shaw

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