After a very discouraging first year teaching band & mostly commerce courses in a Burnaby junior high school, I was most fortunate to be hired by Doug Pryce, music supervisor and senior band director until he retired. Doug has since passed but he was a driving force and responsible for an enviable band program in New Westminster. I spent the first 5 years teaching Grade 7 band in all the elementary schools in the district. The next 21 years I spent at NWSS teaching band at all levels throughout those years.
The band rooms and offices were hangouts for the students at lunch time and after school. Even though I did not teach all the students every year, they were always around and I witnessed them growing up. That was a perk that not many other teachers had. They and I considered the band rooms as our second home. I was called Uncle Gerry, Gerry’s kids, Mr. Q and other names, I’m sure. I saw shy students grow into confident young adults, immature kids become responsible members of the band.
During one performance with an 80 piece choir from Salt Lake City, the senior band accompanied them in the Battle Hymn of the Republic which our students heard performed at the Temple Square in Salt Lake City with the Tabernacle Choir and USAF Air Force Band. It was quite an impressive and moving experience. So as we started our performance, after a few bars, the band somehow got behind a few beats, which was a bit unnerving, but to show how responsible these kids were, we got back on track very shortly after and finished the performance admirably.
I was often asked how I could handle 50 - 70 kids on a band trip and the answer is that they behaved well and responsibly (most of the time!) and the relationship between teachers, chaperones and students were mutually respectful.
Of course there were times when things did not go as I would have liked. On one trip to California, one of our trombonists forgot his music folder but fortunately, we had fax machines in those days so we were able to get the music before our performances. On another trip, two of our Grade 12 students were caught with marijuana so that they were not allowed to go to their grad. Their punishment was upsetting to me because they were good students who had never been a problem.
Besides band, Doug entrusted me with leading the orchestras in the 4 musicals that we did during my time at NWSS. My favourite was Fiddler on the Roof. It made you laugh, it made you cry, it made you happy and it made you sad and each performance did that for me but there was one performance where there was a glitch with music stand lights. They went out. We could not see the music and the orchestra was about to enter again very shortly. Fortunately, our technician, Bill Bayley, quickly found the problem and the lights came back on just before we had to start playing again. Whew!
With Owen Erwin being director, Bill the technical director and stage designer and Charlotte Diamond choral director (and actor in “Oliver!”), the musical productions were top notch with a few professional actors, amateur strings and a lot of band members, students and teachers from NWSS and some elementary schools involved.
And graduation was a special time for me as the Grade 12s performed with us for the last time and when we got to Rodgers and Hammerstein’s “Climb Every Mountain”, there were feelings of sadness because they were leaving but happiness and pride knowing that they were going on to their next stage in life as young adults.
Music is such an important part of life and I’m sure most of the students feel that was even now in adulthood as I know a lot of them are still participating in bands and choirs as I am at age 80.
Gerald Quan