Most teenagers look forward to sleeping in during summer vacation. Not me. The first day of summer vacation after 9th grade I got out of bed earlier than I had all school year. I was a member of the Granite Jr Youth Symphony and I had a bus to catch. I'd been a member of the symphony during the first half of 8th grade. I enjoyed my time in the symphony, but I dropped out partially due to the difficulty of getting a ride over to rehearsals at Granite Park Jr High on the East side of the valley. I hadn't been a member during 9th grade for that same reason. Summer time was a different story. The district was able to use some of the school buses to pick up the symphony members and bring them to Granite Park. Since I knew I wouldn’t have to worry about who would give me a ride I joined the symphony.
That first day I woke up early and walked with my dad over to Kearns Jr High. There I waited with my friends Autumn B, Chris L, Mike J, and Alan R for the bus. The bus showed up around 5:40 with kids from Brockbank and Jefferson Jr Highs already on it. We joined them and then the bus driver drove us over to Bennion Jr High where the last kids on our route joined us. From Bennion we rode to Granite Park.
Rehearsals started at 6:30. I can't believe they started that early. Looking back I thought they started at 7:00, but the schedule that I saved says they started at 6:30. Talk about dedication! I didn't own my own bass so I first had to pick out one from the 7 or 8 that Granite Park provided. Those basses had taken a lot of abuse over the years. Most of them were missing the little wing nut bolt that keeps the end pin at a certain height. Some were even missing end pins. The end pin is what regulates the height of a bass. Height is important because you want your fingers to be in a comfortable position. I found a bass that worked for me, though I think I had to use a block of wood to make it tall enough.
There were 4 bass players that summer. First chair was a girl from Bennion I think her name was Allison. I was second chair so I shared a stand with her. The other two bass players were boys. One was really good looking, but for the life of my I can't remember his name – it was something like Johnny. The other was Peter. We all thought Peter was a little uppity because he owned his bass. He also was the most serious about music of us four. The rest of us were just there for the fun of it. As far as I know Peter was the only one of us who went on into Sr Youth.
Rehearsals consisted of practicing songs with the whole symphony; dividing up into strings, winds, brass, and percussion; and dividing up into sections. I especially liked when we divided up into sections. One of the conductors was the music teacher at Eisenhower Jr High. She was also a bass player in the Orchestra at Temple Square. This was the one and only time I was taught by a teacher that also played the bass.
We learned about 8 songs but the only two I remember are “The Theme from Carmen” and “Three cheers for the Red White and Blue.” I learned how to play all of the songs really well. This summer marks the high point in my talent as a bass player. Most of the time during my 7 1/2 years as a bass player I just faked my way through. Sure I had some talent, but mostly I was just taking the easy way instead of really digging down and developing it. Bass parts aren't that complicated so I could figure them out fairly easily. The parts are also really similar to cello parts so I could get away with just following the cellos. During Jr Youth though I was given technically difficult songs that weren't exact replicas of the cello parts. I really had to work to learn to play them well. I even developed the ability to tune my bass without an electronic tuner.
I don't remember a lot about the rehearsals. They were mostly the same every day so it makes sense that I don't remember anything specific. I do remember that a girl was able to get into a cello case once.
Rehearsals lasted 2 hours and ended at 8:30. Then it was time to get back on the bus and go home. The bus ride on the way to rehearsals was usually pretty dull. It was early in the morning so we were all mostly asleep. I remember the bus driver would listen to music on Cozy 106.5 and we all would just zone out. However on the way home we were more awake and able to have lots of fun. I have more memories of the bus ride than I do of rehearsals
The 5 of us from Kearns Jr High were all really good friends. Mike and I had been in at least 4 classes together during each year of Jr high. Alan and I had been office aids together in 9th grade. Autumn was 2 years younger than me but was one of my best friends. Her mom would come pick me up most mornings and drive us over to the Jr high where we caught the bus. Chris had been in Orchestra with me for 2 years. Autumn and Chris were also “going out.”
All musicians, except bass players, had to provide their own instruments. So there were lots of instruments on the bus as well. Mike's parents had recently bought him a cello. He was very protective of that cello and hardly let us look at it. Autumn and I enjoyed secretly opening one of the clasps that held the case together and waiting for him to notice. He would always freak out and give us a lecture on what would happen if the case opened up and the cello fell out. He didn't need to worry, neither one of us would have let that happen, we knew how important a brand new cello was. Alan played the trombone so he had that instrument with him. He also played the Sousaphone (That's the really big instrument that wraps around the player and had a huge bell above their head.) The sousaphone had a case, but I have memories of the sousaphone itself being on the the bus. Alan liked to use the bell to hold things so sometimes at the beginning of rehearsals I would see him pulling a shirt or two out of the bell. Autumn was a cello player, but she also played trombone. I don't remember which instrument she played in the symphony – but I think it was trombone. Chris played violin. I think he had to drop out of the symphony after only a few rehearsals
The sousaphone belonged to Kearns Jr High. The day that Alan decided to borrow the sousaphone we all went to the Kearns Jr high music room. Ms D,the band and orchestra teacher, held a summer jazz band class after Granite youth. I don't know why, but Alan wanted to see if he could get the sousaphone out of the room without Ms D noticing. So he attempted to do that. However, sousaphones are huge and their cases are even bigger so this was pretty much a failed mission from the start. Ms D immediately noticed what was going on and she made Alan ask to borrow the instrument.
One day Alan brought a bag of old candy corn on the bus. He also had a bag of some cereal On the way home from rehearsal he started randomly throwing candy corn out the window. At one stop light he threw a whole handful of cereal out the window. It landed on some lady's car. She flipped him off and we all thought it was hilarious. It wasn't so funny a few minutes later. We hadn't even made it to Bennion yet when suddenly the bus pulled over. The bus driver called Alan and Mike to the front of the bus. The lady had called the district and reported what had happened. After that Alan and Mike had to sit at the front of the bus. Autumn and I felt bad because we had sort of egged the boys on so we sat up in front with them.
At one point we all got into a discussion about the size of trolls. Some of us were adamant that trolls were bigger than humans, while others insisted that they were much smaller. I can't remember what my opinion was, but I know it was the opposite of Mike's. This was an ongoing debate until we all went to the Kearns library after rehearsal one day. The library had a huge dictionary and we looked up Trolls in it. The definition proved us all right when it said something like, “a mythical creature that can be larger or smaller then humans.”
Jr Youth was held every week day from from June 5th through June 23rd. After the rehearsals were over we had three day concerts and one night concert. I remember playing at the Valley Fair Mall, Trolly Square, and the State Capital. The day that we played at the Capital we were given some time to hang out on the lawn. I'm not sure if we were eating lunch or just killing time. Anyway, Alan thought this would be a good time to climb the trees. He was also in the Kearns High Marching Band and had just bought brand new marching shoes called Dinkels. He was very proud of the shoes and he didn't want them to get dirty so he took them off before he climbed the tree. Somehow he forgot the shoes when it was time to get on the bus. Most everyone was seated on the bus when suddenly he yell, “My Dinkels!” and ran off the bus. There were two girls in front of Autumn and I who looked very offended by what Alan had just said. “There shoes.” I explained. Alan got his shoes and made it back on the bus before we left.
On another concert day we stopped for lunch at a McDonald's. I hope that the directors called ahead and let the restaurant know we were coming because there were about 150 of us. The McDonald had a play place but we were all too tall for it. Alan took off his shoes and knelt down. He put the shoes under his knees and he pretended that he was a little kid. He even pulled his arms into his shirt. Then he started singing some crazy song. It was extra funny because Alan had very large feet. We would often say, “Alan act your age, not your shoe size.” And he would reply with, “Well technically . . .” because he was 14 but he wore a size 15.
We had one night concert so our parents could hear us play. At that concert my stand partner, Alison, and I played a prank on a bunch of flute and piccolo players. During the “Three Cheers for the Red White and Blue” number several flutes and piccolos were supposed to come up to the front so everyone could see them while they played their parts. They walked right between the last row of the violins and the stands of the basses. Alison was best friends with one of the flutes and she thought it was really funny to move our stand so it was right up against the violins' chairs. The flutes would hurry from their spot and run right into our road block. We did it to them a couple times in rehearsal and had a good laugh about it. Alison decided to do it during the actual concert. I let her do it. I still remember the flutes flustered faces as they went around us rather than going in front of us. They still made it to the front of the stage in time, but I'm sure we caused them some extra anxiety. I didn't know it at the time, but one of those flutes would end up being one of my best friends in high school. Michelle even was my roommate in college for two years. Once again – I'm sorry Michelle, but it was funny.
All too soon the 15 rehearsal days and 4 concerts were over. The last thing we did as a symphony was go to Lagoon for the day. We didn't have to play our instruments we just played. Alan wasn't able to come with us on the bus, but he and his sister caught up with us later. This was before cell phones so we really didn't know have a way to meet up with him at the park. As it happened I was in line at the white roller coaster with Autumn. We looked up and saw the biggest pair of red and white shoes go past on the sky ride. We knew it was Alan and as soon as we were done with the roller coaster we headed down to the end of the sky ride. We were able to meet up with him and enjoy the rest of the day.
I never joined Granite Youth again. I was too busy to be a member of Sr Youth during the school year (plus there was still the ride problem). And during the summer the Sr Youth went on an out of state tour. The tour cost money and I wasn't interested in paying that much money for a hobby. In a way I'm glad that I don't have any other memories of Granite Youth. This one summer is so much fun to look back on. I laugh every time I remember our silly 15 year old antics.
(I think a lot of west side residents complained about the difficulty of transporting their kids to the East side and back during rush hour. When I was in high school the rehearsal locations for Jr and Sr Youth were moved to more central locations. This change enabled my younger brother Billy to be a member of each group for years.)
While Brandon took down the tree I worked on the rock border around my flower beds. (Yeah, I still consider these my flowers.)
