By Vince LaBarbera
“Music has been an important part of my life ever since I started
playing trumpet at 10 years old,” said Mary Newbauer, a member of the
Fort Wayne Area Community Band trumpet section since the summer of
1980. “Even though my musical career started on a rocky road since I
picked an instrument that wasn’t quite kosher for ‘girls,’ it has been
not only a life safer but an enlightening and exhilarating
experience,” she continued.
“When I was a senior in high school our band won first place in a
national contest of parochial high-school bands. We were able to do
that because our director, Joseph M. Woods, was a mentor, teacher and
an innovator who believed in expanding our horizons. He also
programmed our marching band routines for contests and half-time shows
when everyone else was using canned themes,” Newbauer related. And
again, against the flow, he allowed the female band members to join
the dance band and orchestra if they wanted to, she explained. Also,
she said she had some incredible section leaders while in high school,
including citing yours truly, among those so-called “greats many lowly
freshmen hoped to follow someday.” Incidentally, as a charter member
of the FWACB, I’ve sat with Newbauer in both the high-school and the
FWACB trumpet sections.
The downside of graduating from such a great high school as Central
Catholic, Newbauer continued, was the college I went to, St. Francis,
now the University of Saint Francis had no instrumental music program.
“However, Dick Brown, who taught music theory, and who also was
willing to ‘buck the system,’ agreed to direct a wind ensemble if Mary
Lou Thieme Morris and I could round up enough players. And that we
did, so for a few years we had the chance to keep up our musical
‘chops,’” she explained. “Luckily, there also was a community
orchestra on campus that led to some fun times.”
In 1965, Newbauer and a group of others got a jazz band started
called the St. Francis Jazz Band, now known as the Knights on the Town
Jazz Band. Newbauer has played with them for 50-some years with the
exception of 10 years when she became part of the first all brass band
in Fort Wayne known as the Old Crown Brass Band. Unfortunately, they
rehearsed on Monday nights, she said, the same as the jazz group, and
said she was deeply missing the jazz and the friends she had made
there.
“I’ve played along with some hometown greats like Dick Seeger and
the very musical Brown family -- Dick, Don, Tom and Rick,” she
continued. “As a trumpeter I even got to meet a few famous people like
Maynard Ferguson and Doc Severinson (see photo).” And at an
international trumpet convention, Newbauer was able to join a group of
other trumpet players for Aida’s Fanfare, led by Severinson.
Outside of band Newbauer has played for church liturgies of several
denominations, some of which included the original Handel’s Messiah,
in the freezing cold at Christmas. and taps for memorial services.
The Fort Wayne Area Community Band had its beginnings in 1979. But
Sally Hinkle in the Band’s bassoon section, says she and Newbauer were
part of the Community Band before it was founded because Wayne Bennet,
director of music at IPFW at the time, formed the Fort Wayne Wind
Ensemble, which lasted for one year. “That’s when Bill Schlacks took
over at IPFW and formed the FWACB.”
“I can truly say I wouldn’t be here today if it wasn’t for music
and the support of my family, especially my husband, John, who has
been to every concert for the last 45 years and my three kids, Matt,
Mark and Beth. Matt and Mark even joined the FWACB for a few years
until life called them elsewhere.
“Music is indeed a thrilling, soul-filling media that has given me
a chance to perform with some incredible people,” Newbauer concluded.
“My advice to all is to make music a part of your life every day:
dance, sing, learn to play an instrument, listen to music on any
device you have available or just attend concerts.” The Fort Wayne
Area Community Band is here for you. fwacb.org.