Local music lovers are invited to attend a free concert
Wednesday featuring the Watsonville Band in the Rancho San Justo
Middle School gymnasium.
Local music lovers are invited to attend a free concert Wednesday featuring the Watsonville Band in the Rancho San Justo Middle School gymnasium.
The 7:30 p.m. concert is the first of four free regional spring concerts by the 68-piece band that includes performances in Hollister, Santa Cruz on April 6, Salinas on April 9 and Watsonville on April 11.
“(The band) has got some excellent players and I would like young people to hear them play as well as the rest of the community,” said Joe Ostenson, music teacher at Rancho San Justo and Marguerite Maze middle schools and trumpet player in the Watsonville Band.
Fourteen of the band’s members are Hollister residents. In its 56th year, the band is made up of young, old and in-between musicians from around the Central Coast.
The concert is scheduled to include a variety of well-known tunes suitable for the entire family.
The band may be considered amateurs because of its non-profit status, but it plays like professionals, said Edward Pio, the band’s manager for 38 years.
“Considering we’re an amateur band, the sound is pretty close to professionals,” Pio said. “Most times the sound is 100-percent professional.”
The Watsonville Band was the first to follow the Marine Corps Band at a White House performance July 4, Pio said.
Ostenson believes it is important for youngsters to hear live music, since modern music is usually pre-recorded.
“It’s important to see live music because you have to have live music,” he said. “Everything now is done with DJs and there’s nothing wrong with that, but if we’re not careful we’ll have a whole society that relies on nothing but recorded music.”
