A COMMUNITY OF MUSIC
“Music is the soundtrack of your life” – Dick Clark
In 2018, two musicians with a deep love for jazz and a shared commitment to making people feel good set out on a musical journey that would not only transform their lives but enrich the lives of countless others. David Busch, a retired history teacher from the Hudson Valley and Larry Cangelosi (“my spiritual advisor” as Busch calls him) emerged from the vibrant Tomkats Jazz Orchestra – the 17 member ensemble known for its big band sound has played continuously for 40 years.
Their vision to bring live music to smaller more intimate venues started at the Fountains retirement community with jazz infused renditions of American Songbook classics, music that resonates with the 40’s and 50’s generation. They still play monthly, travelling recently to Sarasota where the residents have relocated due to the storms.
What sets the St. Petersburg Sax Quartet apart is their commitment to creating an atmosphere of fun rather than perfection. “We try to include the audience in each performance with sing-a-longs and audience participation. “Music is a personal connection.”
Planning for collaboration with the audience starts in rehearsals. Each arrangement is a cooperative effort. The medley of 5th Dimension hits, for example, is a crowd favorite, with the tenor and alto saxophones – played by Cincy Paauw and Laura Montgomery – leading the charge. Both Laura (also a vocalist) and Cindy encourage audiences to sing along, particularly during the 5th Dimension medley, making each performance feel like a shared experience.
The COVID-19 lockdown in 2020 opened up new avenues of participation. They performed outside the windows of the Fountains playing as loud as they could. Residents in their windows were cheering. They bonded together window by window with music. “People in lockdown were no longer climbing the walls; they were dancing.”
The quartet’s dedication was to bring music to those who needed it, where they lived, be it under condo windows, in a field in Belleair, or on docks in Tierra Verde. It cemented their reputation as a group that goes above and beyond for its audience. “We are about people. Music is the vehicle to something nice.”
For Busch telling the truth of music and history has been central to his life. For him both music and history “are apolitical.” Anyone who has attended his talks at OLLI or his St Pete Beach Library series on The Presidents are aware of his entertaining even-handed approach.”You can’t teach anything if you are not trusted.”
“Where words fail, music speaks.”
– Hans Christian Anderson
As Busch details in his book, “I did lie on one occasion, to get admitted to a different Junior High School in another neighborhood in Brooklyn. I altered my address and forged my mother’s signature. In 7th grade, my music teacher, Walter Davis, put a Baritone Saxophone in my hands – because I was the biggest kid in the class. It changed my life. Two years later I auditioned for the NYC High School of Music and Art, which inspired the film FAME.”
He had a “tough childhood.” The ”lonely teenager who stuttered, and played music in his bedroom every afternoon” was transformed by the school, the teachers who took him under their wings, especially Justin DeCioccio who mentored him. He left his dysfunctional family behind emerging as the outgoing persona we know today.
His experience was not unlike Maya Angelou who stated “Music was my refuge. I could crawl into the space between the notes and curl my back to loneliness.” They not only shared a very difficult childhood, having been muted most of it, he was like Angelou who stated, “When I decided to speak, I had a lot to say.” •
