Over the past two weeks, I've been involved with a good deal of the heavy lifting that music seems to impose on me on a regular basis. And, a group of musicians put together by my close friend Jim Brugman has managed to pull off a bit of a musical coup in the process.
Walt Stuart died a couple of years ago, leaving behind some substantial medical bills for his sister, the surviving next of kin. Fortunately, he also left behind his substantial body of musical work, which the group headed up by Jim managed to purchase at a decent price.
For those not familiar with his work, Walt wrote some kick-ass arrangements for folks like Sinatra, Torme, and Minnelli. Along with a huge selection of male and female vocals, he also did a mass of traditional big band stuff, both for his group and for others. He did a number of custom arrangements for me, and I can't wait to find the score for his arrangement of (Everybody Is A Star) In Hollywood, a Village People dance number that he put together for me a few years back.
He was even working one up for me when he died. The chart, an arrangement of the overture to Chicago that serves as an opener for our sets starting with And All That Jazz, was passed on to Mike Arena, who finished it up shortly before he died - I've almost decided to stop commissioning stuff any longer.
Anyway, once purchased, the only problem remaining was how to get the physical library from Orlando to where the group will process and preserve it.
Enter T. Stibal, possessor of a watertight box trailer and a lot of spare time. I booked a week at Disneyworld (staying in the Caribbean Beach Resort, our choice for some twenty-five years now), and used the Saturday morning to meet with Charlie Bertini, a close friend of Walt's, to package it all up for the big move.
What can one man generate over a fifty plus year career of playing in a big band (along with his wife, a vocalist, and his sister, who played bass for the group) and arranging for a wide variety of musical groups (including folks like the Chairman of the Board)? Well, with the assistance of my lovely wife, my daughter (up from Tampa for the event) and my ne'er-do-well brother (who lives in the Orlando area, and did about half of the heavy lifting), we managed to package and load no less than fifty-two boxes of arrangements and miscellaneous materials (including Walt's arranging tools and his selection of books on musical arranging), plus three large piles of original scores.
All in all, it filled the trailer to the gills, as well as half of the space in the back of our Scion xB SUV - we packed extra light, figuring that we might have overflow into the car. My wife and daughter scanned everything with the movie feature on the iPhone, providing a quick and dirty index to process the stuff once we got it here.
Once loaded (and covered with a plastic sheet, just in case the trailer developed a leak), we parked the trailer in the secure parking area (used for those going on Disney cruises) while we roller coastered and ate our way through the Disney parks. (We are particularly fond of the menus at two of the Disney restaurants, the California Grill atop the Contemporary Hotel, and the Artist's Point, nestled in the Wilderness Lodge - I love their smoked mushroom soup). Then it was time for the wild ride home.
The trailer tracked particularly well with all of the weight in it, even better at 70 mph than it did at 30 mph. The only problem was with the older sections of I-10 in Louisiana, where the joint pattern combined with our axle spacing made for some interesting experiences on curves. The trailer would jump up from the pavement during the transit of the curve, shifting outward a foot or so, before the forward motion of the car would again bring it in line.
The first time that it happened, it scared me half to death. The solution for this was to speed up to 73 mph or so - problem solved.
Next up is scanning it all into the database. We've bought a couple of Brother sheet fed multifunction printer/fax machines/scanners that handle ledger size paper, and Jim has constructed a couple of lightbox/copy stand setups for the older onion skin originals.
Once it's all in electronic form, it's just a matter of formatting...it takes about five minutes per arrangement to archive them to my standards, and Jim want the one scan for the whole arrangement version. At least I can do my share of that part sitting down.
Walt Stuart died a couple of years ago, leaving behind some substantial medical bills for his sister, the surviving next of kin. Fortunately, he also left behind his substantial body of musical work, which the group headed up by Jim managed to purchase at a decent price.
For those not familiar with his work, Walt wrote some kick-ass arrangements for folks like Sinatra, Torme, and Minnelli. Along with a huge selection of male and female vocals, he also did a mass of traditional big band stuff, both for his group and for others. He did a number of custom arrangements for me, and I can't wait to find the score for his arrangement of (Everybody Is A Star) In Hollywood, a Village People dance number that he put together for me a few years back.
He was even working one up for me when he died. The chart, an arrangement of the overture to Chicago that serves as an opener for our sets starting with And All That Jazz, was passed on to Mike Arena, who finished it up shortly before he died - I've almost decided to stop commissioning stuff any longer.
Anyway, once purchased, the only problem remaining was how to get the physical library from Orlando to where the group will process and preserve it.
Enter T. Stibal, possessor of a watertight box trailer and a lot of spare time. I booked a week at Disneyworld (staying in the Caribbean Beach Resort, our choice for some twenty-five years now), and used the Saturday morning to meet with Charlie Bertini, a close friend of Walt's, to package it all up for the big move.
What can one man generate over a fifty plus year career of playing in a big band (along with his wife, a vocalist, and his sister, who played bass for the group) and arranging for a wide variety of musical groups (including folks like the Chairman of the Board)? Well, with the assistance of my lovely wife, my daughter (up from Tampa for the event) and my ne'er-do-well brother (who lives in the Orlando area, and did about half of the heavy lifting), we managed to package and load no less than fifty-two boxes of arrangements and miscellaneous materials (including Walt's arranging tools and his selection of books on musical arranging), plus three large piles of original scores.
All in all, it filled the trailer to the gills, as well as half of the space in the back of our Scion xB SUV - we packed extra light, figuring that we might have overflow into the car. My wife and daughter scanned everything with the movie feature on the iPhone, providing a quick and dirty index to process the stuff once we got it here.
Once loaded (and covered with a plastic sheet, just in case the trailer developed a leak), we parked the trailer in the secure parking area (used for those going on Disney cruises) while we roller coastered and ate our way through the Disney parks. (We are particularly fond of the menus at two of the Disney restaurants, the California Grill atop the Contemporary Hotel, and the Artist's Point, nestled in the Wilderness Lodge - I love their smoked mushroom soup). Then it was time for the wild ride home.
The trailer tracked particularly well with all of the weight in it, even better at 70 mph than it did at 30 mph. The only problem was with the older sections of I-10 in Louisiana, where the joint pattern combined with our axle spacing made for some interesting experiences on curves. The trailer would jump up from the pavement during the transit of the curve, shifting outward a foot or so, before the forward motion of the car would again bring it in line.
The first time that it happened, it scared me half to death. The solution for this was to speed up to 73 mph or so - problem solved.
Next up is scanning it all into the database. We've bought a couple of Brother sheet fed multifunction printer/fax machines/scanners that handle ledger size paper, and Jim has constructed a couple of lightbox/copy stand setups for the older onion skin originals.
Once it's all in electronic form, it's just a matter of formatting...it takes about five minutes per arrangement to archive them to my standards, and Jim want the one scan for the whole arrangement version. At least I can do my share of that part sitting down.
