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07/04/2008
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Staff photo by Jim Evans
SKOWHEGAN — It was a muggy summer night Tuesday and Big Band sounds were seeping through the cracks at the Skowhegan Federated Church on Island Avenue.
Conductor Charles T. Milazzo had slipped off his shoes and was pounding out the beat on the floor, punching the air with his hands and occasionally sounding out the tempo with a “one, two, three...”
The Kennebec Valley Performing Arts Co. was holding its once-a-week love affair with music, according to Milazzo.
“Now you see why we love music,” said Milazzo, who has been the its director and conductor for 25 years.
The committed group of professional musicians from around central and southern Maine meet every week to practice, and this Sunday, July 6, will lead off the 14th year of Coburn Park Concerts.
Eight other performances will be held from 5 p.m. to 6:15 p.m. each Sunday from July 6-Aug. 31, 2008.
Milazzo said the Augusta-based Kennebec Performing Arts Co. is a musical performing group comprised of a jazz band, wind ensemble, chorus and chamber singers. It presents concerts in the Kennebec Valley area in December and May and plays other times during the year.
The company and The Augusta Symphony Orchestra share the same proud lineage, according to Milazzo and longtime Skowhegan musician Peter Foxwell, who was once president of the KVPAC.
Foxwell said the nonprofit group has concerts in the winter and spring and used to play at Skowhegan Opera House, when the costs were split between the town and the organization.
The musicians don’t do it for the money, he said. In fact they pay dues and have to raise money to defray the cost of music.
“It’s an ongoing challenge to buy music,” Foxwell said.
Both organizations came from the original Augusta Symphony that was founded around 1920, shortly after World War I, said Milazzo, a graduate of the New England Conservatory of Music.
A music teacher from Rochester, N.Y., Milazzo ended his 39 years of teaching at Maranacook Community School in Readfield.
In the summer of 2004, KVPAC and the orchestra decided to separate their organizational structure to concentrate on each one’s genre of music.
“This is a very committed group,” said Milazzo. The musicians, are all professional and good in their own professions too, he said. Musicians, lawyers, doctors, engineers, barbers, retired teachers, a photographer, a pilot, all still want a chance to play music. They come from around Somerset and Kennebec counties, including Augusta, Winthrop, Skowhegan, and Clinton.
“With the talent we have around us, this is just a big love affair of music and everyone has a great time,” Milazzo said. “They want to play, they want to make music.”
Those same players who commit to all the rehearsals, all the concerts, all the travel — who practice and play in Manchester, Augusta and Cony High School — demonstrated that camaraderie Tuesday night at the church. The 16-piece combo, with five saxophone players, four trombones, four trumpets, a rhythm section and a singer, were joking and smiling during breaks, yet intent upon improving the piece.
Each week Peter Foxwell, his brother, Alan Foxwell, David Hovey, Glen Holden and Cliff Regoney car pool for the weekly trip to Augusta for rehearsals September through May. This week, however, Milazzo decided to give them a break.
“And we wanted to give them a taste of the Skowhegan air,” Foxwell joked. Even Cindy Yachanin of Augusta, who swung by after work to sing a couple of “Dinah Shore-like” songs with the band, didn’t seem to mind the trip for such a brief participation.
“I was raised on this music,” a smiling Yachanin said.
Darla L. Pickett — 474-9534, Ext. 341
dpickett@centralmaine.com
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