Baton Rouge Gotta Have a Band

More than a century in the making, the Baton Rouge Concert Band marches on, strong as ever

by

Music

When the mythical Professor Harold Hill of the 1962 film, The Music Man, remarked, “River City's gotta have a boys’ band, and I mean she needs it today!” he could’ve been talking about Baton Rouge, or any American river town in the late nineteenth century. 

Before the radio age, organizations, politicians, and institutions recognized the ability of a brass band to draw a crowd. “A town without a brass band was a dull place,” wrote Dr. Karl Koenig of Covington—who has written volumes about Louisiana music history, including the rise of South Louisiana brass bands, on his blog, basinstreet.com. 

It’s no wonder that New Orleans had such a strong brass band tradition. From colonial times through the Civil War, a military band presented the colors every morning in Jackson Square in front of the Cabildo. The Tio family of musicians of early jazz fame trace their family tree back to the drum and fife corps of Colonel Andrew Jackson’s militia at the 1815 Battle of New Orleans. Researcher Gavin Holman says brass bands were ubiquitous in the United States. His Brass Bands & Cornet Bands of the USA directory documents more than 8,700 brass bands active between the years 1840-1872. 

The tradition of community brass bands sponsored by fire departments and businesses, social and pleasure clubs has been around for a long time, but the establishment of a permanent community concert band for Baton Rouge was beset with fits and starts. It took more than a century for one to finally take hold. 

Vernon Taranto Sr., the band director at East Ascension High School, said, in 1976, that Baton Rouge needed a community concert band. He got the blessing of the Baton Rouge Arts in Development committee of the Arts Council. A more qualified candidate could not have been found. Mr. T, as he was known, served in the U.S. Navy during World War II and played in Admiral Bull Halsey’s Flag Band. He was a high school choir and band director for thirty-two years. His East Ascension and Dutchtown bands were known for their quality and always awarded “Superior” at marching and concert band festivals. 

A brass band is as much a necessity to a city like Baton Rouge as a hotel or an opera house. But brass bands are hard to maintain. There is no money in a brass band in a town like Baton Rouge.” —The Advocate, 1902 

The fifty-five-member fledgling Baton Rouge Concert Band, under Taranto’s baton, presented its first performance on April 23, 1977 at the Bon Marché Mall on Florida Boulevard. Anne Price, the longtime cultural writer for The Advocate, wrote that the new concert band was a “first” for the Capital City. But Price didn’t have all the facts. If she did, she would have known that the track record for community bands in Baton Rouge was not good, but that Taranto’s wasn’t the first. 

The first mention of any Baton Rouge band available for public performance was on December 20, 1851 when the Magnolia Brass and String Band advertised it was available for “music for any occasion.” The Baton Rouge Gazette editor noted, “We have long been in want of a well-organized band of music in this place. We are satisfied that Messrs. Jolly, Walters, and Coats will have plenty to do and they will be well done.” But by 1854, Messrs. Jolly and Walters were continuing without Mr. Coats and looking to create “a new band of music.” The Gazette praised “Messrs. Jolly and Walters (who are) now at work organizing a band of music, expressly for the benefit of this city. We really hope it will be a permanent organization.”

The Gazette editor, while praising Jolly and Walters, added a flourish describing the power of the art: “Music is the lovely goddess that stands on the right hand of religion, where the burning words of truthful eloquence release us, music comes and with its melody transport[s] us to the realms of blissful happiness, where the soul revels in heavenly delight.”

[Read this: "How New Orleans Became the Cradle: From its origins in Congo Square, jazz carries forth as the spirit of the Crescent City] 

But bands, well-organized, blissful, or not, had trouble maintaining their status in Baton Rouge throughout the nineteenth century. The Advocate editorial staff of 1902, fearful the Capital was falling behind culturally, lamented, “A brass band is as much a necessity to a city like Baton Rouge as a hotel or an opera house. But brass bands are hard to maintain. There is no money in a brass band in a town like Baton Rouge.” An outfit billed as the Baton Rouge Concert Band under the management of Director Curt Wiehe was in operation from 1913-1916, but there isn’t another mention of a community concert band until Baton Rouge High band director Robert Hughes conducted a public ensemble from 1954-1955. That band’s concerts were often sponsored by Weirlein’s For Music, Santa Maria Dairy, and the American Federation of Musicians Local 538 Union.

To this new band of the 1970s, Mr. T. brought dogged energy. He organized, recruited, and rehearsed. The concert band performed at any venue he could find—Bon Marché Mall, Cortana Mall, the Old State Capitol, the Baton Rouge Zoo, St. Joseph Cathedral, the steps of the state capitol. The musicians he invited to guest conduct or perform read like a who’s who of the Baton Rouge instrumental world: Tiger Band conductor Frank Wickes, trombonist Larry Campbell, trumpet professor James West. He enlisted WRKF’s Lew Carter as emcee for concerts. Just as nineteenth century leaders recognized the impact instrumental music in a public setting could have, Mr. T recognized the power of mixing patriotism and civic pride with music. The band gave Independence Day and Christmas concerts. Anyone who attended the band’s annual Memorial Day concerts, especially the ones performed on the steps of the state capitol, will remember the pride they felt when the concert band played the “Armed Forces Salute.” It’s a stirring moment and the practice remains a band tradition.

“We have ninety-year-olds, twenty-somethings, and teenagers playing first, second, and third chair parts side by side with each other." —Bond Lux, president of the Baton Rouge Concert Band 

Mr. T conducted the Baton Rouge Concert Band until 2002, when he turned over his baton to assistant conductor Sheily Bell, who remains the band leader today. Bell also serves as the director of the excellent band at Dutchtown High School. She is assisted in BRCB by Daniel Modenbach, also a music educator at Dutchtown. 

The band of 2026 is virtually the same as any previous version. Players include the young and old, men, women, high school students, college students, husband-and-wife duos, former band directors, grandsons of early jazz musicians, military veterans, and retired professionals.

[Read more from Sam Irwin, here: "Satchmo's First Performance in Baton Rouge: The story of Louis Armstrong's 1920 performance on the Streckfus Line, and the man who got him there"] 

Bond Lux, president of the band, is one of those retired professionals. He left information technology ten years ago. “We have ninety-year-olds, twenty-somethings, and teenagers playing first, second, and third chair parts side by side with each other,” Lux said, pointing out that the band will celebrate fifty years performing together in 2027. “There are very few community bands that can maintain existence that long . . . We’ve kept the band going by the grace of God and a lot of hard work from people,” he said. “It stays together because we have folks who enjoy the music and the longstanding friendships they’ve made since they grew up in band. As I look around . . . there are a dozen or so that have been in Tiger Band; there’s a least one in high school band. Band is good because it allows friendships in band to extend beyond school. People just really enjoy getting together and playing music.”

The band, unsurprisingly, tackles John Philip Sousa’s military marches with ease. The repertoire ranges from pop favorites to concert band war horses, but some of the music, like “La Mezquita de Córdoba,” composed by renowned LSU alumna Julie Giroux, is challenging and sometimes requires extra rehearsals. The hard work paid off when the band traveled to Fort Smith, Arkansas and got favorable reviews for its performance at the Association of Concert Bands Convention in June 2025. 

Conductor Sheily Bell’s energy, perhaps inherited from Mr. T, is one of the reasons the band continues to flourish. Her experience as a conductor and knowledge of the concert band repertoire guarantees a stellar performance every concert.  “I love what I do,” Bell said. “I love the excitement of starting a new piece and seeing it to fruition.” She said she has no plans for retirement—“My mom taught piano until she was ninety. As long as I [can] do it, I will.” 

The Baton Rouge Concert Band meets every Tuesday night from 7 pm–9 pm during the concert season and currently rehearses at the old LSU Band Hall. It plays fall, Christmas, spring, Memorial Day and Fourth of July concerts annually. The band relies on donations to purchase, maintain, and insure instruments and equipment. Currently, its home stage is the plaza at the East Baton Rouge Parish Main Library on Goodwood, but it also produces an annual Christmas concert in St. Joseph Cathedral. 

Catch the Baton Rouge Concert Band at upcoming performing dates: 

Spring Concert

April 19 at 5 pm at East Baton Rouge Main Library

Memorial Day Concert

May 25 at 7 pm at  East Baton Rouge Main Library 

4th of July Concert

July 4 at 7 pm at East Baton Rouge Main Library

Fall Concert 

September 27 at 5 pm at East Baton Rouge Main Library

Writer Sam Irwin is an author and freelance journalist residing in Baton Rouge. He is a member of the Baton Rouge Concert Band (second chair!) and the frontman of the Florida Street Blowhards, a traditional jazz band performing regularly in the Capitol City. He is also the author of three books, The Hidden History of Louisiana’s Jazz Age, Louisiana Crawfish: A Succulent History of the Cajun Crustacean, It Happens In Louisiana: Peculiar Tales, Traditions and Recipes From the Bayou. His website is samirwin.net. 

To learn more about how to join or support the band, visit the group’s website at brcb.org.