FM Washington

by Michael @ NW Lens

Spare Time Swing

Ask the simple question “What do you do for a living?” in Washington, DC, and you’ll likely be met with a shrug and the blank phrase: “I work for the government.” Bureaucrats for many federal agencies often live an anonymous existence, tucked behind desks in imposing, gray buildings.

The employees of one large federal agency, though, have found a way to liven up the daily DC grind. The EPA Starlight Orchestra, a jazz big band that draws many of its members from the Environmental Protection Agency, holds weekly rehearsals in the massive EPA West Building. Their lunch-hour playing sessions inject a little jazz into the players’ routines to provide a musical outlet in a city best known for the pomp and circumstance of The President’s Own.

Organizing a jazz band practice within a large government agency is an impressive behind-the-scenes operation. Each Friday the members have to clear out tables and chairs from a sixth-floor conference room. Dan Reinhart, a statistician who plays trombone, calls out charts and leads the group through sight-reading sessions, though he dislikes a title as formal as “director.” “It’s a morale break for us,” Reinhart, 63, of Kensington, Maryland says. “We switch off parts and take turns for solos.” He joined the band when he came to the EPA nearly 20 years ago and is now its longest-tenured member.

The group has an array of government-owned instruments at their disposal, many of which formerly belonged to US military bands. The instruments used to be kept in a basement storage room that doubled as a rehearsal space — until Mother Nature intervened. “We used to have a book of 150 charts,” Reinhart says, “but we lost those charts to a flood in 2006.”

Since then, the band has holed up on the sixth floor, clearing space weekly for chairs, stands, and rhythm section instruments, including the drum kit played by Paul Shriner, 38, of Dumfries, Virginia. Shriner, a chemical engineer, plays many instruments, including saxophone, guitar, and bass, but he spends most of his time drumming. “Swing is the hardest thing to do,” he says, “but if you can read music and devote enough time to practice, you can play any instrument.”

The band has performed at events for the fundraising program Combined Federal Campaign, as well as outdoor gigs during the summer months at Woodrow Wilson Plaza, a courtyard amid monolithic government buildings just outside the Federal Triangle Metro stop. Any money they receive from gigs goes toward new music and instrument repairs — a newly restrung bass and saxophones with new pads are products of their most recent windfalls.

Sax player John Adams serves as the announcer at performances, injecting prankish humor into his between-songs banter. He sometimes calls the group “The Toxic Winds of the EPA” and introduces soloists as hailing from various EPA departments, like Wastewater or Air Pollutants.

One outdoor gig caught the attention of trumpeter John Alumbaugh several years ago. At a concert commemorating the September 11th attacks, the orchestra performed “America the Beautiful” and Alumbaugh, who works at the US Agency for International Development, was deeply moved. Though he isn’t an EPA employee, the band found room for him in the trumpet section.

“I just wish it were longer,” Alumbaugh, 46, of Woodbridge, Virginia, says of the group practices. “Sometimes you only have 45 minutes to play.”

Like Alumbaugh, the younger members have a soft spot for the music from the hot-jazz and swing eras that came before the boom of the big bands in the 1940s. The band’s audiences love it too. “The Feds are an older crowd anyway,” Alumbaugh says.

Alumbaugh, who served in the Army and trained as a military lawyer in the Judge Advocate General’s office, played trumpet in high school in Illinois, but lost touch with music during his military service. After the Starlight Orchestra caught his attention and got him to pick up the trumpet again, music has taken root in his life; his seven year-old daughter recently started piano lessons, and he is often at her side as she practices.

The band is a bright spot in the lives of its other members as well, including alto saxophonist Carey Johnston, an environmental engineer from Arlington, Virginia. “This is a godsend,” says Johnston, 38. “I have two kids, and it’s hard to find time play at home, so having this every week at work is great.”

In the last few years, the band has played summer concerts on the Plaza, where employees at the other nearby agencies flock on weekday afternoons, and the band’s presence has brought about some unexpected connections. When the drummer couldn’t make it, a last-minute preconcert e-mail brought a drummer from the State Department out of the woodwork. In Washington, DC, where competition between agencies is common and frustration with red tape and regulations can be high, the collegial atmosphere of music has replaced the turf wars with some common ground.

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Tags: Spare, Swing, Time