front: Larry Versteeg, Jeanette Tippets, Ellen McGowan, David Geffen, Kevin Kilzer, Mary Cox
back: Walt Moffat, Larry Baedke, Bruce Legge, Don Larry, Paul Green
(photo by Kelly Reiter, 2011)

"If music is the universal language, the Territorial Brass Band is surely one of its most gifted translators...
a musical voyage back to the golden era of town bands, with stirring renditions of original arrangements."
- ARIZONA HISTORICAL FOUNDATION



Founded 1987
Proclaimed Arizona's Official Historical Brass Band, 1990
Second Annual Great American Brass Band Festival , Danville, Kentucky, 1991
52nd Presidential Inaugural Parade, Washington DC, 1993
Goldwater Lecture Series, KAET/PBS Television, 2000
CultureKeepers Award, Arizona Historical Foundation & Westin Kierland Resort, 2003
Featured band on BrassCast.com international podcast, 2008
Awarded a Legacy Project for the Arizona Centennial by the Arizona Historical Advisory Commission, 2009

See and Hear our New CD, Arizona Mosaic


Now Available, see below

UPCOMING EVENTS

Listen to BrassCast.com featuring Territorial Brass on a 25 minute podcast with interview and music

Visit KBAQ Hearing the Century podcast site with photos, interviews and music

Photo Gallery: Twenty Years of Terrtiorial Brass, 1987-2007


TERRITORIAL BRASS was formed in February 1987 to perform at Territorial Days for the Mesa Southwest Museum and was quickly recognized by museums across Arizona as an entertaining living history resource. Dressed in turn-of-the-century costume (modeled after the Prescott and Bisbee brass bands), TERRITORIAL BRASS recaptures the golden age of the American town band. This twelve member ensemble specializes in 19th century American brass band music, playing authentic arrangements from 1835, through the Civil War, to Arizona's year of statehood. Popular songs of the period are rendered by a soprano vocalist and the program is narrated from the perspective of a young lady living in Arizona Territory in 1897. For indoor concerts, the music program incorporates slides of vintage photographs of Arizona bands and daily life in the territory, and includes a "follow-the-bouncing-ball" sing-along. Among the instruments often played is a rare 1867 over-the-shoulder soprano saxhorn, a type widely used during the Civil War. To learn more, the Library of Congress has an excellent overview of the American Brass Band Movement.

ACHILLE LA GUARDIA FEDERICO RONSTADT

It is the goal of TERRITORIAL BRASS to replicate the brass bands that were active in Arizona and New Mexico during the territorial periods. Brass bands were organized in the settlements of Prescott, Phoenix, Tucson, Tempe, Mesa, Yuma, Kingman, and many of the mining towns such as Bisbee, Morenci, Jerome and Globe. There are over 200 original 19th century works in the Repertoire of TERRITORIAL BRASS. Music played by Arizona and New Mexico's territorial bands and written by Arizona composers, such as Achille La Guardia (Fiorello's father) and Federico Ronstadt (Linda's Grandfather), are being researched and collected by TERRITORIAL BRASS, and programmed into each concert. Our research of the Arizona's earliest beginnings of the brass band movement in Prescott was published in the DAYS PAST feature of the Prescott Courier, sponsored by Sharlot Hall Museum.


ARIZONA MOSAIC is our new CD, an official Legacy Project for the Arizona Statehood Centennial in 2012.

DISTANT HORNS, VOLUMES 1 & 2, THE BRASS BAND ERA IN THE OLD WEST, is a compact disc recording that documents the band music heritage of Arizona and New Mexico. It features compositions by Achille La Guardia and Federico Ronstadt never before recorded. The Volume 1 portion of the CD is music from an earlier released cassette tape. In 1995, TERRITORIAL BRASS recorded the soundtrack for the historical documentary, LA MERA FRONTERA. This music is represented on the CD as Volume 2.

Retail outlets for ARIZONA MOSAIC include the Sharlot Hall Museum and Prescott Fine Arts gift shop in Prescott AZ, The MIM (Musical Instrument Museum) in Phoenix AZ, and the Courthouse Museum in Tombstone AZ. For mail order purchase send a check to the order of Territorial Brass in the amount of $15 for each CD with your address to Don Larry, 523 N Macdonald St., Mesa AZ 85201. DISTANT HORNS is not currently available as a CD but can be downloaded from iTunes. ARIZONA MOSAIC will be on iTunes soon.

INSTRUMENTATION & MUSICIANS

Larry Baedke
Bb cornet, flugel horn

Bruce Legge
Eb cornet, Bb cornet, flugel horn

Walter Moffat
flugel horn

Jeanette Tippetts
Eb alto horn

David Geffen
Eb alto horn, flugel horn, cornet

Larry Versteeg
trombone, double-bell euphonium, arranger

Don Larry
euphonium, didgeridoo

Paul Green
tuba

Kevin Kilzer
drums

Ellen McGowan
piccolo & flute

Mary Cox
vocalist

LINKS to other Living History Brass Bands


Don Larry, 523 North Macdonald, Mesa, AZ 85201, (480) 495-2299, donlarry@hotmail.com


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