Director's Annual Report

The Gateway Concert Band

Director’s Report

Annual Meeting

October 12, 2026

Jack Prindle, Music Director

 

  1. Since my last Director’s Report on Oct. 13, 2025, we have rehearsed forty times and performed ten times.  All of our rehearsals were held in the Great Hall of the Crescent Lodge #109 of the Free & Accepted Masons in Enumclaw.  The first two performances were our winter concerts, entitled “We Need a Little Christmas”, performed on November 30th and December 1st in the Theater at White River High School.    Though the concerts were on “Thanksgiving Weekend”, the audience attendance and the amount donated were the substantial.  Sherman McCormick (trumpet) and Jessie Sanchez (alto saxophone) played solos with the band, and Todd Frazier directed one piece while I played percussion.  Our spring concerts (entitled “Come Dance with Us”), also in the Theater at White River High School, were on Sunday, March 22nd, and Monday, March 23rd.  In addition to the concert, the event was also a celebration of the 30th anniversary of the beginning of our group.  Much of the music was quite challenging and the band played it well. Two of our assistant conductors, Todd Frazier and Stephanie Magnusson, directed one piece each while I played percussion.  The band performed for Memorial Weekend ceremonies in Enumclaw (on Sunday, May 24th) and at the Tahoma National Cemetery (on Monday, May 25th).  The band was well “staffed” for both ceremonies.  Because of the performance on Memorial Day, we did not rehearse on Monday, May 25th.  The seventh and eighth performances were summer concerts, entitled “Name Those Tunes XXVII”, presented on Monday, June 15th at Rotary Centennial Park in Enumclaw, and on Monday, June 22nd at Creator Lutheran Church in Bonney Lake.  Annie Gist played a solo on alto saxophone with the band and Stephanie Magnusson directed a piece with the band while I played percussion.  Our ninth and tenth concerts, entitled “The Adventure Never Ends”, were both presented at Rotary Centennial Park in Enumclaw on Monday, August 10th and Monday, August 17th. It was a bit of an experiment to see if having both concerts in the same place would result in higher audience numbers.  Attendance at both concerts was higher than previous years, so it seems advisable to have all of our summer concerts near our “main” audience base in Enumclaw in the future.  A group of six players from the band were featured in a “Dixieland Combo” with band accompaniment.  Two of our euphonium players (Rob Sturza and Doug Weeks) were featured on another piece and a novelty piece had most of the band squeezing rubber chickens as part of the music. 

 

  1. Todd Frazier recorded both of our winter concerts, and selected the best recordings to produce archival recordings for our members.  Thirteen of our members requested either CDs or thumbdrives with MP3 versions of the recordings,  Todd also recorded both of our March concerts and 11 band members (and I) have ordered archival CDs and 5 thumbdrives of the recordings.  We attempted to record our “Summer Favorites of 2026” on Monday, September 14th, but technical difficulties prevented us from making the recording.  
                    
  2. Since my last Director’s Report, we have had eleven new members join the band (three flutes, three clarinets, one bass clarinet, one horn, one trombone, and two percussion); nine players have left the band (two clarinets, one alto sax, one tenor sax, one horn, one tuba and three percussion).  One player joined us for part of the year, then left (horn).  One player has changed instruments (tenor sax to percussion). Five band members played with us just for the summer (bassoon, clarinet, alto sax and two percussion).  We could especially use another tuba player.

 

  1. Music sponsorship has continued to be a effective fund-raising effort for the band.  All but two of the 29 pieces available for sponsorship were sponsored this “year”.  Assuming everyone paid, we should have collected $2,654 (more than the $2,000 budgeted for music purchase).

 

  1. The band trailer is continues to be safely stored in the yard of Sheri Bundy when we are not using it and is in good condition.  Another band member has recently volunteered to haul the trailer to and from our rehearsals. The efforts of four dedicated band members who haul the trailer are a great help to me.

 

  1. The band’s storage unit at Enumclaw Heated Storage is working well.  A group of six of us met at the storage unit in August, partly to inventory what is there, but also to remove items we no longer need.  Right now, we are temporarily storing our old vibraphone, some (but not all) of the parts of our old drumset and our old set of chimes. Now that we will have completed our replacement of substandard percussion equipment (until we replace the old timpani, which will obviously not happen for at least several months), it’s clearly time to either sell or dispose of the old stuff.   

 

  1. In May, we purchased a new drumset, which we began using in June.  We also paid for a new set of concert chimes, being careful to choose a type which is easier to move and also with a better “damping” system.  It turned out that the model I chose was not readily available and had to fabricated in Japan and then shipped oversea and across country (don’t ask me why, but we had to wait as it was shipped to Pittsburg, San Francisco, Portland and eventually Tacoma).  During the shipping, several of the tubes were marred with pretty noticeable scratches (apparently, the manufacturer did not adequately package the heavy device).  Ted Brown Music, from whom we made the purchase, tells me that new tubes are being produced and should be arriving in a few weeks.

 

  1. We are in the process of signing papers for a grant to help us purchase a new set of Adams Professional Gen II timpani.  4 Culture has chosen to award us almost $12,000 toward that purchase, and we have about two more years to raise the approximately additional $8,000 to complete that purchase.

 

  1. I have selected themes for our concerts for the upcoming year, as follows:

 

            December 6 and 7, 2026:                        “Believe!”

                        March 14 and 15, 2027:                          “Magical Journey”

                        June 14 and 21, 2027:                             “Name Those Tunes XXVIII”

                        August 16 and 23, 2027:                         “A Joyous Jumble”  

 

  1. I want to acknowledge and thank several people who have performed vital jobs for the band: Susan Evans, Communications Director, Concert Coordinator and Grant Manager; Scott Freisthler and Raquel Chase, Social Media Coordinators; Leslie Frazier, Music Librarian; Rick Pabst, Trailer Coordinator; Joe Ferong, Membership Coordinator; and Todd Frazier, who ably maintains our website and records and produces our archival recordings.  I really appreciate the help with setting up and taking down the chairs, stands and percussion for rehearsals and performances, though I am a little concerned that it seems to fall on the same four or five people most of the time.  I also want to thank those who have served on our Governing Board, particularly Joe Ferong and Cheryl Krieger Brown, who complete their terms at the end of the month.  Thanks also goes to our continuing Governing Board members: Ross Fjermedal, Ruth Orozco and Howard Webb. 

 

 

  1. In October of 2022, I announced my intention to retire from directing this group within the next three years.  Part of my purpose was to motivate the band to figure out how to do the many things I had been doing for the band which were outside the contracted responsibilities of its Music Director.  As promised at the Annual Meeting of the Governing Board last October, I observed a commitment to appraise them at least six months in advance of my intentions about retiring next November, after the completion of my current contract with the band.  By the first of May, I gave my “official” declaration that I do not intend to retire after completing my current contract.  But, of course, it is entirely up to the Governing Board, including the two new members who will be elected at this meeting, to decide if it wants to offer me a contract for another “year”.

 

 

            In conclusion, I want to thank you for another fantastic year of marvelous music-making and great fun and friendship together.

 

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