Office of the Mayor Sedalia Missouri
Official Proclamation
The Sedalia Community will be honored by the presence
of the renowned Canadian Brass in concert on December 3, 1999; and
The Sedalia Symphony Society is to be highly commended
for its efforts in arranging for this outstanding group to appear
in concert to celebrate The Symphony Society 's 65th anniversary
and in appreciation for community support received over the years:
and
This concert will be a homecoming for Canadian Brass
co-founder and trombonist Gene Watts, a 1954 graduate of Smith-Cotton
High School, who attended the University of Missouri-Columbia
from where he received an Honorary Doctorate in Music in May of
1998: and
Members of The Canadian Brass have delighted audiences
for twenty-nine seasons all across North America, Europe, Japan,
Australia, China, the Middle East, and the former Soviet Union,
have appeared as featured guest artists with every leading American
orchestra, on a Christmas TV special, and in music festivals', and
whose recordings include over twenty titles on CDs', and
It is with great pleasure that we welcome these talented
musicians. Gene Watts, Jens Lindemann, Ronald Romm, Christopher
Cooper, and Charles Daellenbach to our community,
NOW THEREFORE., I, JANE A. GRAY, MAYOR OF THE CITY
OF SEDALIA, MISSOURI, do hereby proclaim Friday, December 3, 1999,
as "GENE WATTS - CANADIAN BRASS DAY" in the City of
Sedalia, Missouri.
In witness whereof I have hereunto set my hand and
caused this seal to be affixed.
Mrs. Nora Watts: A Tribute
Eugene Watts has dedicated this homecoming concert to his mother,
Mrs. Nora Bell Rogers Watts.
Many in tonight's audience, including third-generation piano students,
took lessons from Mrs. Watts. Others will remember her as pianist,
organist, choir director, and active member of First Christian Church,
the Order of Eastern Star, and the Helen G. Steele Music Club.
Mrs. Watts lived in Sedalia most of her life. After her marriage
to Rev. J.W. Watts, the couple lived in Lincoln and Warrensburg
before returning to make their home and raise their sons, Jim and
Gene, at 1605 South Carr. Life in the Watts household was steeped
in music between the mother's piano and the father's trumpet, violin,
and piano tuning. Jim played trumpet in the Smith-Cotton band and
later was a member of a military band while Gene, five years younger,
played trombone, was immersed in the local jazz tradition, and dreamed
of playing in a dance band. While attending the University of Missouri,
he realized that dream by forming the Missouri Mudcats, a Dixieland
band.
According to Jim Watts, his mother's five grandchildren were bitten
by the musical bug that infected her sons. Mrs. Watts also has nine
great-grandchildren. Mrs. Watts pride in her sons' achievements
was evident in her collection of photos and recordings and her travels
to attend early Canadian Brass concerts.
Gene Watts, son of the life-long piano teacher, became leader of
the Canadian Brass, champions of music education. The Brass offer
educational activities for young musicians and teachers while they
are on tour, and they fund grants for musicians to continue their
studies.
Gene studied transcendental meditation in India before organizing
the Canadian Brass and has passed that experience on to the other
members of his group. Meditation, he says is "a search for self-knowledge,
which for me fit into everything that I had learned in a Christian
upbringing, but in a new and vital way." In his philosophy, music
creates a resonance between performers and the audience that generates
an exchange of energy and communication.
Nora Watts' influence on her son through her own gentle nature,
love of music, and spiritual influence are evident in Gene's life
and work. He says, "Everything I went through before the Canadian
Brass really prepared me for it. When we play Dixieland, especially,
is when I feel like the little Missouri boy's finally back home."
We honor Nora Watts tonight for her enduring musical influence
on her students and family‘and particularly for the legacy that
is evident in the Canadian Brass.
