Local favorites the Al Welsh Orchestra played their trademark brand of toe-tapping swing music and big-band standards at the Perry Performing Arts Center Sunday to a crowd of about 70 — and older.
That is a joke, but the audience’s maturity is a fact the orchestra itself often notes at many of its performances.
Since the mid-1950s, the Al Welsh Orchestra has been a regular fixture at Lake Robbins Ballroom near Perry and other venues around Iowa, playing ballrooms, town celebrations, wedding receptions, birthday and anniversary parties, dedications and many other events.
Trombone player Denny Anderson of Rockwell City is owner of the Al Welsh Orchestra. Membership varies with availability, but the other core members include Ross Leeper on lead saxophone and clarinet, bassist Brad Bleam, Marlene Radebaugh on alto saxophone and clarinet and Steve Cook, lead trumpet and flugelhorn.
Cook, the former instrumental music instructor at Perry High School, also serves as the band’s audio and design tech person.
The Al Welsh Orchestra plays music of the big band era along with many of the most famous dance tunes of the 1920s to the 1960s and beyond, with special expertise in the big band sounds of Glenn Miller, Tommy Dorsey, Duke Ellington, Woody Hermann and Benny Goodman and the most popular dance bands, such as Lawrence Welk, Guy Lombardo, Sammy Kaye and others.
“The difference today,” according to the Al Welsh Orchestra website, “is that there are not as many opportunities to perform. Many ballrooms and other venues that were running decades ago are no longer in existence. Nevertheless, the dancing and music are still alive and well, thanks to ongoing ballroom dance lessons and classes, catering to a younger generation, taking the place of past generations.”
Eternally young at heart, the orchestra and its appreciative fans will continue to entertain the Perry area for generations to come.
The next concert in the Perry Fine Arts series will be Feb. 25 at 7 p.m. at the Perry Performing Arts Center with a production by the Iowa Statesmen, an Iowa State University group specializing in the performance of traditional and contemporary male chorus literature.
The Perry Fine Arts concert series is part of the Perry Cultural District.
It is sad to see so few people attending the Perry Fine Arts concerts. The entertainment each year is outstanding, yet few people attend. This concert was outstanding, and there should have been more people there.