The Waterbury Democrat., 1942-07-14
NAVY BANDSMEN ARE ROOTN, TOOTN FIGHTING MEN WHEN ACTION COMES
ny ROBERT RUARK


 NEA Service Stan COFrespOndentI
 When the Japs swept over Pearl HaFhoF and splasfed bomb on the uES Arizona. the powder mazazine blew up. killing an entire crew of ammunition handlers. That parti- euIar crew was the ships band, pressed into battle service.
 Later, when there was no more Ammunition to handle and no more battle stations to man, another Navy band unpacked its instru- meEats. While the damage was being totted, and the wounded carried to ethe hospital, that band played for l6 hours straight, touching on everything from 'L'Apres-midi dun Faun" to Beat Me Daddy" It helped quite lot.
 MUSICIANS CAN
 STEER OR SHOOT. TOO
 On sea duty a Navy musicians chores extend above and beyond the expulsion of wind from a horn. He may hold down key job in the ships vital communications center. He can steer course, shoot Q machine gun, bandage a wound or swab a deck-and he can do it just as well as the next guy.
 Footing a Navy trumpet is no soft touch for languid lads who don't relish deck service. Since 1895, Navy has been operating a musicians school in the Washing ton Navy Yard--a school designed to put iron in the soul, steel in the muslces and seafaring sense in the head. The arpeggios come later.
 But they do get around to music ... to such degree that the ship-term "boilermaker' for musi- clan has just about died out. Cur rently training in Washington are some 250 musicians who not only could hold jobs in the nations better bands and orchestras, but in many cases have actually done so.
 Director and fervent exponent of the Navy school is a former member of Leopold Stokowskfs Philadelphia orchestra-Boatswain J. M. Thurmond. A serious beSpec- tacIed graduate of Curtis Institute of Music, Bosn Thurmond puts his boys through a course that would gtagger Stokowski. He has 30 as- sistants, all experts and all tough taskmasters. There is raft of ar- tistic talent in the Navy school, but no artistic temperament. Faint encouraged.
 TWO-YEAR COURSE
 TAKES 12 MONTHS
 In one year the bandsmen cover courses that run two years in an average conservatory. But the men aren't starting from scratch. Two-thirds have college training, four have M. A. degrees, and several have M. A. degrees, and several have been recruited from name" orchestras. In one of the jazz groups. a former Hickory House (New York City) pianist beats the boogie-woogie, and en- first horn in the Denver Symphony goes out of this world on a hot trumpet Such technical subjects as solfege, musical theory, history, harmony, conducting, and orchestra tion don't bother the boys a bit.
 At the moment Gos'n Thurs monds boys are flung all over the face of the globe. They go only to flag commands, but some 300 have graduated since the school started in '35. There was Thur mond- trained outfit on the Lex ington, by the way-mentioned favogably for its work in caring for the wounded during the long period when major surgery was impossible.
 Just before the Japs bombed Pearl Harbor, the Arizona's band won the fleet championship in a musical battle. The award, in the future, will be called the Arizona Trophy, in honor of the ladys who died when the magazine went up.