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Paul “Trombone” Ackerman

Class of 1979

I had the good fortune to enjoy my K-12 years in Westfield public schools where the music program was always the highpoint. My 1st grade ear test revealed a tonsillectomy was required to preserve my hearing and my first record player with Prokofiev and Wagner LPs were fitting gifts from my Julliard trained Grandmother to enjoy in convalescence. As I listened closely, the oboe that was the careless Duck and ominous horns that were the Wolf and altruistic strings that were Peter, launched my imagination into a world where anything is possible! Wagner’s  Valkyries descending and uplifting fallen Vikings to Valhalla introduced me to the supernatural! Before long my turntable was spinning the Beatles, Deep Purple and Alice Cooper.

Meanwhile, my Father purchased a massive stereo console which gave our family higher musical fidelity. On it he played Miles Davis, Herb Alpert and Glen Campbell. Again I listened intently. After hearing Tijuana Taxi I said “Dad I think I could play that on the trombone you have in the basement if you’d let me.” It hadn’t been played since his days in the marching band at Duke University so he said of course! Turns out I was right. The Tijuana Taxi honk was easy to blow and by the time Mr. Ward introduced himself and the music program I was raring to go!

In Middle School, Mr. Bartley showed us how we too could be Rock Stars! With patient instruction of the jazz rudiments in “Bubble Gum Pink” and “Furious Elise” he invited our Stage Band to join his Prime Time band to play Sweet Caroline in our annual concert! I played guitar at the Big E with Sam Falcetti’s groups and competed in the Whip City Drum Corps that Jack Kowal and Hank Gardikis built with their blood, sweat and soul.

Education even got better in High School. Mr. Gannon had a killer Marching Band, Concert Band and Jazz Band! I even had an opportunity to study harmony and music theory with Ms. Virginia Coffin! Mr. G saw I loved music and gave me the privilege to perform a disastrous trombone concerto while my parents faithfully recorded the cacophony from the audience. Amazingly, he gave me a second chance and recommended I join the Holyoke Community College jazz band and help out with their musical production of Carnival. I went on to major in Afro American Jazz Studies at UMASS Amherst and even had an opportunity to tour eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union with the Friendship Ambassador Foundation.

A failed attempt to reach “the big time” in NYC led me to change course, settle in Topsfield and put the steps in place to raise a family. This too proved to be a decades long detour. Now I’m back in Westfield and this time playing my trombone for a living! As a “starving artist” I make the most of the business skills Mr. Ward taught when he paid me to march in parades with the VFW. I play in a first call wedding band: The Sultans of Swing, The Blues Brothers Next Generation, The Brass Rock Overdrive Horn Band and perform solo trombone at senior centers and hopefully at restaurants soon too. I’m open to almost any opportunity to earn and make music and look forward to reconnecting with my hometown community in our 350th celebration under the direction of my fellow classmate and now WHS Music Director Mr. Patrick Kennedy and beyond.

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The music doesn't have to end after graduation.

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The music doesn't have to end after graduation.

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I began learning the B-Flat Clarinet in 5th grade while a student of Southampton Road School.  My mentor was Mrs. Ward who I always held dear to my heart.  By Junior High School, or Middle School back then, I played under the direction of Eugene (AKA Gene) Bartley.  When I became a student of Westfield High School (WHS), I played under the direction of both Mr. Douglas Ward and Mr. Thomas Gannon (AKA Mr. G).  Mr. G had asked me if I would be able to play the Bass Clarinet as we had many B-Flat Clarinet players in the band, and he needed another Bass Clarinet player as the one currently with the band would be soon graduating in a year, so I did and I absolutely loved it!  The current WHS Director, Patrick Kennedy, was one of my band mates.

I remember enjoying my time with my band mates back in 1978 when we all went to Clearwater, Florida to participate in an exchange concert.  The parents of the Clearwater High School band were kind enough to open up their homes for us WHS band students while we were there.  I enjoyed marching in the Walt Disney World parade, and seeing the fireworks directly after.   I made so many wonderful memories while in the WHS band. I shed a tear when I played Sentimental Journey in the POP’s for my last time as a Senior.

I currently not only perform with the WHS Alumni band when we are invited to perform, but I also perform in the Greater Westfield Community Band (GWCB) as a B-Flat Clarinetist.  I have been a performer with the GWCB for approximately nine years.  We volunteer our time to keep music and the arts alive in our communities and our local school systems.  We perform twice a year.  Once during Spring and once during Fall at no cost to the audience.   I was blessed to be back performing under the direction of Gene Bartley.  It was like going back in time, but we were adults now. Gene has since handed his baton down to our current Director, James O’Connor. Jim is doing a fine job!  Gene on occasion will perform his trombone with us as our colleague. You see… playing your instrument does not have to end after you graduate from high school.  This year will be my 40th class reunion (time flies), and I still feel the strong connection due to my instrument.  I am keeping my music alive!   - Genevieve (Genny) Broderick, class of 1979

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I started on the trumpet with Mr. Bartley at Southampton Rd School many years ago. I progressed to First Chair pretty rapidly....I was the only trumpet player.....
By Junior High, I was firmly entrenched in the Band and Jazz Band under the direction of Mr. Bartley. It was here that band life made it's impression. I was in the Jazz Band and enjoyed it immensly.
The Fall of '73, I started in The WHS Band under the direction of Mr. Gannon, some new guy that had transferred after teaching in Southwick.
I spent the best four years under his guidance (along with Mr. and Mrs. Ward)
Four years of fun! The football games, the concerts, parades and of course the annual Pops Concert!
My Senior Year, our WHS Jazz Ensemble captured First Place at the Western Mass Jazz Festival and we moved onto the state competition.
I still have many friends from all of those music years and wouldn't trade any of those memories for anything!
Hope to see a lot of old friends and make some new ones!

Steve White (Whitey) '77

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Congrads on the wonderful WHS Band I show enjoy at the parades etc. Our band 1950-54 was not exactly state of the art.  Mr. Ward tried hard but the talent was not there.  Most had two left feet and were slightly out of tune.  We did not have the early band experience  and it showed. We were at every football game and the parades A for effort and I do have fond memories.  Wished I could march along for 350th that would be fun

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Congrads on the wonderful WHS Band I show enjoy at the parades etc. Our band 1950-54 was not exactly state of the art.  Mr. Ward tried hard but the talent was not there.  Most had two left feet and were slightly out of tune.  We did not have the early band experience  and it showed. We were at every football game and the parades A for effort and I do have fond memories.  Wished I could march along for 350th that would be fun

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When Munger Hill Elementary school opened for the ‘91 class, I happened to be starting kindergarten, so I was with the first class to go K- 6th grade in that school- it just worked out that way.  It also worked out that a very special husband and wife, Mr. and Mrs. Lampiasi, used the warmth in their hearts to share the joy of music with scores of fortunate children.  As I moved along with their inspiration, there was a major middle school makeover matriculating, so I was with the last class to be in the ‘old’ middle school in 7th grade, now the South Middle, and the first 8th grade class in the ‘new’ North Middle school- it just worked out that way.  It also worked out that a man there was taking the time to change young people’s lives with his love of music.  Mr. Bartley has a presence, and I don’t need to tell you how many have been impacted by him, because if you are reading this you are probably one of them.  Furthermore, we are talking about a man that, in his prime, could play a flugelhorn that displaced gravity, and the orbits of planets.  Yeah.  As I moved along again, into the ole WHS, the only numerical quirk of interest was that the Sox won the year I graduated high school in 2004, which was after an 86 year drought, and I was actually born in ’86, incidentally the year of the Buckner debacle, but truly, I digress… If you were in the band in high school in Westfield, you were a better person for it, because you had Mr. Kennedy as an instructor.  He fills a room, and he has high expectations, but he has the right to- because he really does care enough to do anything to help you achieve the success he believes you have the potential for.  Then, after the months of practice, the grand night would arrive.  The lights, the fancy clothes, and the all the buzz of the evening, would all come to a still hush with the ‘tap tap tap’ of his baton.  And in that deafening silence, as hundreds sat holding their breath, and we in the band all poised for that first note, he would look right at us all.  And he would smile.

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I remember being introduced to the music program in the 5th grade at Paper Mill by Mr Gladwin.  He was one of the first teachers I had that didn't see me as an "IEP" student who probably would struggle with and not succeed in the band program.  With his support and a lot of hard work, I was able to not just succeed in elementary school band but pursue band in middle school with Mr. Bartley and high school with Mr. Kennedy.   I was even able to accomplish being first chair Piccolo by my senior year of high school.  To this day some of my favorite memories have been with the WHS Band.

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Mr. Gladwin started me on the drums in 5th grade band at Franklin Ave. School.  Then I met Mr. Bartley; who inspired me and terrified me every day, and whose job I envied to no end.  Joining Mr. Kennedy's gigantic WHS band was an awe-inspiring event, filling my days with magic. The Music hallway was my home in High school, even worked it out so five of seven classes my last semester were in band or chorus!  I was drumline captain and the Bomber Bird, and my Bomber pride has never ever diminished.
Now I am a teacher  myself, with my very own music class.  So I  can finally live the life of these teachers who inspired me, and pay forward the life-altering gift of collaborative music.
So proud to be returning to the powerhouse beast that is the WHS Band . . . I still cry when I hear "Sentimental Journey."
Go Fight WIN!!!!

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Hello Alumni and Friends of the Westfield High School Band! I have been proud and honored to direct the WHS Band since the fall of 1997. My career as a musician started in the gym at Highland School, where Mr. Douglas Ward introduced me to the trumpet. I can still recall my first spring concert on that lawn, underneath the flagpole on a beautiful spring day, the smell of fresh cut grass filling the air. I'll  always remember walking home to our house on Hawthorne Avenue with my mom, feeling proud and ten feet tall with  my trumpet case in one hand and the other holding my mom's. When I drive by on a spring day now I always open the car window in hopes of reliving those formative moments in my life. Following Mr. Ward, Gene Bartley introduced me to jazz and rock music via the stage band and for that I will be forever grateful. In high school, Tom Gannon showed me what a successful life and career could look like.....never in a thousand years did I think I'd have a chance to do just that in good old room 133 at WHS!

Life has a funny way of coming full circle as I am fortunate to now work with some of my best students now as colleagues in the Westfield Public Schools music program.

It is my hope that many WHS Alumni will come back to Westfield for the Westfield 350 Parade and take the opportunity to relive some of their favorite musical moments and memories too!

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Hi! I am a 2001 graduate of the program and I am currently the band director at Westfield Intermediate School. I am so excited to be involved! One of the reasons I came back home was because of my strong belief that Westfeild has one of the best music programs in the state and I am humbled and honored to be a part of it! Go Bombers!!!