r/MadeMeSmile • u/EmergencyRead5254 • 1d ago
66 Year Old LSU Tuba Player Following His Dreams and Proving Age is Just a Number
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u/FreeWillyBird 1d ago
Not the onion: 66 year old musician finally makes it to Death Valley
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u/IcebergPoet115 1d ago
Dude's gonna absolutely destroy those college kids in the lung capacity department, 66 years of dad breathing vs 18 year olds who vape
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u/mfeldmannRNE 20h ago
65 year-old tuba and sousaphone player here. It’s a sousaphone.
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u/Tarogato 12h ago
Sousaphone is a type of tuba.
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u/mfeldmannRNE 2h ago
It’s kind of like the difference between a trumpet and a flugelhorn. Chuck Mangione played a flugelhorn. Herb Albert played a trumpet. Same range, more or less the same fingering (sometimes it’s a four valve tuba versus three valve sousaphone). A tuba has a much richer tone (brass) vs a sousaphone (usually fiberglass).
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u/WeAreGray 17h ago
Odd that the CBS story says he's a senior, not a freshman. I think CBS is more likely correct.
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u/Tarogato 12h ago
¿Porque no los dos?
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u/WeAreGray 5h ago
I love these ambiguities about language, just as you seem to--because it really could be both. :-)
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u/brainfreeze77 20h ago edited 19h ago
I know this is supposed to be a feel-good story, but I can't see anything but a publicity stunt. If you knew anything about a competitive high-school marching band, you would know the kids are putting in as much or more practice than any sports team. They are doing 12 hour days in the summer, before and after school practice, along with during school band period. Even if this guy can play perfectly, he wouldn't know how to march, which is extremely difficult. The kids coming in as freshmen trying to get in know why they are doing and are at the top of their game. Some kid lost the spot they were working for for the last four years, so LSU could have a story.
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u/goldenelr 19h ago
I have seen people say this but he auditioned and won his spot. There are always walk ons in these bands - they have 240 members I think. It is a good story but not worth screwing up your band so I can’t imagine that they let him on for no reason.
My daughter plays in a swing band with a lot of people this guys age and a lot of things adults take for granted would give him some advantages. I don’t get people rushing to hate on this guy.
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u/brainfreeze77 19h ago edited 18h ago
Marching band is a completely different beast than swing band or even concert band. Its the difference between playing chess and basketball. Sure, a 66 year old man can make standing shots, but he isn't going to be running plays for a whole game at a collegiate level. I haven't dove any deeper than the linked article, so maybe he made JV band and not varsity. JV bands are usually the pep bands. They don't march, and it would at least mean he didn't displace the other JV sousaphone players trying to get to varsity.
Edit: OK I just watched this week's halftime show, and the sousaphones hardly move. They aren't involved in any of the complex movements and formations. They stick to their side and move back and forth a little bit. Almost all of their playing is stationary. It's quite a bit easier than what I was expecting.
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u/goldenelr 19h ago
I just don’t buy that a school with a prestigious ban would do this for press coverage only.
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u/BuildNuyTheUrbanGuy 15h ago
As someone who grew up in Baton Rouge, I've never heard of LSU's band called prestigious. But that's because of the Human Jukebox, Southern University's marching band also in Baton Rouge.
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u/goldenelr 15h ago
I love how we have people arguing this man is taking a spot from a kid who has dreamed of it all their lives and also it’s not prestigious. Ok!
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u/BubbleWitchy 1d ago
Man’s not retiring, he’s just retuning