The Fourth of July celebration at Wingfield Park will feature the Reno Municipal Band and DG Kicks, a local jazz band, as well as fireworks, food and drinks, a salute to veterans, and watermelon and apple pie eating contests.
DG Kicks will start off the musical performances for the night with Cindy Sabatini as their vocalist. The Reno Municipal Band conductor and program director A.G. “Mack” McGrannahan III is also a member of DG Kicks and said the band has a lot of fun playing together.
“We call it a kicks band, like we do it for kicks,” McGrannahan said.
The Reno Municipal Band will perform after a short intermission with a patriotic performance.
“Our concert is going to be much like seeing or hearing a service band, any of the service band concerts you would go to if they were in the area, like the United States Marine band,” McGrannahan said. “We’re gonna play a lot of patriotic stuff and we’re going to have a lot of marches as well.”
Throughout the day there will be a Veterans Honor Wall available for visitors to write down veterans’ names, branch of service and dates served. And the Reno Municipal Band will also perform a salute to all the armed forces near the end of the concert. Just before the fireworks begin, they will perform “Stars and Stripes Forever” as a salute to our nation, too.
In addition to the patriotic songs and salutes, the municipal band will also include some more contemporary songs including selections from Frozen and Les Miserables. The Frozen songs are expected to be well received because of the recent obsession that’s seemed to take hold of kids of all ages—and many adults, too.
“We have a new arrangement of that that is hot off the press,” McGrannahan said. “I know all the kids will love that. I’ve got a granddaughter who’s five who sings the songs all the time. … I only hear it eight, 10 times a day.”
McGrannahan is looking forward to this performance more than some others because of the amount of people expected to attend in comparison to the municipal band’s other concerts.
“We’re going to have the chance to play in front of five, six thousand people. We’re really excited about that,” McGrannahan said. “It’ll be the biggest crowd that we’re playing in front of because it’s July Fourth and because it’s in the evening. All of the concerts that we do in Wingfield Amphitheater are always at 12 noon, and we do these concerts on Wednesday and Friday throughout July.”
McGrannahan said that both groups play for the sake and love of playing, and many of the members are long-time musicians in the area. A few even played with him in the Harrah’s house band—back when the casinos all had house bands.
The Reno Municipal Band has quite the history to it. It started back in 1882 and has had various names throughout the years but only eight directors in its 134 years. The director prior to McGrannahan—Glenn Little, the namesake of Wingfield Park’s amphitheater—conducted the band for about 35 years, and the director before him conducted for about 40 years. McGrannahan has been the director since 2010.
The youngest member in the municipal band is 21, and the oldest is 88. One member has even been in the band since 1942. The members seem to enjoy playing their instruments.
“People start playing this band because they just love playing their instruments and some of them continue doing it for years,” McGrannahan said. “It’s great. So there’s quite an exchange of ideas from young and old. It’s just a great experience to be involved with it. I just love it.”