The Buies Creek Big Band will play its debut concert at 6 p.m. on Sept. 4 on the front porch of the Taylor Bott Rogers Fine Arts Building at Campbell University. Admission is free, and audience members should bring their own lawn chair and picnic to enjoy the concert on the Fine Arts lawn.
The program will be a diverse mix of music by the Beatles, Earth Wind and Fire, Frank Sinatra, George Michael, Glenn Miller, Marvin Gaye, Henry Mancini and others. Vocalist Debbie Dunn, a native of Four Oaks, will sing with the band.
BCBB membership is diverse, with players from 18 to 70 years old. While the band itself is new, there are many decades of experience in the group.
“The genesis of the band was that three or four former classmates from the 1970s who had recently retired began to reminisce and reflect on how much fun we had playing jazz as Campbell students,” said guitarist Rick McDuffie. “We knew there were ‘big bands’ in Durham, Raleigh, Fayetteville and Wilmington, but there was nothing comparable in the Harnett/Lee/Southern Wake/Johnston area. We decided to try to organize something, and, since Buies Creek seemed to be centrally located, we elected to ‘pitch our tent’ here.”
McDuffie said he had no idea the band would be so enthusiastically embraced by Campbell’s Fine Arts department.
“We’ve since become affiliated with Campbell, and that has given us a quantum leap forward,” he said.
The band’s director, Dr. Adrien Re, is a professor at Campbell and there are several faculty members and three students in the band.
“We’ve been able to rehearse on campus, which has been a huge blessing,” McDuffie added.
Re is a Grammy-nominated composer, arranger, multi-instrumentalist, audio engineer, music producer and educator. His professional playing credits include The Temptations, Rosemary Clooney, Mel Torme, Burt Bacharach, Johnny Mathis, Carol Burnett and Chevy Chase. His groups have opened concerts for Boney James, Spyro Gyra, The Neville Brothers and Tower of Power.
The 18 band members are Campbell faculty, professional musicians, local band directors and advanced students.
Listen to the band: https://www.youtube.com/@BuiesCreekBigBand