Pachiel "Boss" Smith (Trumpet, bari, alto) – Our venerable leader, what can we say about Pachiel. What can we say? Nothing! He reads our mail, censors our thoughts, and times our bathroom visits! At night (after “lights out”) he sings us to sleep with his sinister mantra, “chromatic long tones, I want to hear more chromatic long tones!”
Dr. John Lindsay, M.D. -AKA Dr. Electro (Alto pocket Sax)
Dr. John joined our band after the breakup of "Dr. Johnny Fun-Times and the Puddle-Jumpers". A true Anglo Sax-on whose passions for tinkering and invention has lead him to innovate many an amazing kitchenware contraption. His first gadget, a merry-go-round, was made entirely out of the Lindsay family's heirloom Jubilee dish set. Next, he invented a bicycle made entirely out of tea cups. A year later he invented a jumping jack out of pots and pans. Running low on household goods, he raided the silverware drawer and made a hydro-electric power station. He even manufactured his own mini-sax out of uncooked pasta and crazy glue. Dr. John is now re-inventing the art of playin' horn.
Jenna Jade (Percussion) In the rainy spring of 1937 the band was listing two and fro in the desperate need of more rat-a-tat-tat, shooga-shooga and poom-pah-poom-pah-poom-poom-poom-pah. Kicking down the dusty isles of a thrift store someone spotted a Jenna Jade doll in a second-hand stuffys bin between Tickle-Me Elmos and Raggedy-Annes. She was so enthusiastic to leave the thrift store and join the great gravy train to stardom of our band, she sprang to the floor and impressed us with a song-and-dance number she had been practicing. We adopted her and soon discovered all she asked for was a dozen turns of the key in her back to play through a whole set.
Cathe "De-caf" Gilchrist (Euphonium) When not flipping beef disks and slinging lava-hot java this versatile ex-prairie oyster of amazonian extraction finds peace and contemplation with euphoric euphonium expressions. Cathe is a pensive, hard-drivin' peacenik who enjoys feeding hungry hippie maws at the market and comforting the afflicted during the week . . . when she inflicts the unexpecting woodland animals with thunderous brass blasts of rhythmic bass!! If you happen to be bush-bound and catch glints of shiny metal plumbing and all the while hearing what sounds like the rousing of a spirited she-moose, it may be our Eupha-riffic Cathe harmonizing with a deep and mysterious occult resonance . . .
Simmah Petersen – (Clarinet, feather duster) Simmah joined the Brassicas as lead trianglist. At first James vied for the lead, but when it became clear that Simmah could move seamlessly between Isosceles, Equilateral and even Scalene, Simmah was awarded the lead role. She switched almost immediately to clarinet. Utter confusion reigned in the band for the next several weeks: some members claiming the band was no longer “geometrically sound”, others claiming that the clarinet is “sorta triangular”, and the whole time Jen sat smiling smugly to herself. . . She's just happy Simmah keeps supplying her frothy jars of home-made "Drummer Juice."
Gabe "Quick Fingers" Blondin (Trumpet) Gabe was born to a roving troupe of Highland Gypsies and for fifteen years plied the itinerant trade of a convivial purse-snatcher. We found Gabe living under a bridge with a motley gang of zealots and discontents . . . and after loosing $300 in three minutes, we figured his skills and prehensile fingers and toes were best focused on the tactile challenge of horn playing. He does not miss his former life but tears up at the whiff of stewed cabbage. Gabe has naturally taken to life touring on the road with the band and after each performance he merrily shares his booty of watches and finery gleaned from rubes in the audience.
Gretje "Leederhosen" Lohmann (Tenor saxophone) What gets Gretje's liederhosen in a knot quickest is when she has to use her pre-school teaching skills with her band-mates. "Time-outs usually work for the horn section, but when the percussion section is fighting, I have to turn the garden sprinklers on them" She now wears a holster for a smart leather riding crop. Gretje loves being in the band and it has earned her more deutschemarks than a Liechtenstein milk-maid. "It sure beats my old gig being Governess to the Von Trappe Family!"
Jacob (The) King (Sousaphone) – After a life-changing pilgrimage to HonkFest 2007 (in Boston) Jacob had an epiphany and, in three short months (they were all Februaries) wrote his Magnum Opus, the now famous pamphlet, Tantric Healing, the Tuba, & You. Despite the ensuing overnight success Jacob is still known to his bandmates as “him”. Jacob has recently started wearing trousers again.
The Ape (Bass drum, anger management) the Ape came to America with an organ grinder. After the mysterious bludgeoning of his partner, the Ape fell in with the filthy staff of Jim Henson. Sadly, his first "Muppet Show" appearance ended with a banana liquor-indused outburst. He then couch surfed at Bert and Ernie's and at the apartment of the Man with a Yellow Hat where he developed the habit of dropping turd balls into traffic. Pursued by Health Authorities and back on the mean streets, he met Pachiel of the Bolting Brassicas at a banana peeler bar. "I don't know what's his problem." Says Pachiel, "but we're giving him a chance to take his frustrations out on our bass drum . . . but hell, where'd you find a drummer who'll work for jars of fermented banana juice?"
Katrina Jean Herriot a.k.a. Zebra Kitty (Flute, Universal Love) Zebra Kitty's lifelong musical passion has been a religious devotion to electronic dance music. Therefore, during her nightly practices under a smiling crescent moon on a fence in the alleyway behind Andy Capp's house . . . with Heathcliff strumming a catfish skeleton and Garfield singing angora calico, Zebra Kitty toots her silver flute . . .
At an electronically inspired 32,000 beats a second!
Jen "Off-beat" Gobby (Accent percussion, politics) – “It has always been a dream of mine,” said Jen, tearfully, at one of the band’s first Group Hug sessions, “to strike – at regular intervals – big metal disks.” This dream, thanks to the Bolting Brassicas, was soon to be realized. For the next three months she showed up at practice and mimed the parts almost perfectly. Shortly thereafter we found some old pizza pans in a dumpster, WOOHOO!
Julie "Mama" Chadwick (Alto sax, baby-maker) - Julie is a casualty of Band Class - when she first joined the Brassicas she was suffering from a form of Musical Trauma. Her horn would go silent at the word “solo”, and the term “improvise” would send her cowering under her music stand. However, after just one year in the Bolting Brassicas, Julie has begun to imagine a life outside the “prison bars of the musical staff”. Now if we miss a beat she raps us over the knuckles with her conducter's rod.
Reid "Slim" Wilson (Trombone) – Reid actually studied music in university, where he also dabbled in macrame, and experimented with nudity. Sorry, slight correction, Reid listened to music in university - what he studied isn’t exactly clear, he usually mumbles something about plate tectonics & quantum theory, while his wife claims it has more to do with gin & tonics and humdrum theories. “One thing is clear,” she says, “one night I went to bed with a nice normal guy, the next day I woke up with a tromboner.”
Shari "Guru" White – (trumpet, euphonium) “Shari can hit a high C,” I was told shortly after joining the band, “it shouldn’t be too long before she learns some other notes!” In addition to the trumpet & the euphonium (a sort of pocket tuba) Shari also plays the piano, and once tried to incorporate it into the marching band – with disastrous results. The gig was a Seniors’ Day Parade; Shari lost control of the piano at the top of a steep hill. It raced perilously toward a crowd of octogenarians but luckily smashed itself into a clump of Shriners.
James "Tea-time" Booker – (snare drum) We are so proud to announce the return to the stage of our stunning rhythmical mastermind, James Booker! All we can say is "Thank You, Thank You, Jamie!" for coming back out of retirement and returning to lead those floundering, tone-deaf baffoons in the percussion section with your brilliant beats, man! You are an irreplaceable asset to this organization! Cheers! How you ever found it in your heart to forgive us for that terrible rainy night when we ran you over and left you for dead on the highway naked outside the lice infested hoe-joes, well, it's no one's guess. You're the better man, James! You're the better man! Welcome Back! You're doing so much better!
Past Members
Kristin Charleton (trumpet) When not splitting molecules with her particle accelerator and researching world domination and the cure for tone deafness with her partner General Hawk-eye deep in their secret mountain lair, Kristin blows a mean horn with the Bolting Brassicas. "We don't always know what important research Kristin is working on, but when she's hanging with the band, we ask her to refrain from using words with more than eight syllables!" says band leader Pachiel Smith. "Kristin is so smart, she can play the trumpet with one hand while doing the accounting, writing visa applications and filing our income taxes with the other!"
Andrew "Bean" Day – (Canned Ham) Have you seen this man? Reward offered. Please call. He is late for diner. After making tongues wag on the seedy Eastern Tush-Push Night Club circuit performing with a half-dozen gyrating Polecats in flame resistant jumpsuits, Andrew took the job of the Brassicas Ringmaster with his partner Tarantella, an accomplished spidertamer. Andrew and his partner have raised two Barbary Apes during their musical production of "Cabin Fever!" Andrew answers to the names Guido, Sally and four-finger Mike.
Auggie "Holy" Mann (Sexyphone, Peacekeeping) Always after the next best thrill, Auggie left the band to pursue a full-time career in Bovine Suction. She is now the nation's third most important Dairy Magnate and has no time for the likes of us. The band has been down since her departure, for Auggie is a natural peacemaker and can whip up an amazing spicy dumpster curry. Because we can't publicise Auggie's present address, please forward all of her mail to her friend his Holiness the Maharishi.
Rejeanne McKechnie (clarinet, three-beaned salad)
Rejeanne has not always been a strict Clarinet-tarian. In her early twenties she travelled around the country by camel-back expounding the main guiding principles of classical Bassoon-ism. Before that, during her care-free youth, she was often seen downtown hanging out with a plaid-clad gang O'Merry Bag Pipe-imbibers. In other words, with six arms and three heads, she'd be a one-woman wood-wind whirlwind ensemble!
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The Bolting Brassicas Marching Band is a Klezmer Funk and Balkan Gypsy Marching Band playing gigs throughout British Columbia, Canada and the Pacific Northwest!
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