Tom Beggs
When I came to Central High School I had previously worked as a band director at Jackson Middle School, Oglethorpe County and Temple. I had spent six years teaching music from fifth grade through high schoo
l and was very interested in drum corps having used those style shows at Oglethorpe County. I was also
working on my Masters in Music at West Georgia. (Note that while at West Georgia I met a young
trombone player named Neil Ruby.)
In 1979 when I began teaching at Central, we moved into a new band room at the back of the gym. It was
one large room with no instrument or uniform storage. Band parents worked to build additional rooms in
the band room. In 1980 we founded the flag line to compliment the move to drum corps style shows. Some
of the music I remember the band playing included the Theme from Rocky, the Rockford Files and my own arrangement of a theme from a Brahms Symphony. We marched in a back parking lot during band camp and I climbed on the roof the watch.
There were many good times, but one of my favorites was when the entire clarinet section went to Solo and Ensemble Festival. They scored a Superior Rating on a moving arrangement of ”Londonderry Air.” I fondly
remember the many band students who made the band successful.
After leaving Central and getting my Masters in Bassoon, I worked in a recording studio while I played rock and jazz. In the 1980s there were also stints as a newspaper reporter, an arts program coordinator in Carrollton, and school community relations specialist for Carroll County Schools before I began working as an instructional designer and audio-video specialist at West Georgia in 1991. Now as the Classroom Support Coordinator at the University of Georgia, I manage a group that designs, installs and supports classroom technology systems.
A few family notes; my son played trumpet and both my daughters played trombone. My youngest daughter played trombone in the Jefferson High School Band (Class of 2010), and also performed in the Athens Youth Symphony. It was at one of our marching festivals in 2009 I got to see the Central High School Band again and find out what a tremendous program it had become. I still get emotional when I hear high school bands and probably always will. Best wishes to the Central Band that will always hold special meaning to me.
