For many, the highlights of the 37th annual Bell Tower Festival were musical.
Rick Morain performed the first live concert on the new 47-bell, four octave carillon atop the Mahanay Memorial Carillon Tower Friday preceding the festival’s opening ceremony.
Saturday morning Shades of Blue, the jazz ensemble of the U.S. Air Force Band of Mid-America, performed for an hour on the Plaza Stage before the parade.
The ensemble played many Big Band and jazz favorites by artists such as Hoagie Carmichael, Glenn Miller, Thad Jones and Nat King Cole.
They also performed a patriotic medley and a salute to all military veterans. The finished with the National Anthem in advance of the parade.
The organizers of the earliest Bell Tower Festival’s sought to include things people didn’t often see in Greene County, and that tradition continued this year with Shades of Blue.
