Who was Tom Hernandez?

[_TrumpeT_]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rafael_Mendez

I didn't know there was someone who had studied under both Rafael Mendez and Maurice Andre...?

[trpt.hick]

I am not sure who posted that on Wikopedia. The name is not familar to me and has not been mentioned by the Mendez sons. There is no reference to the name in the Mendez Library that I am aware of.

Late in Mendez' career, he had to miss a few tours. In the cases I am aware of, Doc Severisen was asked to cover them (which he did).

[trumpetlover57]

Tom Hernandez did indeed study under both Mendez and Andre. Hernandez was the director of the Golden West Symphonic Band from its inception in 1967 until his semi-retirement in 2003. Mendez was a guest conductor for the band before he passed away and actually wrote a special version of Danny Boy for Hernandez that he still plays. Hernandez studied under Andre during his sabatical in 1974 (In Paris) and under mendez 1955. Hernandez decided to focus more on directing rather than being a trumpet soloist but is still sought after in many church circles, namely, the Assemblies of God churches. He has been the guest soloist for many general meetings of the church. He also has taken his symphonic band to play in Europe about twenty times. The most recent being in 2001 where they played in front of about 200,000 at an international mass in front of Pope John Paul II.

Another side note about Hernandez is that he played with the Sinatra band but decided to turn down the position because he was offered a teaching job instead and couldn't risk the job security that came with teaching. Luckily, Sinatra kicked out his whole band about a few weeks later so it was a good choice to take the teaching job.

If you would like recordings of Hernandez you can contact me. I have a great version of him playing La Virgen de la Macarena from about 1982.

[hnakayama]

I played in the Golden West Sumphonic Band from 1976 through 1977 under the direction of Tom Hernandez. Golden West College probably had the best all-around college music program in the Orange County area. The other music director at the college, David Anthony was music theory wizard and a very good Jazz band director. Tom was very demanding yet very gracious and patient with us at the same time. As a note Tom's high school age daughter played the flute in the band at that time.

Tom used to fly to Paris about once a month to take his trumpet lessons at the Paris Conservatory of Music under Maurice Andre and was required to play internationally several times a year.

I remember when Raphael Mendez was invited by Tom as the guest conductor during the Spring semester of 1977. Mr. Mendez was very enthuiastic and inspiring to us, especially the trumpet players. But, he was very demanding on Tom who was to be the soloist for our Spring concert. Yes, "Danny Boy" arranged by Mr. Mendez was one of the pieces that we played. I also beleive that we played "La Virgin de la Macarena" and "Nothing Like Music, " which was arranged by Branson. This concert was recorded on a Nakamichi master casset and casset tapes were made and sold of this concert. I used to have one, but it has been lost. I sure would like to be able to find a copy of that concert if someone still has one of those cassets.

[trumpetlover57]

Thank you so much for finally proving that I am right about Mr. Hernandez. He did indeed study under both Andre and Mendez.

Mr Anthony is indeed a very good music teacher but you are mistaken about his time in France:

Herandez actually lived in Paris for 6 months in '74 to study at the Conservatory because he studied 8 hours a day at the conservatory. He did not travel once a month to france. He did, however, travel around to be a soloist all the time.

Mendez was very hard on Hernandez because he knew how good he actually was. In fact, as I just learned, Mendez told Hernandez in person at the Andre concert here in southern California that Hernandez was a much better player than Andre. I know everyone will laugh at that but it is true, From Mendez's mouth to the trumpet players' ears. That night Andre stopped signing autographs to embrace Hernandez in front of everyone.

I have talked to Hernandez and he said he will look for the cassettes because he still has them somewhere. If you would like a copy of this concert, just pm me.

Thanks again!

[_TrumpeT_]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o31TRNWPQDU

I guess this is the guy you are talking about?