Tom Worcester's long musical journey

The 4th of July is an important day for Tom Worcester. It will mark a musical milestone he planned many years ago. At 89 years old, he's lived a long, interesting life that included military service during the Korean War, a career as a journalist and a long-time love affair with music. Now, he's taking the stage in what may well be his final public performance.

Worcester inherited his first musical instrument in high school. It came to him when his brother Jack, who was a P51 pilot in World War II, left for the war. Jack did not survive his service. Tom played his brother's horn in the high school band.

"My all-time best friend was a horn player and we had a horn quartet," he recalled "As we moved on to college, we continued playing together. We drove to Denver and took lessons from an old man, about 80, who was very good. He taught us things that others didn't."

Worcester's horn is a brass French horn called a King Double, which can be very difficult to play. The benefits for Worcester were worth the trouble.

"It has two rows of slides and gives me much more advantage in the higher registers," said Worcester.

His French horn is fingered with the left hand, which is unusual. The slides on the horn take a bit less air than other models, but Worcester finds it's getting harder to play the way he wants to.

"When you're 89 years old it takes a lot of air!" he said.

After high school Worcester attended the University of Colorado NROTC program. While there he played in the marching band. Then he was commissioned for two tours in North Korea on a destroyer and a heavy cruiser.

"I didn't see the horn for a long time. I was off to Korea and then back to my first job. I played in a community band for a while," he said.

There were long stretches after the war when Worcester was too busy with work and family to play much music.

Worcester left his job as a journalist at Colorado Community College when his family moved to Oregon in 1959.

"We had a daughter who was very ill. We wanted to get her to a different situation with lower altitude. Unfortunately, it didn't help and she died a month after we got there," said Worcester. "I was working on the Reed College staff and when it came time to make a change my wife Lois and I decided we wanted to get back to higher altitude, so we came here."

In Oregon, Worcester finally opened the old black case holding his beloved French horn and decided to join the Cascade Horizon Band, which formed in 2003.

"Lois and I had taken a trip to Alaska on the Alcan Highway. I joined the band when I got back. That's when I started playing it again," he said.

Picking up the complicated instrument after all those years proved to be a challenge.

"It was like starting all over," he recalled.

But he persevered and has been happily playing with the Cascade Horizon Band ever since. But Worcester always knew that eventually, he'd pass along the instrument to a younger family member. To finish up his musical endeavors he'll play in the "Sound Fourth" on July 4th at Bend High School.

"We play with a choir," he said. "That may be the last time I play the horn."

Worcester's finding playing the horn is getting harder.

"I'm getting to the point where it's difficult to get the amount of air through the horn to make it playable for me. I'm tired of having to do the practicing. I have asthma, not heavy but I have to use my inhaler. If the horn could talk, it would tell me quit while you're ahead!"

Worcester has two great-grandchildren and four grandchildren.

"I have a great-grandson who's 10 and I talked to him about learning to play," he said. "His grandfather and I are hoping that he will take over the horn. He's way too young now but I'm going to give it to him with the hope that he'll keep it in the family. He's interested in drumming and he's musical. If he's interested it would be wonderful!"