Photo By Sgt. 1st Class Mary Mott | Sgt. Chris Williams, trumpet player for the 4th Infantry Division Band, plays "Taps"...... read more read more
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CAMP LIBERTY, Iraq A lone Soldier stands, silently and unobtrusively off to the side at a memorial service. It is nearing the end volleys are fired. The Soldier steps forward, raises a trumpet to his lips and solemnly blares Taps,the poignant 24-note final tribute to departed service members perhaps the most well-known bugle call ever scribed.
For more than a century, "Taps" has given closure to grieving family and friends attending military funerals and memorial services. Formerly played by a bugler, the haunting refrain is now the job of trumpet players.
In Iraq, the 4th Infantry Division Band's six trumpeters alternate playing "Taps" at memorial services throughout the Multi-National Division " Baghdad area of operations.
Led by Sgt. 1st Class Timothy Ledoux, 4th Inf. Div. Band noncommissioned-officer-in-charge of the horn section, the trumpeters each have their own perspective on the experience of playing "Taps." Their viewpoints are as different as the musicians themselves are from one another. All agree on two significant points, said Ledoux: 'that it is an honor, and that it never gets any easier."
Ledoux, a 17-year band veteran, is an intensely spiritual man who prepares himself for memorials "knowing that no Soldier is less important than any other and also knowing that it could have been me on any given day." Ledoux 'says a prayer for the deceased, one for the family â?¦ and then I ask God to give me the notes so I don't miss any."
Sgt. Chris Williams, 24, first played "Taps" at the funeral of his older brother, Cory, a former Marine. It was in 1999 " the same year Chris graduated from Oakridge High School back home in Orlando, Fla.
"I knew if anybody was going to play Taps at (my brother's) funeral, it was going to be me," said Williams.
For him, every memorial service brings back the memory of a loss that will never be overcome, he said. At the memorial services he is assigned to in Iraq, he "asks not to know the name of the deceased Soldier or anything about him or her. Also, I don't want to hear what the chaplain or anyone else says."
Williams stands quietly outside until he is called upon to render "Taps," which he does with a heartfelt and haunting perfection, then departs immediately.
On the other side of the coin is Spc. Dennis Kerr, 22, who said he 'saves all of the memorial programs and wants to find out as much as possible about the Soldier who died" before he plays for the service "because it means something to me."
"It is more meaningful and more real (in Iraq) because you are in the same place as they are," said Kerr, a native of Sparks, Nev., and former resident of Idaho Falls, Idaho.
Playing memorials in Iraq is admittedly "outside the comfort zone" of many of the trumpet players, said Ledoux. "The (deceased) Soldiers are our age or younger," he pointed out, whereas back home at Fort Hood, Texas, the trumpet players were most often called to play at services for older, retired servicemembers.
"It is almost kind of nice when you hear about all of the things the deceased accomplished in his life," said Ledoux, who calls both Toledo, Ohio, and New Smyrna Beach, Fla., home. "Here it is different " when you hear that the Soldier left a spouse and two little kids and parents behind, and you see grown men and women crying as hard as they do."
For Spc. William Grady Kersh, 26, 'there is a little ritual I go through. I make sure I am set and in a good spot and make sure I remember "Taps" because you get anxious "
You get butterflies. I want to play absolutely correct, so I pray "let me play good for this Soldier.""
Taps comes at a crucial moment, said Kersh, who hails from Higginson, Ark., and "you almost want to hold your breath " but you can't. It is kind of an icon of closure. When they hear "Taps," they know it's done."
Staff Sgt. Henry Reyna like Ledoux, 15-year Army veteran bugler, from San Antonio, has played "Taps" for everyone from buck privates to 4-star generals, and from the retired and famous to the unknown.
"Mentally, it is hard when listening to the ceremony and hearing their buddies talk. You say, "Tim Ledoux could be playing taps for me next week." The reality really hits you.
"But the bottom line is we are Soldiers and professionals " those two words go hand-in-hand, so we have to perform well and keep ourselves up."
1st Sgt. Chris Lopez, the sixth bugler, and a native of Copperas Cove, Texas, plays only when no one else is available due to his responsibilities as first sergeant of the 52-member band and as the lead trumpet player for the Latin Band.
Lopez, a 19-year Army band veteran, concurs that it is very difficult to play Taps, but the memorials are first priority over everything else that they do.
Lopez and Chief Warrant Officer 3 Otha Hester, band commander, "make sure that a chaplain is on hand" when the trumpet player returns from a memorial service.
"The chaplain comes to check on us, and I look forward to the visit. I feel better when he comes around," said Kersh.
Chaplain David Montgomery, 4th Inf. Div., is used to being there for the trumpet players.
"What I usually try to convey and share with them is that what they do with "Taps" is probably the single most important thing during the ceremony," said Montgomery. It ties all the loose ends together. It is the moment when you realize you have a fallen comrade.
"They are real professionals," said Montgomery, of the buglers. The band's buglers never take playing Taps as just another duty that gets easier with time.
"They take it real serious," he said. "The more you do it, the more difficult it becomes because every time you are out there you know it means one more Soldier has died."
The buglers, being Soldiers themselves, face all of the same dangers as their fellow Soldiers, and that includes going out on convoys in order to play Taps, he added. Sometimes while traveling to memorials, they have come under fire. On top of that, they have the emotional burden.
"They are pretty amazing men," said Montgomery.
Lopez also makes sure he is there to talk to the buglers when they get back from a memorial to check on their emotional state.
It is 'real important for us to support memorial services," said Lopez, "(but) I worry about them every time they go out that gate. They put on some miles" with memorial services. "It is taxing emotionally. If you are close to where everything is going on, it really affects you."
For now, the job of the buglers in the band in a war zone goes on with tragic regularity.
| Date Taken: | 05.22.2006 |
| Date Posted: | 05.22.2006 13:20 |
| Story ID: | 6463 |
| Location: | BAGHDAD, IQ |
| Web Views: | 183 |
| Downloads: | 33 |
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