The William F. Cody Archive: Documenting the life and times of Buffalo Bill

WILD WEST COWBOY BAND ENTERTAINMENT.

Buffalo Bill's Cowboy Band made their first appearance in Greenock Town Hall last night before a large area and gallery audience. The performance was a complete success. The clever instrumentation of this now famous band raised the feeling of the audience almost to the pitch of enthusiasm. Every individual player is master of his instrument, and all the members are so thoroughly drilled that, under the skilfu[l] conductor, the music "goes like clockwork." In the march, the "Yorktown Centennial," in the "Grand Fantasia,"—in which solos for cornet, clarionet, and baritone were introduced—and in "The Darkies' Jubilee," the above remark most fittingly applies. After a Swiss song by the Arlberger Tyrolean Singers, the band gave another series of selections. Amongst the most enjoyable of these was the fantasia "Beauties of Scotland." Some of the sixpenny youths in the gallery were inclined to be rather noisy, but "music has charms to soothe the savage breast" of even a Greenock rough; and so when the Cowboys played with firmness and yet delicacy such Scottish airs as "Bonnie Dundee," "Scots Wha Hae," "Ye Banks and Braes," "Maggie Lander," "Duncan Gray," "John Anderson, my Jo," "What's a' the Steer, Kimmer," "Twas within a mile o'Sweet Edinboro' Toun," &c., the listener's cup of pleasure was filled to the brim, and if the proverbial pin has fallen it would doubtless have jarred as a discord. One of the   cleverest things in the playing was the management by the drummer not only of his "private drum," but also of a number of instruments, some of which may be called musical and some not. Triangles, bell, anvil, were all called upon as occasion required, while with sandpaper the shuffle of the nigger and dance was finely imitated. In the "Darkies' Dream," and the waltz, "Life in the Tropics," the band was especially successful, and had to accede to loud demands for repeats. Following selection from the "Mikado,"—in which those old friends, "The Flowers that bloom in the Spring" and "Titwillow" came well to the front—"Echoes from the Swiss Mountains," by the Tyrolean Singers (a very enjoyable effort). and "Ten Minutes with the Minstrels," came a war dance and songs by a group of Sioux Indians. These number ten males and two females, under their chief, the latter being a striking specimen of the aboriginal "red man of the country of the setting sun." The squaws supplied the rude music, and the Indians—fearless-looking fellows with big bone and plenty of muscle—danced their wardance and also their famous ghost dance. Though many of the audience had no doubt seen this savage display in Buffalo Bill's place in Glasgow, still to the majority it was, what Mr Salsbury (Col. Cody's manager) said, a genuine, an interesting, and instructive novelty. It is probable the Cowboy Band, under the direction of Mr Joseph H. Hart, may re-visit Greenock before leaving Scotland, in which case an even much bigger audience may safely be anticipated.