Next but Not Last

Local rockers The Doublewide Kings were supersized when they performed The Next Waltz, celebrating the classic rock group The Band with the Santa Barbara Symphony under conductor Brett Strader at the Granada.

The hugely entertaining sold-out show, presented by the theater and Earl Minnis, under executive director guitarist Palmer Jackson, Jr. – a symphony board member and executive chairman of the Granada – launched with gusto with Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony followed by works from Elgar and Dvořák’s “New World”. All of which was skillfully interspersed with music composed by Bob Dylan’s former backup band who, after 16 years on the road, called it quits with their legendary 1976 farewell concert at San Francisco’s Winterland Ballroom.

That storied concert was captured by Oscar-winning director Martin Scorsese and shaped into the legendary documentary film called The Last Waltz. It was selected for preservation by the Library of Congress in 2019.

By sheer coincidence I met The Band in 1969 at the second Isle of Wight Rock Festival when Dylan was the headliner with the Moody Blues, The Who, and Joe Cocker.

They were staying at the Halland Hotel in Seaview near a cottage my parents used to rent each summer.

A small world!