Hopefully Not the Kings’ & Symphony’s ‘Last Waltz’

It was pure serendipity when rock band Doublewide Kings co-founder Palmer Jackson, Jr., met Brett Strader at a social function in San Francisco just shy of two years ago. When Jackson mentioned that his band was planning a collaborative concert of Van Morrison songs with the Santa Barbara Symphony for the following November, Strader – a composer, conductor and arranger with decades of experience – let on that he’d performed a concert of Morrison’s music with strings about a decade before and still had the arrangements available. 

The rest, as they say, was history. Strader expanded and added to his existing arrangements, and the concert at the Granada – a first for both organizations – was a smashing success, the show a sellout that was wildly entertaining. 

A year later, they’re doing it again, this time with music by The Band, focusing on the famed The Last Waltz album and concert, which, coincidentally, took place 46 years ago in San Francisco. Strader not only wrote all the arrangements from scratch, but will conduct the symphony at the November 9 show, stepping in for the orchestra’s artistic director Nir Kabaretti. 

“The album and movie had lots of horns and woodwinds, but there weren’t any strings, so it was exciting to imagine how those songs could be expanded and upscaled, so to speak, by adding strings,” Strader said. “I modeled the woodwinds and the brass after what was on the original album, but even extrapolated there to add more classical instruments – flutes and clarinets. With the strings, saxophones, trombones, trumpets, tuba and flugelhorns, it’s a fascinating set of instruments to write for.”

Given that there are prominent horn lines that people will recognize, Strader said he worked to capture them with a lot of accuracy, and then added his own touch. 

“I’m deviating a little bit from the original recordings and making some things my own, a different vibe entirely than what The Band originally did, including counter melodies and more.”

As with the Morrison show, several songs will find the symphony silent as the Doublewide Kings do their rock and roll thing sans accompaniment. But the orchestra also gets a chance to shine. 

“I’ve written two interesting orchestral introductions, including opening the show with a remix of Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony, a re-imagined version three minutes long with saxophones and trombones,” Strader said. “Another piece starts off with just the orchestra, too, because people will want to hear how great they are. What motivates me when I’m writing for orchestras is that the musicians have a good time playing, coming up with interesting stuff that makes ‘em sit forward on their chairs rather than being bored because they’re just playing chords.” 

On the other hand, the show is a rather unusual gig for the arranger-conductor because the Kings don’t read music, so they don’t have charts to follow or to cue them. 

“I call them an almost professional dad band because they’re really quite good, but they got that way simply by playing together for so many years,” Strader said.

A year after the massive success of the Morrison show, Strader and the Kings are much more comfortable with each other, he said.

“There’s a high level of trust between us,” he said. “This is going to be a blast.”