In another sign of life here edging back toward normal, weekly dances resumed Friday at the Vero Beach Community Center after a year-long hiatus due to the COVID-19 pandemic, as dozens of ballroom dance enthusiasts swayed to the Big Band sounds of the Jay Miller Band.
The band was a smaller version of the larger Jay Miller Band that played regularly at the community center prior to the pandemic.
“Some [band members] have left, some have passed away,” said Trumpet player Herb Bradley. “We are playing with the remnants.”
Despite the smaller band, some 50 people, mostly retired couples, showed up to dance on Friday. They wore face masks inside the spacious Community Center and kept their distance from other couples on the dance floor, while the six-piece band played behind a small partition, all to reduce the chances of spreading the virus.
The trumpet and saxophone driven band will play ballroom dance standards again this Friday and next Friday from 10 a.m. until noon at the Community Center in downtown Vero Beach.
The band’s repertoire includes Great American Songbook classics such as “In the Mood,” “Stardust,” “It Had to be You,” “Sweet Georgia Brown” and “Moonlight Serenade.”
But city officials have yet to decide whether to continue the dances into April.
Dancers and musicians said they missed their routine of participating in the weekly dances and seeing each other.
“I love it. I come all the time,” said Aida Goldsmith, 86, of Vero Beach, a retired performer. “I used to teach dance. It’s the only exercise I do.”
The old standards bring back memories of her youth dancing and working as a model with her twin sister in New York City, Goldsmith said.
Eli Rauzon and Lucy Sokol, seasonal residents from the Lehigh Valley in Pennsylvania who stay at the Village Spires on the barrier island, said they’re glad the dances resumed while they were in town.
“We’re very thankful they have this,” Rauzon said. “It’s music you can relate to, that’s the important thing.”
Trumpet player Bradley, who has been playing the dances at the Community Center for six years, said he’s glad the band was able to swing back into action, albeit with fewer members.
“It’s good to be back with them,” Bradley said. “It’s a way of life.
“You know, when you’ve got worries in your life, when you’re playing the horn, or any instrument, that’s all you’re thinking about . . . It takes your mind off other things.”“I missed it,” said Saxophonist George Viksne, a resident of the Seabreeze condominium on the barrier island. “It’s a form of psychotherapy.”
Guitarist Al Perna said many local musicians feel it’s time to get back into the groove of playing in public and entertaining people.
“I play with a couple of different groups,” Perna said. “Everybody is saying, ‘Thank God we’re able to get together with musicians and play for people that want to hear music.’”
Perna said dancers he has spoken with are telling him the same thing: “It’s time to get back at it.”
