The photograph we could not print: The Holcomb Memorial Bandstand after final concert

The photograph shows the Holcomb Memorial Bandstand in Wexagaw County's Riverside Park, taken from the gravel path that curves past the drinking fountain. It is twenty minutes past eight on a Tuesday evening in late August, and the folding chairs still face the empty stage.

The bandstand itself is white-painted wood, two tiers of benches arranged in a half-circle around a conductor's platform no larger than a card table. The roof is green composition shingle, replaced in 2003 according to the dedication plaque, which is visible in the lower left of the frame if you know to look for it. Someone has left a music stand on the second tier. The stand is open but empty.

Seventeen folding chairs remain in their rows on the lawn. The rest have already been collected and returned to the township garage. You can see the impressions in the grass where perhaps forty people sat for the final performance of the Wexagaw County Community Band, which played Tuesday evenings from Memorial Day through Labor Day for sixty-one years.

The light at that hour

The light comes from the west, from across the Great Lake, and it makes the white paint almost gray. The shadows of the roof supports fall at an angle that suggests the photograph was taken around eight-twenty, possibly eight-twenty-five. In the background, beyond the bandstand, you can see three of the river birches that mark the edge of the park, and beyond those the back of the Elks Lodge.

There is a watering can beside the leftmost bench support. Louise Eckhart, who played clarinet in the band since 1987, told us she brings it every week to water the petunias in the memorial planter, the one dedicated to Howard Holcomb, who left money for the bandstand in 1962. The watering can is green plastic, the kind sold at hardware stores, and it sits exactly where Mrs. Eckhart always leaves it, in the shade so the water stays cool.

The conductor's music stand—the good one, the black metal Manhasset that belonged to Gerald Priske before he retired—has already been packed away. What remains on the conductor's platform is a square of paint four shades whiter than the rest, marking where the stand sat every Tuesday for six decades.

What the band played

The final concert program, which we have on file, included three marches, two Stephen Foster medleys, and the theme from a television program no longer in production. According to township minutes, attendance was estimated at forty-two, which matches the number of chair impressions visible in the grass.

The band is not disbanding due to lack of interest. Township Supervisor Raymond Kelk told us the issue is strictly one of zoning—the park's designation was changed in April to permit the new dog exercise area, and performances with amplification are no longer allowed in that zone after 7:30 p.m. The band needs amplification for the piccolo to carry. Mrs. Eckhart said they looked into moving to the high school parking lot, but the acoustics were described as "all wrong."

In the photograph, if you look closely at the second tier of benches, you can see where someone has carved initials into the wood. They are not fresh. The bandstand has been repainted eleven times, according to township records, and the initials show through every coat.

The photograph could not be printed because we do not have a photograph. Our editor assigned it too late on Tuesday, and by the time we arrived the bandstand was dark and the chairs were gone. What remains is the memory of how the evening light falls on white paint, and the shape of an empty music stand, and the particular quality of silence that follows the last note of a concert no one knew would be the last.