MANSFIELD, Ohio —When music education veteran Ralph Brown entered the fourth grade in the 1930s, his school’s music teacher introduced him to the clarinet. And the clarinet would become his passion.
As passions sometimes do, his took him on a adventure through several states, across an ocean to Japan, and finally landed him in Richland County where he became a beloved music teacher.
Here’s how it happened.
Discovering his talent
It all started in the 1940s in a school in a Pittsburgh suburb. Brown walked into the music room one destined day. There, his music teacher introduced him to a plastic cased woodwind instrument with silver colored knobs and levers — she called it a clarinet. Nine-year-old Brown’s eyes widened as he held it for the first time–the beginning of a relationship that could only grow.
In the subsequent weeks and months and years, Brown discovered his talent and love for music. He learned to sight read and improvise.
“At 15 [years-old] I was playing in bands at uncouth dives six nights a week,” said Brown. He said he would finish his algebra homework during intermissions of shows.
By the time he hit 10th grade, he had a choice of which school to attend through 12th grade. So, Brown said, after he finished 10th grade, he picked one and became its drum major.
His senior year in high school, his band director found out Westminster College (near Youngstown) was searching for a drum major, a position for which Brown was qualified.
“And so he took me up (to Westminster College) one Saturday. I didn’t have any music to audition with so we stopped at a music store on the way and I sight-read the music at the audition — and I ended up in college,” said Brown.
After graduating from Westminster College with a degree in music education, he decided to work on his master’s degree in Michigan. At the same time, a friend from Westminster was attending graduate school in North Carolina. He asked Brown if he wanted to come along to help him move in.
After his visit, he hitchhiked his way back north.
“A truck driver picked me up in Virginia on a rainy night. We started talking and he told me about the Navy school of music in Washington (D.C.), dropped me off at the gate. I went in and they loaned me an instrument and I auditioned. A month later I was in the Navy,” he said. “It was one of the most correct decisions I ever made. I enjoyed every minute of it.”
A focused direction
While in the Navy, he spent 27 months in Japan. While there, he remembered growing far from music and becoming increasingly interested in being a pastor because of his involvement in a worship center.
He explained that through his involvement with the worship center in Japan, he became convinced playing jazz music was not acceptable within the faith. So he stopped playing in bars and nightclubs.
“I had sold all my instruments while in Japan. I was going to give up music,” said Brown.
When he left the Navy after four years of service, he was admitted to Gordon College’s seminary program in Beverly Farms, Massachusetts.
After a month, he missed music so he bought a used clarinet. He practiced on it between seminary classes. And after the first year of seminary, Brown moved off the pastoral path because he realized his life’s primary focus should be his first love: music.
“Music was just too dominant in my life. I couldn’t get away from it,” said Brown. It was this realization that drove him to explore a career in music education.
Brown’s teaching legacy
With his music education degree, four years in the Navy’s band, and hope, he sent his résumé to schools.
Sure enough, in 1953, he got his first teaching job at a school in Pittsburgh. His stay in Pittsburgh was brief, however; five years later he found himself teaching in Richland County.
In 1958, Brown started his music teaching legacy at Madison High School. He retired in 1983 after 25 years. He touched many lives while there.
“If not for Mr. B I would have probably dropped out of school,” remembered 1971 Madison High School graduate Michael Crawford. “Mr. B’s” patience and humor are what left long-lasting effects on young Crawford.
“He really cared about us all and would listen to us. He made me feel like I mattered,” said Crawford.
When he retired in 1983, Brown took a 12-year school teaching hiatus. In his new-found free time, he played clarinet and saxophone for Mansfield’s The Ribtickler Band, gave lessons in a music store, delivered mail and became a janitor for a church.
“I had no intent on going back to teaching,” said Brown. But he could not avoid it.
In 1995, Brown and his wife lived in Loudonville. One Friday night, they decided to attend a high school football game: The Loudonville Redbirds versus the Clear Fork Colts. Clear Fork’s band director was one of Brown’s former students.
At the game, the two caught up on life and reminisced on days in Madison’s high school music room. Then the conversation took an unexpected turn.
It turned out that Clear Fork’s band director needed an assistant. Brown applied and in weeks his hiatus came to an abrupt, 20-year halt. But he didn’t mind. As long as music and teaching were part of his life, he enjoyed it.
“I enjoyed wherever I was. No job is all cream-and-sugar. There are always things that come up that sometimes make you wonder if you’re in the right spot. But those are few and far between. Most of the time it was great,” said Brown.
One of those great moments was when a student finally made notable improvements with her trumpet playing. Brown said this specific student would come in everyday to the band room and make awful sounds.
“I’ll tell you, some days it was pretty bad,” said Brown, and after a thoughtful pause, added, “You never give up on someone though.”
That student, he said, went on to be senior section leader for trumpet.
It is Brown’s never-give-up mentality that transpired into 50 years of music teaching. He retired from Clear Fork in 2015 — he had been there 20 years.
What’s next
At 85-years-old, Brown now plans on spending his time being a husband and father.
“There were some long days back then. It’s time for me to be a husband,” said Brown. He also looks forward to bicycle rides on the B&O Trail with his daughters.
And every once in a while, he said, students from Clear Fork and Madison get in touch with him to show their appreciation.
“It’s very rewarding. That’s what you’re there for, really,” he said.
Brown still touches lives with the music that flows through his clarinet and saxophone. He is still a part of Mansfield’s The Ribtickler Band, which has played around Mansfield and North Central Ohio since 1966. Brown has played with the band since 1970.
The band’s frontman, Ralph Thauvette, said Brown is one of Ohio’s premier reed men and a joy to work with. “If everyone was as enjoyable to work with, we’d have a much more enjoyable life — a much more enjoyable world, rather,” said Thauvette.
When asked what he feels when playing music, his passion, he said: “Oh man, I don’t know how you could describe that. And I don’t know if everybody would feel the same thing. But, there’s just something that inside of you that … rejoices, I guess. I don’t know if that’s the right word or not.”
“He really cared about us all and would listen to us. He made me feel like I mattered,” said Michael Crawford.
