Story of Rudy Salvini -Army Bandsman

This story was submitted by Eric Burger which includes details about Olds trumpets and trombones used by the military during WWII.

My late father, Rudy Salvini, was an Army bandsman trumpeter during World War II. He was drafted in 1944 and the whole band went through basic together in Ft. Ord. They were all from California and all 18 or so. When they got the horns after basic, the horns were all new. The trumpets and trombones that were issued to them were all Olds instruments. From this first experience, he became a real fan of Olds. I think the model would have been a Standard.

Interestingly, they could buy their horns on the way out of the service and I think he said he paid $25 for it. He played it until the ’60’s.

He went on to lead the band in Wiesbaden, and then played in the 7th Army Radio Band with Tony Bennett and a few other big names.

He continued to play Olds (and later Kanstul) and cited his Army experience as the reason.

After three years in the service, he went on to San Francisco State and received his teaching license. He led a big band and was first call trumpet at the San Francisco local. More about his life and career is posted here.

He said he had a Super Recording and a Mendez, but was “shamed” into a Bach 37 sometime in early 1970’s. He played that horn until the early 2000’s when he re-friended Zig Kanstul and bought a copper bell trumpet from Kanstul. He said it was the best horn he ever played since the Amy Olds. He passed away in 2011.

From my personal experience and observations, I can add this to the information about brasses used during WWII:

If you look at photos of military bands of that era, you will see Navy and Marine bands with exclusively silver horns, but Army & Air Corps band mixed in brass and silver finishes. Only the premier Army bands seemed to exclusively use silver.

When I was stationed at Fort Carson in the early ’90s, we were cleaning out some areas of the old WWII hospital where our band hall was. We found a whole band’s worth of instruments in a room (and library). Trumpets and trombones were all Olds – brass, and pre- 1946. Marked US, no model. It killed me, but we had to turn them in for “re-utilization”. Tubas & horns were King and Saxes were Buescher.

Eric Burger

November 2024