Tucson repairman instrumental to school district

TUCSON, Ariz. (AP) -- Sick musical instruments abused by local schoolchildren come to an unobtrusive trailer in a gritty Tucson industrial transportation complex to become rehabilitated.

On the way to the do-re-mi recuperation ward, there are warnings of what can happen at the end of a lifetime, with piles of broken lawn mowers and obsolete computers clumped around other trailers.

But the real attitude adjustment for those instruments that need it is this: The tiny few that don't get better get crushed under automobile tires, their flattened carcasses hung on the wall as a warning to others.

Sean Randel is the 36-year-old, ponytailed king of this instrument-repair domain, who admits to the rare stress relief on the musical ne'er-do-wells.

In charge of fixing the stock of about 10,000 instruments owned by the Tucson Unified School District, he's sort of like the reverse Maytag man. Lonely in his isolated little trailer, perhaps, but certainly not idle. On any given year, he handles 2,000 repair tickets for instruments, about a quarter of them coming through in the summer.

In short, he's the guy who keeps the marching bands going and makes sure the kids can play at their recitals.

On a recent day, there were dozens of instruments lined up inside his door. One tuba, full of dents from years of less-than-careful handling, is awaiting a new valve. A number of drums anticipate cleaning. About 20 clarinets, all needing various TLC, wait like good little patients in a row, their vitals on display on blue repair tags.

The pile doesn't raise his blood pressure, Randel said. It's better than when he came to the district 11 years ago. Since the district had gone a year without a repairman, he faced a waiting pile 2,000-strong and others still coming in.

Randel also is in charge of buying instruments, with the district putting between 30 and 90 new instruments a year into its elementary school pool.

The upside of his in-house repair skills is that if there's an emergency with a sousaphone and the marching band needs it for a Saturday morning performance, Randel can handle it, said Joan Ashcraft, director of the district's fine-arts department. An additional perk is that he can talk to the students about protecting the precious gifts they're being lent.

Even the 120 music teachers, many hard-nosed perfectionists, love him, Ashcraft said.

"He really has a remarkable talent to fix anything there is."

A favorite story she likes to tell is about when Randel delivered new instruments to an elementary school one day. School officials watched as one boy walked off with his case, stopped a block down, looked all around, and then dived into the case and started to play.

"Sean is responsible for that kind of joy," she said. "He loves his work, and he's committed to our children and teachers."

A Tucson native, Randel wasn't born into a musical family. He got started the way a lot of kids do - he joined his fifth-grade band. With no instrument, he took what was available, which happened to be a French horn. He went on to play trumpet and bass guitar in high school.

"I was a failed music major," he said. "I think my big thing is that I couldn't concentrate on one instrument. I just kept picking up something else."

The other part of his future calling came as he watched his father, the manager of a hardware store, tinker. He joined in, learning to take things apart and to put them back in some semblance of order.

Serendipity called out of high school. He became an apprentice to a music repairman. His mentor made him take lessons on all of the instruments so he'd know what they should sound like.

The double-reeds, such as the oboes and bassoons, still give him problems, but he now plays some 40 instruments, at least well enough to know if his repairs got them closer to releasing the right notes.

He soon found that it was satisfying to fix instruments.

He loves the ornamentation of the occasional old instrument he comes by, often equipped with embellishments that don't come in the newer, bare-bones models that are all about functionality without the aesthetics.

And there's something very personal about an instrument, that isn't quite like fixing a car. People might put their lips on it and breathe out art, he said.

"I've been doing this now for 16, 17 years," he said. "And I still haven't gotten bored of it."

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Information from: Arizona Daily Star, http://www.azstarnet.com

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