Kashmere: A High-School Band’s Staying Power
August 4, 2006
By David Brown
High school stage performances often prove to be nothing more than memories, but Kashmere High School in northeast Houston has spawned a sensation that’s still drawing listeners, some 40 years later.
Conrad Johnson, the school’s band master, formed the Kashmere Stage Band with some of his very best students and took them to compete at high school festivals. The band became a national phenomenon — not just at band competitions, but in the world of commercial popular music.
Today, Johnson is 92 and physically frail, but he remembers vividly a concert nearly 40 years ago that changed his life: Otis Redding was performing.
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