Oom-pah oomph

photo Tyner High School band member Jermaiya Grimes plays a new trombone Wednesday during practice at Tyner Middle Academy.

HOW TO HELPDonate instruments to Tyner Academy's marching band in the atrium of Silverdale Baptist Church at 7236 Bonny Oaks Drive between 7 p.m. and 7:30 p.m. today and Nov. 8 and from 9 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. Sunday and Nov. 9. Or call Peggy Payne at 667-4972 if you need an instrument picked up. Tyner Academy band also will accept instruments, or checks can be submitted to Tyner Pride Band, c/o Band Director Elias Smith, Tyner Academy, 6836 Tyner Road, Chattanooga, TN 37421

Peggy Payne graduated from Tyner Academy back when it was still Tyner High School.

"I won't say when," she joked.

So it upset Payne to learn in September that the school's marching band used instruments so old and battered that they were taped together.

"It broke my heart when that girl was having to play a tuba with duct tape holding it together," she said.

That's why Payne and others in her 10-member church group collected money Wednesday at Silverdale Baptist Church's Fall Festival. They also will collect old instruments at the church this weekend and next.

"Out of 4,000 members, I'm thinking we will surely get some [instruments]," Payne said. The public is welcome to donate at the church, too.

Payne is among those who stepped up with donations of money and musical instruments in response to a front-page Times Free Press story about the award-winning, high-stepping marching band at the predominantly black high school having to make do with instruments that were falling apart.

The band has a better collection now.

"In the first week, we had about $10,000 come in," band director Elias Smith said. "We've gotten saxophones, trombones, some drums. We bought two new tubas."

The Hamilton County Department of Education pays teachers an extra 8 percent above their base salary to lead marching bands, but it doesn't buy band instruments.

Tuba players Miracle Chappelle and LaAdrieanna Hodge appreciate the new instruments they got a couple weeks ago.

"It plays great," said Hodge, an 11th-grader. "It has no air leaks. I used to have air leaks in my other tuba."

She used to have to repair her old tuba with tape.

"I would just fix it before I went to the game," Hodge said.

Smith said the band could still use some help upgrading its baritones, trombones and drum line.

But he was amazed at the outpouring of support. For example, a Colorado man whose parents live in Red Bank sent a tenor saxophone, Smith said.

"We have had at least 75 mail-in donations - cards and letters from all over," Smith said.

"People around here really have big hearts," he said. "They don't want to see the kids miss out on something as great as music."

Contact staff writer Tim Omarzu at tomarzu@timesfreepress.com or www.facebook.com/tim.omarzu or twitter.com/TimOmarzu or 423-757-6651.

Upcoming Events