Rhythm Section

Merle Biggin - Keyboards

Merle began his musical education with three years of piano lessons at age 9. His father, a trumpet player, insisted that he and his siblings play an instrument in the high school band. The summer prior to high school, He started playing an ancient Helicon tuba, one of the many instruments his father kept in the house. After playing the sousaphone in high school, Merle had the unique opportunity to perform in the January 1, 1963 Rose Bowl as a member of the University of Wisconsin Marching Band.

After moving to the Washington, D.C. area, Merle played the sousaphone in the Washington Redskins Band for several years. Since 1967, he has played tuba in the Rockville Concert Band.

As a retired Federal employee, Merle now has time to perform with several other groups, including the Olney Community Band, the Village Jazz Band, and the Rockville Dixie Rascals jazz band. Looking for new challenges, he returned to the piano, after more than 50 years, when the Olney Big Band was formed.

Jack Bilby - Guitar

Jack was born in Washington, DC. His earliest musical memory is of regularly singing “Happy Trails to You” with his mother at the end of every Roy Rogers TV show in the 1950s. (She was Dale to his Roy.) Jack’s singing became more serious during high school when he sang with the James Madison Madrigal Singers from Vienna, Virginia. This superb group performed to glowing reviews in such places as the Kennedy Center, the National Cathedral, the Phillips Collection, the Shrine of the Immaculate Conception, and Carnegie Recital Hall. He even got to meet President Johnson and Lady Bird after performing for a White House luncheon.

Jack’s first guitar? A Roy Rogers model from Sears Roebuck, of course! Jack’s first performing experiences with guitar (now a Gibson Les Paul Junior) began during junior high school playing in a rock band. Enjoying some local success, he continued to perform throughout high school. At age 14, he studied jazz guitar with a local jazz professional. Because he couldn’t really apply what he was learning at the time, Jack says he could never have guessed how valuable the information would be some forty years later.

Since 2004 he has played with the Civil Air Patrol Big Band and since 2005 with the Olney Big Band. Jack says, “It’s been really satisfying to perform again with a great group of musicians before audiences that love the music.”

Tom Harwick - Bass

Tom grew up in Emmaus, Pennsylvania, in the Pennsylvania Dutch country. He holds a degree in Industrial Engineering, from Lehigh University, Bethlehem, PA.

Tom founded the Olney Big Band in 2002, recruiting friends he met playing with the Olney Community Band. After a slow start with the big band, Tom succeeded in recruiting Rip Rice as leader, resulting in the level of success the band has achieved in recent years.

Tom started on piano in second grade, euphonium in fifth, and tuba in eighth. In high school, he performed with the Marine Band of Allentown, a local community band, and played under the direction of Albertus Meyers, who had played on the Sousa band. Tom marched for parts of two seasons with the Baltimore Colts Marching Band, during a stretch where they never won a home game. For years, Tom performed at the Maryland Renaissance Festival on bass recorder. Later, Tom studied tuba with David Fedderly of the Baltimore Symphony and Ed Goldstein of the Peabody.

Tom started playing jazz tuba with a Dixieland combo called the Starvation Army Band, and took up electric bass as the group began to add swing numbers to its repertoire. Tom is a former member, and charter member, of the Columbia Jazz Band, with whom he toured the Netherlands in 1996. Tom continues to play euphonium with the Olney Community Band, and tuba and bass with the Starvation Army Band.

Jim Watson - Percussion

Jim got his musical start at age 10, when his older, guitar-playing brother formed a band and needed a drummer. There are times today when Jim wishes his brother had asked him to play something that did not require being hauled in a pickup truck. Still, as a budding musician Jim’s passion for the drums only grew. He found he had a knack for rhythm, and he liked the almost sport-like quality of the instrument. Besides, there was a certain power in being the loudest member of the band. Over the years, Jim has dabbled in a wide range of musical styles – from rock to country to blues, from marching band to theatrical to symphonic, from funk to fusion. He has played in dozens of musical groups, including some he’d like to forget – like the disco band led by a wild-haired Greek accordionist. And yet, despite this broad experience, Jim’s musical universe was rather narrow in scope. He felt he’d heard it all, played it all. He was beginning to grow weary of music in general when, suddenly, he discovered a “new” sound that set him on fire like nothing he’d ever heard before. Only it wasn’t new at all. The sound that electrified him was the big-band jazz of the Swing era: Benny Goodman (with Gene Krupa on drums), Tommy Dorsey, Glenn Miller and the like. Sheltered as he had been, Jim heard these orchestras for the first time only in the late 1980s. It was if a door had swung open to reveal a vast trove of musical treasures. He knew immediately this was the place for him. Naturally, when Jim was invited in January 2008 to join the wonderful Olney Big Band, he was thrilled. It was an offer he could not refuse.