I regret saying this, but losing someone can be the surest way to acknowledge that someone meant something to you.
And what do we have in life beyond one another?
I met Bob Greene in wind ensemble at the University of Rochester in 1993. I knew he came from Sarasota, Florida, and he seemed nice enough, if not quiet. A fellow trombonist by the name of Matt asked us if we'd be willing to join a project he was starting - a trombone ensemble that would perform like a barbershop quartet. I had no clear idea what this guy Matt meant but Bob and I looked at one another. We decided "why not?" and joined the Stingers.
We had a rocky start, with what outfits to wear, and what repertoire to play. By my senior year, the ensemble played a number of my original compositions and Bob had become a friend, as had many other members of the University's new trombone ensemble. We were not great, to be sure, but for me, every rehearsal and performance was worth the effort, and then some.
Last month when I'd learned of Bob's passing, him having led a very successful career in academia sans trombone, I felt empty inside, for someone I'd hardly spoken to but a half dozen times since college. Knowing Bob was there, doing his thing, shining for students at the Unversity of Montana, was enough. He was a scholar and one of the smartest people I knew. I can't really say what he thought of me, but now I sit here so mad that he maybe didn't know what he meant to me.
The truth is I never knew, really, how to reach Bob. We could talk the shit about anything, jokingly almost always, as he had an unseemly severe humor. He'd lost his dad when we were in college together and I was a horrible friend, not knowing what to say or how to act. It was easier to ignore the fact he'd lost a parent so young; what would you do with someone like that, whom you valued, but who rarely let you inside beyond his profound intellect?
I'd always fancied the idea that there was a layer of this man I'd never be privy to, and as it turns out, I was right.
It wasn't long after that when he lost his mother. "What tragedy," I remember telling someone, to lose both parents so young. I remember trying to broach the topic but he simply nodded. He wouldn't budge. He'd bring up another friend, or that, and I graduated and I was gone from his life.
Bob followed my writing, at this very website, in its earliest incarnation as "biberfan.com," where the wares were both music reviews and other sundry writings of questionable taste. Bob had always told me I was a great storyteller. He urged me to write my "stories." I had the internet at my fingertips, so in 1997, I started my website and I cataloged some of my writings. He was an avid follower and cheerleader.
I visited him twice in Ann Arbor when he was a graduate student in history. He'd go on to earn the Ph.D. with distinction for his research, and he eventually landed in Montana as a history professor.
I never visited him because Montana seemed so far away. For that, I know, I was a fool.
I connected with him about two years ago when I needed him.
He took my call and we talked at length and I asked him questions about our time in college together. I needed details to help with a writing project. "You're still writing?" he asked me. I told him I'd started a novel. Not just a novel, "a three part novel. It's garguantan. I only hope I live long enough to finish, and eventually, to publish it."
He told me he couldn't wait. That he'd treasure anything "the Admiral," as he still called me, would write. This was from a man who thought I was a perfect candidate for rolling about campus in a so-called Pope-mobile.
Robert H. Greene, known to some of us as RHG, a solid member of the River Campus ensemble Stingers, will be sorely missed by all that knew him: family, friends, professional colleagues, and students alike. He was one of the few people in my short life that I knew, without question, believed in me and my potential.
In the last year of my tenure with the Stingers, as Bob would describe, as "resident composer and conductor," we performed an arragement of Bach's B-minor prelude I'd made, BWV 869. As was the situation then, most of our performances I led from behind the podium. For this one, I insisted on playing first trombone. Bob played second, and our dear friend Orlando Quiroz played the bass, punctuated in staccato, just the way I liked it.
The recording I have is imperfect, mostly due to me, and Bob misses a half-beat at one point. But perfection isn't the point. It was in music that I could truly converse with, to share with, and commune with who was to become the Dr. Robert Hunter Greene, who'd go to my motherland of Ukraine, and unearth from the archives details otherwise obfuscated by the authorities. It was in Bach that we shared a bond, together with Orlando. The piece is my favorite of all the forty-eight preludes in the double collection of the Well-Temepered Clavier. It was with him and Orlando both that I could be myself, a musician, a partner, and an equal soul.
I don't know any greater feeling that I've had than to play like that, with two other men, two friends.
The world will never know what profound gratefulness I have for making music with those two men.
Mr. Greene, I wish I could tell you what a different you made in this world. I should be envious to be so lucky myself.
Thank you and may you rest in peace.
During my senior year I worked on a thesis which became a musical composition which I entitled The Mayan Ballcourt. I was invited to return to the University of Rochester to join the Stingers in the fall of 1997, and one of the pieces they selected was from this suite in six parts.
In the audio, you hear Robert Greene introduce me before the movement starts. I had honestly not remembered that piece, that specific movement, until January of 2021, when I spoke with Orlando Quiroz. The piece, along with Bob's voice in the recording, are profoundly moving to me.
I should be so lucky to be remembered with this piece; for me, some 20-something years later, the music resonates as it not only captures my own voice, but that of the ensemble for whom it was dedicated. I am so proud to have shared this with others, including Bob.
For anyone finding this article online, associated with the Stingers, I can think of no greater honor than to perform this piece again. In the honor of a profound person and a more than trusting friend.
One day, upon returning from work I heard the odious strains of Neil Diamond’s “Sweet Caroline” emanating from our living room. Yes, Bob was singing along to that tune like a drunken lounge singer at Motel 6. I cannot express in words his love for that song, nor my horror at having to live with that tune throughout the summer.