Calendar-girl musicians find a way to help finance their appearance at famed Carnegie Hall
Posted on Thu, Jan. 23, 2003
Sax appeal
Calendar-girl musicians find a way to help finance their appearance at famed Carnegie Hall
Ryan Huff
The Tribune
CAL POLY - For the Cal Poly Wind Orchestra to get to Carnegie Hall this spring, it will take practice, practice, practice.
And a nude calendar.
To help fund the band's April trip to the nation's most prestigious stage, 13 female musicians posed in the buff for a calendar on sale now at the campus bookstore and other locations.
The women aren't pictured totally au naturel. Flutes, saxophones and other instruments are placed in strategic locations to cover their - ahem - raw talent.
"It's not supposed to be seen as sexually provocative," said Kelli Johannesen, who is Miss September, sporting a French horn in front of her chest. "We're artists. This is artistic."
In fact, Johannesen said, the band members have received a streak of positive comments from men and women alike.
The "Carnegie or Bust" calendar features tasteful black-and-white photographs of the women - some in group shots with conductor's scores and others posing solo with their instruments.
The idea for a calendar is the brainchild of bass trombonist Holly Ransom, a.k.a. Miss February. Her boyfriend received a calendar full of Hawaiian models after a friend visited the islands last summer.
"And I thought, 'Why couldn't we do that too?'" Ransom said.
In September, she began tapping shoulders of fellow wind orchestra members in the middle of music classes, asking if they wanted to be involved. Most consented, thinking it was a joke.
A couple months later, they found themselves in a studio showing off their artistic background to student photographer Karly Forgette.
Other Cal Poly organizations have printed scantly clad calendars in the past five years - including sororities and the men's water polo team. While sorority women and cheerleaders have graced calendars across the nation's college campuses, the wind orchestra's venture may be the first of its kind.
"This calendar is really about breaking down stereotypes," said Ana Hartwick, who plays the piccolo. "We're not a bunch of ugly band girls wearing glasses."
University administrators almost stripped the calendar project last fall, fearing it would be distasteful and shed a bad light on Cal Poly. But campus leaders gave the project a green light after Ransom showed them the pictures and said that none of the women was required to participate nor discouraged from doing so.
The wind orchestra club printed 700 calendars and hopes to make a $4,000 profit, which would help cover some of its $72,000 travel bill to New York City's Carnegie Hall. Ticket sales from local performances leading up to the trip will also help.
Student reaction to the calendar was mixed on campus Wednesday. History senior Marchal Monckton, chomping on pizza in the University Union, said he liked the product but probably wouldn't buy it because he already has a 2003 calendar.
Jill Rockway, a liberal studies sophomore, said the calendar "seems like a Berkeley kind of thing to do to get attention."
"I think there's better ways to get exposure than being provocative," she added.
Ransom argued that the women bared themselves in a classy manner.
She also mentioned that conductor William Johnson volunteered to pose in the calendar, "but we just pretended he was joking."
Johnson recalled it another way.
"They didn't ask me, because they knew what my response would be" - not to do it, said a chuckling Johnson, who has taught at Cal Poly for 37 years.
Whatever the case, it probably would have been difficult to cover up behind a conductor's baton.
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Ryan Huff covers higher education for The Tribune. He can be reached at 781-7909 or
rhuff@thetribunenews.com.
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