This may be a Christmas event, but we would like to dedicate its moving and inspirational music, performed by the young men and women of the United States Air Force (USAF) Band, to the memory of Bill Wehner, one of the FASF’s principal founders, who passed away only days ago.  Since Bill’s family will not be conducting a service, we thought it appropriate to honor Bill’s memory with this uplifting music played and sung by the young Air Force men and women who compose the USAF Band – a musical group that evolved from the sparse and crude beginnings of American Air Power and Civil Aviation that took place here in Columbus, NM, back in early 1916.

“Starting with a single cellist on the floor of the National Air and Space Museum’s “Milestones of Flight” gallery, and swelling to 120 musicians, The U.S. Air Force Band exhilarated museum visitors with its first-ever flash mob. The four-minute performance featured an original arrangement of “Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring/Joy to the World,” led by the band’s commander and conductor, Col. Larry H. Lang. Unsuspecting museum visitors including tourists and school groups were astonished as instrumentalists streamed into the gallery from behind airplanes and space capsules, and vocalists burst into song from the Museum’s second floor balcony.”

God’s Speed, Bill!