A concert of patriotic music will be held at 7 p.m. Saturday, April 25, at Prichard Auditorium.
Tickets to the concert, sponsored exclusively by The Falls City Journal, are free of charge and available at The Journal office at 1810 Harlan St., Kwik Shop, 1403 Harlan St. and Sapp Bros, 1521 Harlan St.
The Heartland of America Band is a group of Air Force professional musicians whose backgrounds include advanced degrees in music performance and whose broad mastery of musical styles range from classic to contemporary, jazz to country, and pop to rock.
Its various component ensembles perform more than 150 concerts annually, performing extensively throughout Nebraska and surrounding states.
Known throughout the United States for its outstanding performances and recordings, the Heartland of America Band reaches more than one million people annually through live, radio and television appearances, and has been joined in concert by guest artists such as Frank Mantooth, Kevin Mahogany, Frederick Fennell, Chip Davis, John Denver, Crystal Gayle, Joseph Alessi and Wycliffe Gordon.
The U.S. Air Force Heartland of America Band has a rich history of inspiring hearts and minds, building and sustaining American patriotism, and enhancing esprit de corps in the United States Air Force. It began as the 402nd Army Air Force Band on Feb. 1, 1943 at Ardmore Army Base, Oklahoma. After assignments at Andrews Field in Maryland and Selfridge Air Force Base in Michigan, it was eventually assigned to Strategic Air Command at Offutt Air Force Base, Nebraska on Oct. 2, 1948, its home ever since. Officially inactivated on Aug. 1, 2013, it was designated as the USAF Heartland of America Band, a named activity at Offutt and assigned to the USAF Heritage of America Band as Operating Location A.
The Heartland of America Band has received four Air Force Outstanding Unit Awards and six Air Force Organizational Excellence Awards. In addition, it boasts five Colonel George S. Howard Citations of Musical Excellence from the John Philip Sousa Foundation.
The band has the singular distinction of being the only Air Force musical unit deployed throughout the entire area of responsibility in support of troop morale during Operation DESERT SHIELD in 1991. In 1995, it was named a “World War II Commemorative Community” for its comprehensive support of activities recognizing the 50th Anniversary of victory in World War II.
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