Columnist Susan Snyder: Music’s future hits a sour note

Tuesday, April 1, 2003 | 8:17 a.m.

The next time Clark County School District officials suggest cutting school music and art programs, think about Kevin Stout.

Stout, of Las Vegas, is a 45-year-old father of four and a trombone player. It's his job, not his hobby.

Formerly a member of the Four Freshmen, Stout has been playing his way around Las Vegas clubs and lounges since moving from Salt Lake City in 1978.

"I turned 21 the day before I started working. It was just in time," Stout said.

I hooked up with Stout on Monday because he's playing at this week's First Friday arts district block party in downtown Las Vegas. Stout and his partner, Utah tenor saxophone player Brian Booth, will start playing at 4 p.m. in City Park, which is on Stewart Avenue just west of Las Vegas City Hall.

Stout said they will feature selections from "Good Pals," a self-produced CD they released last year. The trombonist said he had long wanted to make the recording. But he was pressed into doing it after his 80-year-old mother was killed by a motorist who crashed into her car in August 2001. The driver tested positive for methamphetamine and marijuana.

"After the crash, I realized that any time something like that can happen to you too. And now I have kids. I want something to leave to them," Stout said.

He described the CD as "peppy."

"I tried to pick stuff my mom would listen to," Stout said.

Stout is the youngest of six children, all of whom began playing musical instruments at a very young age. He met his wife, Linda, while he was working at a Target store in the wake of the 1989 musicians' strike in Las Vegas.

"I joined a dating service, and she was the only date I got," Stout laughed. "No one wanted to go out with an unemployed musician."

The couple married 51 weeks after their first date (yes, they counted), and have a 6-year-old daughter, 5-year-old son and twins, a boy and a girl, who turn 3 at the end of the month.

They're hoping to acquire a piano soon. With a musician for a dad and a mom who teaches art at a local elementary school, music and art aren't likely to be cut from this family's budget.

They can only hope those in charge of the county's school budget feel the same way. Stout has seen what happens in districts where art and music instruction falls under the budget axe.

His sister is a Salt Lake City string player who taught music at an elementary school until budget cuts in that district abolished the grade-school music and art programs.

She found a job as a string and orchestra teacher at a middle school in Salt Lake City. But that position now teeters on uncertainty.

"There's no feeder program for the orchestras and the other groups," Stout said. "They have no incentive to start playing (an instrument), unless they've been in private lessons. The whole system is falling apart all the way up through high school. It's going to be a lost art before too long."

It's also going to be a lost job skill. Music is, after all, a job -- like selling real estate or designing a computer network. The Stouts support a family of six with the arts.

I guess deciding whether it's luxury or a living depends on your point of view.