The sound of a horn, or the hiss or a snare drum, still puts a smile on the 95-year-old man’s face.  

“It’s real music,” Mr Holmes, a former president of the Bendigo RSL, said. 

“It’s happy.”

So when the Bupa Aged Care resident detected a lack of his favourite musical genre in Bendigo, he set about organising a concert to put things right. 

The show, which will take place in the St Andrews Uniting Church tomorrow night, will star the Maryborough Traditional Jazz Ensemble.

It was to its trombonist, Bill Beasley, Mr Holmes turned for help.

Mr Beasley shared in the senior citizen’s lamentation for jazz, saying his daughter was surprised by the band’s sound the first time she heard them play.

“No-one hears it playing at the gym, or on the radio, or anywhere else young people hear music,” he said.

“This is real communication stuff, and since no-one was doing, we told Alan we would.”

Keeping alive jazz music’s legacy was also a boost for local communities, Mr Beasley said, remembering the days when each city or town had its own ensemble.

In fact, Mr Holmes was a longtime member of the City of Greater Bendigo Jazz Band and was a fixture of the town’s Easter parade, playing the bass drum.  

All the Maryborough band’s members reside in central Victoria, but bass player and former Kangaroo Flat resident Paul Emery will be most familiar to Bendigo audiences, having given guitar lessons in several schools around the city. 

Nonagenarian Mr Holmes, who now lives at North Bendigo aged care facility, and still makes time to tune in to his favourite type of music. 

“I’ve got my radio and lots of tapes, and what not,” he said.

He does so from a room in the Alan Holmes wing.

It was named after the jazz lover because of his contributions to aged care and the elderly. 

The two-and-a-half hour gig at the Myers Street church begins at 7.30pm.

Entrance costs $15, or $10 for seniors and concession holders.