Why CB Save The Music is More Than a Concert
I’m leaning against the column at the back-center of the auditorium, with the tech pit right at my belly. On my left, Dave and his team of sound engineers adjust sliders on a mixing board that looks like the Land of the Lost crystal table, keeping the forty-some mics in perfect harmony. Alex is at the other end of the board, guiding the lighting and set team. Joe is dead center, with a young kid sitting beside him, maybe eight or nine years old.
It’s mid-song on stage in a packed house when I see Joe quietly showing the kid how the light board works. Then he casually hands the board over. The kid starts pushing buttons like he’s been doing it for years.
Before the show, I had the chance to meet Mena, a young and up-and-coming concert photographer. It was her first official concert gig, and we quickly struck up a conversation. She asked a ton of questions, which took me straight back to my first concert shooting The Cadillac Three at the Theatre of Living Arts. Bob Linneman, a veteran of the Philly and Jersey music scene, noticed something in me that night that I recognized immediately in Mena: a mix of nervous excitement and fear, the desire to capture the moment without becoming part of it. Bob made room for me then. Last night was my turn.
I was back again this year covering the CB Save The Music concert weekend, my annual return to one of the most meaningful events on my calendar. This marked the 23rd annual benefit concert, organized and performed by Central Bucks educators who somehow manage to be exceptional teachers by day and a fully dialed-in rock band by night. On the surface, it’s a night of great music and entertainment. Beneath that, it’s something much more: a community deciding that music matters.
That collective decision has turned a three-performance benefit show into a community institution. It sells out quickly and fully every year.
Ten percent of all proceeds stay right here in Central Bucks to fund scholarship instruments for students in need. The remaining ninety percent goes to the Save The Music Foundation, which works nationally to restore and sustain music education programs in public schools by providing instruments, resources, and long-term support. Over the years, this concert has generated more than $450,000 for the foundation, along with $11,000 for the CBSD Scholarship Program, a newer initiative launched in 2024. This year is expected to push that total over the half million dollar mark.
Toward the end of each show, C and Glaser, the concert’s dynamic duo frontmen and emcees, do what Springsteen’s done forever: call out each member of the band one by one. The E Street roll call. It feels especially appropriate here. The concert takes place at Holicong Middle School, just up the road from Central Bucks East High School—not on East Street, but close enough to make the dad pun unavoidable.
It’s celebratory. Deserved. And usually just a fun way to roll into the final set of the night.
This year, it landed differently for me. I could go on forever about the musical talent on that stage. These teachers can play. But that’s not the part that stopped me this year.
As names were called out, I started recognizing something: many of the people on that stage — these teachers — were once students themselves. Former kids who learned in those rooms, held those instruments for the first time, and decided to keep going. Imagine the impact of inspiring a student to eventually stand exactly where you’re standing.
That’s the real talent. And it says more than any solo ever could.
This year’s theme was ROCK in the U.S.A., a title that hits a little differently right now. Music has always reflected the country back to itself, sometimes proudly, sometimes uncomfortably. Springsteen’s recent protest song, “Streets of Minneapolis,” is part of that lineage. Proof that music still responds to the moment, still matters when things feel unsettled.
But music like that doesn’t appear fully formed. Future Bruces don’t happen without exposure. Without instruments. Without programs that survive budget cycles. Without teachers willing to give their nights, their weekends, and their energy so kids can discover what they’re capable of.
That’s why I’m a vocal proponent of the STM in CBSTM and of the educators who selflessly make this concert happen year after year. This isn’t abstract support for the arts. It’s practical. It’s local in how it shows up and national in how far its impact reaches. It’s generational. You can see it on that stage and hear it in the roll call of the former students now teaching the next generation.
In a moment when so much feels uncertain, that kind of resonance matters.
Mike Maney 
Leave a comment