As a student in Ireland, he had formed his own dance band to put himself through university.  He played the piano and saxophone superbly.  As a spin off after a dull meeting of the Calgary and District Medical Society, some of us hung behind and the nucleus of the Medical Band was born.

We played for student nurses' dances at their Calgary General Hospital residence.  Discipline in the band was strict:  wear a tuxedo, no booze, get someone to take your calls, no leaving in the middle of the engagement and no charges for your playing.  We had a great time; during intermission there was usually a skit, student nurses taking off the doctors, particularly those playin in the band.  It was fun for everyone and we took our playing quite seriously, some of us even practiced between dances.

Catastrophe occurred after the first few months.  The Musician's Union said we couldn't do this without hiring a stand-by band.  "Smitty" used every logical argument in the book.  We didn't play from music, we only had a list of tunes noting the key and the first few notes.  We didn't belong to the Union (probably that was the basic problem).  We were playing for student nurses at a free dance.  None of these arguments made any difference.  The initial band had to break up.  As a gesture of our defiance, we bought the nurses a good Hi-Fi set and gave them a collection of records.  Years later the band was revived by a retired pediatrican and drummer, Dr. John Birrell, under the name of "The Hippocratic Oath," a name later shortened to "The Oath".  Life wasn't all work!"