Tick Tock

No I'm not talking about the Ke$ha song but the countdown to band camp. It's just around the corner(1 week) and I'm getting a little bit excited. I had to go into work for a mandatory workday...lol....but I actually got a lot done and I get to do it again tomorrow. I've just about unpacked my office after a full year of being there. I'm looking forward to meeting my new staff and getting to know the new kids. I will say that I don't enjoy the "bad things" like having to deal with kids changing their minds or vacation plans being changed at the last minute but its something that has to be dealt with as part of the job. Oh well bring on "Black Monday"!!

Summer Heat!!

So it has been a very long time since I've written in this thing but I am going to attempt to do much better. Also I'm going to see if it will help me with my weight loss. When I started working out/exercising back in January I was a Homer Simpsonesque 244lbs. My current weight is 213lbs-217lbs and depends on how much I have eaten as well as if I got a chance to workout or not. I'm also currently stuck in a plateau that I am trying to get out of and continue with the weight loss. This is hard but I'm not going to give up.

On another note, I love my job. I've been doing some type of band related work since I got out for summer break a week and a half ago, but I must say that I actually don't mind. It's got to be done and its my job. Let's see how I feel when band camp gets here!!

AAA State Bound

So let me recap the week. No school on Monday due to a mistake in the district calendar. Great rehearsal on Tuesday. Good rehearsal on Thursday. Great rehearsal on Friday except for the one student who decided not to come to rehearsal or the game. It was also our middle school band night and that went pretty well. We had about 15 kids show up and even had a couple that asked to go with us to Lower State the next day. We also had a great run of the show on Friday night which is the first time that has happened for us. Skip forward to Saturday morning and the rain...we went into the stadium and rehearsed for an hour and a half in the rain and it was a great rehearsal. I did send that student home that missed rehearsal and the game the night before. We had a good run at the AAA Lower State Championships...it wasn't as good as the one that morning though. I had a good friend call me to wish us well and also to just give me a heads up about the stadium. It is kind of big and the sideline of the field is a good distance away from the stands. That type of stadium doesn't really favor a smaller group like us because it makes us look and sound even smaller. I told the kids about it beforehand and that they shouldn't let it affect their performance. We've also struggled visually all year in marching and with color guard. We've got a lot of new kids and some of them are just taking a little bit longer to get the hang of the whole marching band thing but I'm very proud of the progress they've made. We placed 6th in the AAA Lower State Championships and have qualified for the AAA State Championships this week. By the reaction of some of my kids though, you would have thought they were dead last. I've come into a program that has established a very strong tradition over the last 10 years, particularly in marching band. I've got some big shoes to fill and as much as I try not to let it show, the pressure/task is a little bit daunting. I do think that my younger kids were very excited but felt like they couldn't celebrate because the older kids were not very happy. I do not like that at all. For a program that is now on its 3rd band director in 3 years I would say that they did pretty damn good. I'm very proud of them and they have made it to the AAA State Championships. After this week, for one year they will be one of the top 12 bands in the state in class AAA. WAY TO GO SWANSEA TIGER BAND!!

Some Success

The band performed at the Garden City Classic yesterday and received Best Drum Major, Best Drumline, Superior Rating, 1st Place and Grand Champion of Division 1, A, and AA! I'm really proud of the kids and my staff and parents who work really hard! It was also really neat that their former band director who is at Dutch Fork now was also there and they did very well too. They were Grand Champions of class AAA and AAAA. He was my mentor/supervisor when I was student teaching and has since become a good friend who I look up to as well as someone whose opinion I value very much. He and his wife were very excited for us too. Our hard work is starting to pay off. We still have a lot to do but I feel like things are starting to come together and the kids are starting to realize what it is going to take in order to be successful. Way to go Swansea Tiger Band!

Cold Rain

Thursday in my opinion is one of the most important practices of the week. I checked the weather as school let out and it called for rain about an hour into our practice so I told the percussion to stay inside. We don't have a battery this year. We were outside and it started to rain and I had warned the kids earlier in the week to prepare for that because we lost an outside practice on Monday because of rain. But the rain started to come down harder and it was cold so we went inside to work on the homecoming music while it let up. We got back outside after about 20 minutes and as soon as we started to run the show it started to rain again. It was not as hard as before so we stayed outside and it stopped after about 10 minutes. We really needed the outside time to try and clean some more of the show.
I've also had a problem as of late with a couple of students that will miss practice without a valid excuse or without even coming to talk with me when I see them the next day. Attendance at rehearsals and performances is mandatory and it affects their grade when they miss one. For some that doesn't seem to sink in to well.
I've also had a recent rumbling from a parent about band letters and bars. There are some students at the high school who have bars and letters and are no longer in the program. I don't think this is fair to those kids that do stick it out until they graduate. So since I am the director now I made a change to that policy. They can still buy their band jacket during their sophomore year but they will receive a bar for every marching season they complete once it is done. They will get their band letter their senior year as long as they have at least marched two years with the program. The reason I do it that way is because someone who is in color guard could conceivably just march their senior year and get a bar and a letter. I think this is fair and my door is always open if a parent needs to come and discuss a concern with me.

Rain Rain Go Away

Last week was a pretty good week of rehearsals. We actually finished setting the show on the old asphalt field where the portables are located now. Our grass field was covered in water in certain places. It's rough being behind all season, which we were because of when I was hired. I also felt like we shouldn't try and rush things and I think that has paid off in our favor. The kids have retained the drill and we actually cleaned a little while we were learning it, if that makes sense. Tuesday and Thursday we really started to clean and get picky and things are really improving. Hopefull at the contest this weekend we will do better when it comes to marching and still continue to improve in our music. They are calling for rain most of this week and we were inside yesterday because of the rain but we had great music sectionals. The 2nd trumpets are starting to become trumpet players. They are all young. One is a freshman and the other two are eighth graders but I couldn't ask for a better group. They are only going to get better from here on out.

And the beat goes on...

So our first two contests are done. We were 2nd at the Irmo contest and it got rained out right before the last three bands performed. It was also very interesting having the train come through during the middle of our show. It was not a bad showing but we were plagued by injuries and sickness just like a lot of other groups. We worked hard during our week off and it paid off. We had a much better run of the show and I was quite pleased with our progress. My seniors were not though...because we didn't place. It was the first time in probably their entire high school marching band career that they had not placed at a contest. I told them all week that it was going to be a tough contest, especially with 6 other bands in our class. I originally registered us for a smaller class based on our hornline but to balance things out we were moved up. I had the option to stay in our original class and we probably could have won it but I passed on that option...honestly I wanted to see what we were made of. Musically we did pretty well, we were 2nd in our class and 6th overall for the day. Not too shabby, but visually we were last. We have quite a few individual marching problems that we need to get fixed if we want to improve even more. I think we can do it...we just have to put in the hard work!!