Band and Music 3 | ***Dave Does the Blog

The joy of being a band parent

Someone else talking about the same thing. And I'm quite familiar (from having seen the performance she describes multiple times) with the band her son is in (which was nicely choreographed and had great music selections).

I'll add this — one of the reasons Margie and I volunteer to assist at performances is because, if we're going to get up that early anyway and feel like we should be at the show, it's a lot more fun (and work, and exercise) to be working in support of the band (pushing equipment, helping them get tidied up, making sure they have water, etc.) than to sit in the bleachers for hours. It helps us meet a lot of Kay's cohort, too, who are damned good kids.

(h/t Stan)

The joy of being a band parent
Being a band parent used to be easier. In elementary school, it was mostly listening to a fifth-grader attempting to coax sound — any sound —

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At last, the Colorado State Marching Band Finals

I say "at last" because it's been an extraordinarily time-intensive couple of months of competition, both for +Margie Kleerup and me and for +Kay Hill (who did many times the work we did).

But yesterday was the finals for Colorado, which were held down at the Air Force Academy this year. In the picture below are the 5A and 4A school finalists, eight in each class. Arapahoe HS is the fourth band from the left. All the drum majors are on the line for the award presentation.

In the end, AHS placed 5th in state in 5A (official results are at http://cbamarching.com/images/2014_5AFinals_Recap.pdf), with a score of 80.15, their best of the year, 5.3 points from the 1st place and only 0.65 points from 4th place.

Kay worked her butt off from the 6:30a call down at the school to being picked back up at the school at 2:00a this morning (after loading up the trucks down at the AFA and then unloading them at the school). She was a pretty happy camper, if a tired one. Marching Band has been a great activity for her for making friends and being involved (and getting a lot of exercise, too). It's been a lot of fun (and exercise — 8.2 miles on the pedometer yesterday) for us, too, and all the more benefit for being in support of her.

Part of what was cool was the support we got from friends who came out for competitions, and that grandparents on both sides (my mom last week, my in-laws this week) got to see the show. Kay and we appreciate it a lot.

That's it for the field band work this year. They have some street marching engagements still and there's concert band stuff coming up, but the current show is now retired. Which, as Kay has already recognized, is both a relief ("getting my life back again") and kind of nostalgically sad.

At least until next year.

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Lack of Oxygen will indeed kick your butt

The Air Force Academy Falcon Stadium is at 6,600 feet (just over 2000m) in elevation. The ramp down to the field is full of signs (particularly for visiting teams) warning about hypoxia.

Speaking from personal experience, pushing the percussion pit equipment at a marching band competition, that's not so much a problem going downhill into the stadium, as in pushing all that equipment back up the hill in existing.

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So … far … behind … on TV

Between marching band stuff and being out of the house stuff and early bed time stuff and visiting family stuff, we are desperately behind on watching all the stuff we really want to watch on TV this season. "Doctor Who," "Gotham," "The Flash," "Face/Off," "Castle," "Forever," "Gracepoint," "Agents of SHIELD," "Sleepy Hollow" … we're 2-3 eps behind on all of them. Not to mention our DVD-grinding of "Babylon 5" and "Fairy Tail" …. Not to mention some other upcoming new series like "Constantine" ….

We need a week-long vacation of just watching the boob tube to catch up. Unfortunately (or not), that doesn't seem likely to happen any time soon.

Oh, and have I mentioned both more parental visitations and a certain intense month-long writing event in the immediate future?

SIGH.

Yes, #firstworldproblems , but it makes it damned difficult to go anywhere near the Internet without major spoilers. (Which, yes, is another example of #firstworldproblems .)

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The Marching Band Effect

So that whole marching band parent thing we've been doing? Here's what it's all about. A video someone took of the Arapahoe High School Marching Band (starring +Kay Hill) show for 2014 (not 2015) at the AHS Invitational last weekend. The show is titled "The Marching Band Effect," and portrays the evolution of the band from noobs to a full-fledged band over the course of the season. (The show continues to evolve with additional dialog and actions.)

+Margie Kleerup and I were chaperoning, so we're not visible in pit or prop crew as often has been the case.

There's a variant rendition of the show from a football game the night before here: Arapahoe Marching Band Field Show 2015

We have an invitational Saturday, followed by the Colorado state finals next weekend, which will bring us to a (blessed) conclusion to the field show season. Woot!

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Pushing Pit

As nattered on about at length, we've been full-blown into the Band Parent thing this fall, supporting the Arapahoe HS band that +Kay Hill participates in (playing flute) at games and competitions.

(Two weeks and the season is over. Whew!)

Since this is all new to us, we've been trying out the different volunteer jobs. We've been chaperons and water-carriers. We've worked concession stand. We've set up bleacher cushions for the band members. We've been on the prop crew (carrying around and helping set up the prop pieces for the show). And last night, at the state regional qualifiers, we "pushed pit" — which means pushing around stuff for the percussion pit, all the gongs and ~~xylophones~~ marimbas and chimes and bass drums and speakers and so forth.

Though there's a lot of shuffling stuff around during warm-ups, the key is moving all the bits and bobs and setting them up on the field during the competition slot — an activity which is timed, so swift moves and confident and accurate placement of the equipment is essential.

Or, if you were like us, putting stuff where people told us to put it.

Fun times. And we still ended up doing some chaperon / water stuff, and that's fine, too.

We're on pit for the next two competitions, which wrap up the season. And that should help us figure out where we want to volunteer next year.

This pic I took last night, while the drums the pit crew were rehearsing before the show.

#marchingband

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If it’s Monday, it must be another band competition!

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If it’s Saturday, it must be a…

If it’s Saturday, it must be a marching band competition! (This one we’re running, which adds it’s own excitement.)

Last home football game of the…

Last home football game of the season; but marching band has multiple competitions coming up, so no rest for the wicked yet.

Rather than Flying

When United fubared my flight out to Newark (thence to Glasgow) on Saturday, I ended up going to the Douglas County band competition +Kay Hill was in with her Arapahoe HS Marching Band compeers. This animated photo was shot during the dinner break. And, yeah, a swarm of high school band kids really does move around that much.

The team came in 1st in 5A schools, and 2nd overall. It bollixed up my schedule, and it was an exhausting day, but I was glad I was there to lend a hand (pushing props, in this case).

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Somewhere Over the Academic Rainbow

For a variety of reasons, it would hardly behoove me to recommend Ohio State as a college for +Kay Hill to attend. On the other hand, if she were wanting to pursue that marching band thang to its logical conclusion, there are far worse places she might consider going.

(h/t +Scott Randel)

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Hey, kids, let's put on field show!

Mary and Stan attended the Legacy Invitational this past weekend, where the Arapahoe HS Warrior Marching Band performed. Since +Margie Kleerup and I were busy on prop crew, Stan was able to take some fun pix from the stands.