[.Hack]

anyone currently in a marching band? Maybe you used to be? What were the memorable experiences and shows? Did you like it?

[ast3r3x]

Bandy

Ok ok, band isn't that bad, I knew some people in the band, but...bandy

[EmC]

I was in marching band in highschool and an assistant drum major my senior year. Band afforded me many opportunities I would not have had otherwise. I got to travel to Hawaii and California to participate in parades and the many activities and community service projects that I did throught he band is probably one of the major reasons I got into Tech.

Our band did corps style marching, none of that shake your ass shit, we were very competitive and placed in the top three most everywhere we went.

It is hard to pick out favorite moments, but I really enjoyed senior year. We had a new band director and the three drum majors got to run the entire band. My favorite show was the show for my junior year. I got to re-arange some of the music and write part of the show.

One of the funiest was the time that we had the chance to debut the ponchos that the school board had just bought us. They were hooded plastic ponchos that had "Trojans" embossed on the front. You could hear the kids laughing and some of the parents got pissed.

"Please welcome the marching trojans."

[.Hack]

what band was it, and what show did ya'll do?

[Brad]

I will admit having attended and enjoyed a DCI performance, at least.

[hyperb0le]

EmC: Did you go to Lassiter? I go to Wheeler! (For everyone else, the two schools are in the same county, about 20 minutes away from each other)

Anyway, I am currently playing trombone (and acting as section leader) in marching band. I suppose my favorite band moment was when everyone in the band chipped in $1 to get this kid with really long hair to go get a haircut. Considering we have 150 people in the band, and a haircut costs about $5, the kid made about $145

Oh, we do Corps Style marching as well.

[.Hack]

hey, I play trombone as well! That's cool... We did West Side Story this year. Was really fun. This coming year isn't a state year, so we'll do a pretty fun routine, I think it's going to a 70's Rock 'n' Roll show with We're an American Band, Aqualung, Stairway to Heaven (this one might change), and one other one I can't think of... But the point is that it's really cool to find a fellow tromboner. So where is Lassiter and Wheeler? I don't think that's here in Texas!? Do ya'll have state marching competitions like Texas does, or do ya'll just compete in Bands of America?

[hyperb0le]

Originally Posted by .Hack hey, I play trombone as well! That's cool... We did West Side Story this year. Was really fun. This coming year isn't a state year, so we'll do a pretty fun routine, I think it's going to a 70's Rock 'n' Roll show with We're an American Band, Aqualung, Stairway to Heaven (this one might change), and one other one I can't think of... But the point is that it's really cool to find a fellow tromboner. So where is Lassiter and Wheeler? I don't think that's here in Texas!? Do ya'll have state marching competitions like Texas does, or do ya'll just compete in Bands of America?

They are in Cobb County, GA (Near Atlanta). I'm not totally sure about Lassiter's schedule (I believe they have a "competition year" where they go to BOA Nationals, etc once every four years). Wheeler has competitions every year. We always do a BOA regional (this year we went to the Johnson City regional). We also participate in local and semi-local competitions. Our show this year was "The symphonic sounds of the Rolling Stones." It was really fun, and the judges at the various competitions seemed to like it.

[.Hack]

See, in Texas, we have an organizatioin called the UIL or University Interscholastic League. They oversee the organization of all sports and extracurricular activities involving school. They have regionals around the beginning of october (our state is divided into regions). They give a 1 - 5 rating, 1 being the best. You move on to the area competition if you make an overall score of 1 (there are three judges that either give you straight 1's or two 1's and one 2, both result in an overall score of 1). The area competition is what determines if you go to our state marching competition at the Alamo Dome in San Antonio. The area judges give you a score of 1 - 1000 or something like that. For about 3 hours they rank the bands from 1 to however many bands at that certain area competition and the top 4 go to state. Sometimes, LOTS of bands are at a certain area competition, so we have to have semifinals where they top 10 bands compete for top 5, then they take the top 4. I hope that wasn't confusing lol.

[hyperb0le]

Originally Posted by .Hack See, in Texas, we have an organizatioin called the UIL or University Interscholastic League. They oversee the organization of all sports and extracurricular activities involving school. They have regionals around the beginning of october (our state is divided into regions). They give a 1 - 5 rating, 1 being the best. You move on to the area competition if you make an overall score of 1 (there are three judges that either give you straight 1's or two 1's and one 2, both result in an overall score of 1). The area competition is what determines if you go to our state marching competition at the Alamo Dome in San Antonio. The area judges give you a score of 1 - 1000 or something like that. For about 3 hours they rank the bands from 1 to however many bands at that certain area competition and the top 4 go to state. Sometimes, LOTS of bands are at a certain area competition, so we have to have semifinals where they top 10 bands compete for top 5, then they take the top 4. I hope that wasn't confusing lol.

Yeah, we don't have (to my knowledge) any kind of state judging for bands. It's all about BOA down here.

[BlueRabbit]

Wow, it looks like I'm the only band person on this side of the country (Seattle). I play the clarinet in the Newport HS band. Since I've been there, we've done Westside Story, the New World Symphony, the Channel One Suite, and a show called "America the Beautiful." It's fun, except we're in Seattle, and it gets really rainy and cold by the end of the season. Not many problems other than that, though.

[BarracksSi]

Been marching in one venue or another since my sophomore year of high school (we had a screwy system where "high school" didn't start until 10th grade... don't know why).

That was the fall of 1986.

Shit...

And, yes, one of the corps I marched with did West Side Story one year.

[EmC]

I wish I could have gone to a school with a rep like Lassiter, Pepperell, or Warner Robins. I live in southwest Georgia and because of a stupid bass ackwards school system we were not allowed to compete in BOA. We could only go to regional competitions like the ones in Warner Robins and Waycross.

We never had competition years, we just did the best we could every year. The only way we got to goto Hawaii or some palce like that was if we raised the money out side of school, went when school was not in session and did not go as the school band (really f*^ked up).

Like I said I wish I could have gone to a school like yours. It's nice to have the community behind you, but it would be better if we had the school system behind us as well. I have been out of school five years now, since then the entire school board has been replaced by new elected members and the arts programs have gotten a big boost, but they have also had a recent director change so they haven't been competing the last few years I think.


Oh yeah, the show we did was a 60s themed show. The original show for that year had no theme and had been dubbed "American Hippies in Space" because it was a combination of random songs. The new director nixed that Idea and bought a few more 60s songs, but for some reason I do not recall the names. Far too many more important things have replaced the names, though I could probably still play three of four bars from each show.

[Crusader]

Bando!

I never was in marching band, but most of my friends were, and they seemed to like it. Best time for them was sophomore year when we took nationals (for whatever bloody division we were in), and whenever someone I knew was moved up to first position.

[Ryan]

I'm in marching band right now. We've been all over the place. Hawaii last year, Canada before that, and Europe before that. We were in the Rose Parade a few weeks ago, with a stop at Disneyland to march in their parade.

And yes, we had the "condom hoods", but fortunately, we're the Panthers, not the Trojans.