Category: Band

I watch the clock.

And I wait.

The alarm clock began it’s annoying pulsing at precisely 5:00 this morning. I rolled over, shut it off and got up to get something to drink. I turned on my computer, reset the Internet and checked email.

Thirty minutes later, I woke Jazz up.

While he stirred, I sat back down at my computer and desperately tried to wake up. I had stayed up until midnight the night before (Why? Because I’m an idiot and apparently? Don’t have any sense to go to bed early on nights I know I have to be up early the next morning).

And the little sleep I got? Was terrible.

I tossed. I turned. I woke myself up to look at the clock worried that I would oversleep and Jazz would miss the bus to his first marching band competition.

When my computer clock said 5:30, I jerked myself out of my sleep-deprived stupor to check on Jazz.

He was on his computer, completely ready to go. Though he was tired, I could see his eyes sparkling with anticipation.

He lives for these competitions.

We went through the checklist:

Band shirt, shoes, black socks (he opted to wear these items so CHECK).

Band jacket, pants, gauntlets, gloves, hat. CHECK.

Duffle bag with travel pillow, blanket (it gets cold on that bus), snacks, two bottles of water. CHECK.

Cell phone, iTouch, DS, headphones. CHECK.

Money. CHECK.

Instrument. DOUBLE CHECK. (He forgot it at dress rehearsal last night and I had to make a mad dash back home to get it before his band director found out and kicked him out of the competition today. He’s strict with the kids, and believe me, it keeps the kids in line).

We were ready to go.

I drove him up to the school. The buses hadn’t arrived yet, but the sidewalk was littered with teenagers, bags, instruments and various props.

I watched Jazz walk to join his peers, his hands full of his own gear and I swallowed the lump in my throat. Though I knew he would be fine, I trust God to watch over the entire band, I felt a little apprehension.

I also felt left out. We had decided NOT to drive to the competition (which was nearly three hours away) because the competition wasn’t scheduled to end until 10:00 – the kids aren’t scheduled to get back into town until 2:30 in the morning.

Which is the time we would have gotten back into town and driving after midnight? Is never a good idea for me.

So. We didn’t go. And though we had a logical excuse not to go, still, I feel like we’re missing something.

I haven’t heard from Jazz yet on how they did. The only reason I know they made it to finals is because the band director is on Twitter and told us they made finals and that they were scheduled to perform at 8:45 – 45 minutes ago. They won’t announce the winner for another hour.

Even then, I don’t expect to hear from Jazz until around midnight – when he’s safely back on the bus, when the excitement has died down a bit and he’s settled for the long drive back.

And that’s only assuming there’s something to tell me. If I don’t hear from him at all, well, it’s probably not a good sign.

The kids will fall asleep, completely entrusting their lives to a stranger – the person driving their bus. I prayed for this person last night. I prayed that he/she would have the mental awareness to get them home safely.

About fifteen minutes out of Springfield, the chaperons will wake the kids and advise them to call their parents so that we, so that I, can drag my butt off the couch (because I won’t be able to go to bed and though I will likely be asleep, it will be a light sleep that any little sound will disturb), slip into my flip-flops, grab a jacket (because it’s supposed to get down to 39 degrees tonight – thank goodness Jazz took his band jacket) and drive the ten minutes to the school.

I will most likely beat the buses back, though I got there late one time last year and Jazz was nearly the last student to leave.

I still feel guilty about that.

He will not talk to me. I will not ask him questions. I have learned, from these trips last year, that he will be too tired, exhausted, wiped out, to want, or be capable of, a conversation. I will simply have to make due to simple yes or no answers and wait to hear the details tomorrow morning.

Though I’m THRILLED that Jazz is involved in band, that he’s making some pretty incredible memories with these trips and competitions, I’m just a teensy bit jealous of all the fun he’s having without me.

Next weekend, they will do it all again – different town, different competition, only THIS time, we will be there, too. The finals start a bit earlier, which means it’ll get over with a bit earlier and we won’t be driving home AS late.

I’m okay with that. Parenthood is full of inconveniences.

Chances are, we’ll never even get to talk to Jazz, but it won’t matter. He’ll know that we’re there, somewhere, in the crowd, praying to God, crossing our fingers and sending him positive vibes.

Because that’s what parents do.

*UPDATE: They came in third! (Out of 18 teams). Not bad!!

Marching season is upon us!!!

I know I get insanely excited about marching season, but I can’t help it. I see how much Jazz loves it and it just warms my heart that he is in an extracurricular activity.

The program is ten times better than last year, in my opinion. We only get to see bits at a time – we saw the first two sets marched at the August parent preview and they added another set when they marched at half-time at the last football game – it’s good, it’s really good.

The name of the show is “No Strings Attached” and it’s about dancing marionettes. The kids start out the show on the ground, in various discarded doll poses and then begin their program. There is one section where they all come together and march really fast, narrowly by-passing each other in formation. It’s quite impressive.

They haven’t blocked the fourth, and final, set yet, so we’re not sure how it ends, but we’re loving what we see so far. Unfortunately, I haven’t really heard the music. It’s so noisy at the football games that I can’t hear it, but I’m sure it’ll be beautiful and challenging – the band director is sort of known for picking that sort of music.

I think our kids have a real shot at winning this year. It would be so great if they actually made the finals at Band Over America this year. (They didn’t make finals last year. And I can see why. Their show, though beautiful, just wasn’t flashy enough to compete).

Jazz has the same uniform as last year. I am pretty sure this will be the last time he’ll be able to wear it, it’s pretty tight. In fact, I can’t believe he’s able to breathe in that jacket. He’ll definitely have to get a bigger size next year.

His first competition is next week in Tulsa Oklahoma. The week after that, he has another one in Oklahoma, but in Broken Arrow. We plan on driving down there and watching. It’s only about two hours away – I can handle being on the road for four hours in one day.

I’m excited. I love these competitions. It’s so fun to watch the formations, to marvel at the costumes and listen to the music. It’s an uplifting experience.

Here’s to a successful 2010 marching season!

Jazz’s band traveled to St. Louis this past Saturday for the Greater St. Louis festival (GSL). We didn’t go this time around. I wanted to go, but I knew it would be stressful trying to beat him home by 2:30 in the morning.

Yes. Two-thirty in the morning.

I get sleepy enough driving during the day, there was no way I would make the drive in the dead of night. Kevin probably could have done it, but honestly, driving that late at night is dangerous and what if we didn’t make it back before Jazz?

Ugh. I can’t even contemplate having to rouse a family member out of bed so they could pick Jazz up and keep him company until we got home.

No. Me, Kevin and Dude all stayed home Saturday.

Jazz took off from the school at noon. They made it to Fenton by 4:30 and had dinner then went straight to the Edward Jones’ Dome to warm up so they would be ready to perform by 8:30 p.m.

In the meantime, I spent the entire day watching the clock.

“He should be near St. Louis now.”

“He’s probably eating now.”

“I HOPE he’s eating now and not so excited that he forgets and then passes out from hunger on the field.”

“He should be at the stadium now.”

“The kids are warming up. I bet they’re doing those arm exercises that he loves so much.” (insert sarcasm here).

“Oh geez. It’s 8:15. It’s getting close. I bet they’re nervous. I’M nervous.”

“It’s 8:30! It’s 8:30!”

This is the part where I started chewing my already short fingernails.

And yes, I drove Kevin and Dude nuts.

I knew there were three more bands scheduled after Jazz’s and that the awards were going to be presented at 9:45. So, peace ascended on our household between 8:45 and 9:45.

Then the time rolled around.

“Oh geez, they should be announcing the winners now. I hope the guys did well!”

This is the part where I endured exasperated looks from my guys. We were watching “Mythbusters” and were quite into it when my cell phone rang.

“Put it on pause! Put it on pause!”

I answered my phone.

“Hello?”

“Mom?”

I could tell by his voice that something was up.

“Yeah! Hey buddy! How did it go?”

“MOM! WE GOT FIRST PLACE!”

I think I hooped and hollered, but that whole time period was sort of an out-of-body experience so I’m not sure.

Yes. Our kids got first place. But not ONLY first place, they also received an award for Outstanding Visual Performance and Outstanding General Effect!!

I could hear all of his band mates yelling in the background.

They won first place!!! *squee!*

And you know what? There are 71 freshman in the band this year, which just about makes up half of the band. If our kids are doing this well now, just imagine how they will improve over the next three years!

(Hopefully – more on that in a minute).

Jazz called me back about 30 minutes later to tell me that they were projected to get back into town at about 1:45 a.m. So I set my alarm for 1:30.

When the alarm went off, I got up and turned my computer back on. The band director is on Twitter and I wanted to see if he had made any updates on where they were.

No updates.

My imagination started running away with me (it’s a curse) and I started imagining all sorts of things happening to the buses and had just about convinced myself that they were in trouble and I was going to have to go up to the school and rally with the rest of the waiting parents to try and figure out how to get a hold of the band director and find out why they hadn’t arrived yet when my cell phone went off.

Jazz was 10 minutes out of town.

By the time I reached the school, the buses were pulling in – perfect timing.

It was sort of amusing to watch the kids spill off the bus. They had all been asleep and were disoriented zombies as they stumbled back into the cold night air.

I spotted Jazz and helped him with his gear. While he took his instrument back to his locker inside the school, I unzipped his garment bag and hung his uniform back up (it was wadded up on the bottom).

We got back home and we all promptly went back to bed. (Kevin had gotten up to welcome him back home. Dude was dead to the world).

I had to take his uniform back to the cleaners today. One, it was sweaty (ew) and two, the kids had to change in the parking lot before getting back on the bus and it was dusty.

Picture that for a minute. Exactly how does that happen? In the parking lot? In front of God and everyone else?

I asked Jazz about it.

“So Jazz. When you guys change in the parking lot – how does that work, exactly? Do they put up a screen or something?”

“Nope. We all just change in front of each other.”

“You mean, the girls too? You guys don’t go off somewhere and the girls go off somewhere?”

“Nope. There’s no time. We just sort of deal with it.”

“Aren’t you tempted to peek?”

Jazz’s cheeks flushed a nice shade of pink at that point and I had my answer. But he shrugged it off and said, “We do what we have to do. And sorry I didn’t hang my uniform back up. We only had 25 minutes to change and get everything back on the bus.”

So … Jazz is learning a thing or two about modesty – or lack thereof, apparently. Actually, I’m okay with this. I mean, bodies are bodies and if you treat them as such, then really, what’s the big deal?

I was excited about Jazz going back to school today. I thought his entire band would celebrate their victory but …. um …. no.

“Did you guys have a party in band today?”

“No.”

“No? Why not? Wasn’t your band director happy about your results?”

“Not exactly.”

I was flabbergasted. How could the man NOT be happy with a FIRST PLACE win?!?

Jazz said that the band director showed them a tape of their performance and pointed out all of the flaws (never mind what they did right. And I’d like to add, that when Jazz called me with the news of their win, he said that he felt like it was the best performance they had ever given.)

Their forms (movements) were off. Their lines were not straight. The music sounded off.

Blah. Blah. Blah.

This sort of put me in a challenging position. First of all, I was annoyed. Excuse the hell out of me? Is what I wanted to say, but I didn’t. I defended the band director, but at the same time, told Jazz that he should feel very proud of his performance and never apologize for doing his best.

BUT, at the same time, there’s always room for improvement.

The challenge is, of course, finding the balance between doing your best and doing it PERFECTLY, I suppose.

I’m still a bit annoyed with the band director. How dare he pop these kids’ bubbles! They have worked their ASSES off and it paid off in spades this past competition. To suggest that they didn’t give their all or did a sloppy job is sort of insulting to the judges, don’t you think? That maybe the judges didn’t really know what they were talking about?

BUT, I don’t want to tell Jazz that he should just STOP and give up trying to do better.

We can all do better.

So … it was a weird position to be in. I mean, the kids got FIRST PLACE, how much better could they have gotten!

BUT, the band director knows what he’s talking about and I’m giving him the benefit of the doubt. I just hope he’s not cutting his nose off to spite his face and he ends up losing half of the band next year because they’ve lost their motivation to try and please the man, you know?

Jazz has one more football game Thursday night and then they travel up to Columbia for their last competition of the season. We’re going to try and go – simply because it’s the last competition of the season. We’ll see how it works out time wise. We haven’t gotten the schedule yet so I’m not sure when they’re supposed to get back into town, but the band is the last band scheduled to play (naturally) and then if they make finals, they’ll have to perform in finals. Which means it’ll most likely end up being another dead of the night sort of thing. So, we’ll see.

I’ve ordered a DVD of the band’s performance (and all of the bands that competed in his category), so hopefully, when I get that, I can convert the performance to video and post it for those of you interested in seeing the performance. I can’t make it public (due to copyright issues), but I’ll make it private and keep it up for about a week so friends and family can watch it.

I’m really looking forward to seeing how they did and IF I think they did as poorly as the band director THINKS they did.

I mean, I’m no expert, I’m just a proud mama, but dang it, how can you beat FIRST PLACE?!?

Grr. I’m annoyed.

(You can see more of my tweets on my Twitter stream).

This weekend taught me two things:

1. Our community needs to get more excited about our high school marching band (why? Because I said so, that’s why. *grin*)

2. I’m WAY too emotionally invested in our high school marching band.

The name of the game this past weekend? Beat the clock. We managed to stay juuuuust ahead of schedule – and when I say juuuuust ahead, I mean juuuuust.

Let’s back up a bit:

Jazz had a marching band competition this past weekend in St. Louis – the Band of America competition, to be precise. And let me just say, if you think marching band is nothing more than simple marching and playing music …

You would be wrong. OH WOULD YOU BE WRONG.

But it’s okay, it’s a common misconception. Unless you have a kid in marching band and/or you’ve attended some of these competitions, you wouldn’t know any better.

Heck, I didn’t know any better UNTIL we attended the Valhalla competition a few weeks ago.

These competing bands not only get out there and march, they tell a story. They take three musical pieces and weave a visual representation that not only entertains, it’s artistic in nature.

I thought our show was good … oh my Lord, we’ve got a pretty plain show compared to many bands.

There are PROPS, and FANCY COSTUMES, and in some cases, even the band members get in on the drama. It’s absolutely fascinating to watch and so worth the money if you ever decide to go to an event.

Saturday morning, I woke Jazz up at 5:45 a.m. He needed to be at the school by 7:00 to help load up the buses. Getting Jazz up is not a problem – he’s a morning person and he just perks right up if you give him about five minutes to wake up.

He got up, ate breakfast and together, we went through the checklist of things he needed to take:

His uniform (of course)
Shoes
Black socks
Gauntlets (the fancy things he wears on his sleeves)
Gloves
Hat
Duffel bag with a change of clothes, toiletries and snacks.
Money
Cell phone

Check.

When we arrived at the school, there were four huge coach buses waiting. It was pretty impressive and you could FEEL the kids’ excitement. I dropped him off (with some trepidation – this would be his first overnight school trip and I was a little nervous), and raced back home to get ourselves ready.

Why? Because we were also going to Band of America. Are you kidding me? I’m INTO this stuff. I thoroughly enjoy watching these talented kids not only play some spectacular music, but watch the fabulous shows they put on WITH the music.

Me, Kevin and Dude got on the road about 9:30. We figured we were about two hours behind Jazz.

The weather was a bit overcast, but otherwise, a good day to travel. Our trip to St. Louis was uneventful (which is how I like our road trips to be, thank you very much.)

We reached St. Louis about 1:00 p.m. Our kids were scheduled to play at 2:30. We thought WE were cutting it close. As we were passing by several buses, my cell phone suddenly went off. Since I was driving, Kevin answered (because I practice what I preach – NO CELL PHONES WHILE DRIVING).

It was Jazz. And coincidentally, the buses we passed? WERE THEIRS!! And I thought WE were running late! Our guys had to unpack, set up in the practice area, practice and then perform all under an hour and a half?!

I freaked out a little for them.

We finally found a place to park and located the place to pick up our tickets. (I had purchased me and Kevin’s tickets ahead of time, but we still needed to buy Dude’s. We had to buy his at the ticket office so we could get the student discount – which was substantially cheaper than full price).

After we got out tickets, we went into the Edwards Jones’ Dome. (This is where the St. Louis Rams play, if you don’t know). We were dutifully impressed. The place was HUGE.

We found some seats (which wasn’t easy, the place was PACKED), and settled in. Since we had arrived so late, we hadn’t had time to grab something to eat and Kevin and Dude were ravenous, but it was so close to the time our kids were scheduled to play, that they stuck around long enough to watch them.

These are our kids coming onto the field.

Here they are setting up to begin.

Here are some performance shots.

I’ll be honest, it was the worst performance I’ve seen from them yet. They were out of alignment, they were not marching in sync and the moves were awkward and stilted. The Color Guard girls also messed up.

I knew in my heart, they probably wouldn’t make finals.

After their performance was over, Kevin and Dude went to grab something for lunch at the concession stands. Since our kids played so late in the day, there were only about five more bands scheduled before prelims were over.

The guys came back with a bratwurst, a slice of pizza, a pretzel for me, and two drinks. Guess how much all of that cost.

Twenty-five dollars!!!! And it was easily the WORST the pretzel I’ve had in my entire life. It tasted like stale plastic — which is an educated guess because of course, I’m not prone to routinely chewing on stale plastic.

The guys said their food was equally horrible and the drinks were terribly watered down. Lesson learned – we will not be eating at the dome anymore. Geez louise.

Prelims finished at 4:30 and as I predicted, our kids didn’t make finals. But since I knew the kids were scheduled to come back to watch the finals, I had gone ahead and purchased finals tickets. Though we were looking forward to watching the final bands perform, our hearts weren’t really into it.

Finals were scheduled to begin at 7:00, so we had plenty of time to grab some dinner (we ended up getting off on the wrong highway and found ourselves at a Steak N’ Shake and since we didn’t really have time to drive around inner St. Louis and get even more lost, we ate there), go back to our hotel, check in and move our stuff into our room.

We ended up staying at the Drury Inn next door to the Dome. Quite frankly, when Kevin suggested that particular hotel, I fought him on the idea. RIGHT next door to the dome? First of all, we’d be lucky to get a room (to my utter surprise, we did), but I predicted that there would be a bunch of kids from the bands staying there and it would be terribly noisy and not conducive to a good night’s sleep … but once again, I was wrong. Our hotel couldn’t have been more perfect. It was SO NICE not to have to get back into the car at midnight and drive to our hotel, we simply walked next door – it was awesome.

The room was also very nice and if you’ve ever stayed at Drury Inns, you know they have an AWESOME breakfast buffet. We will definitely be staying there for future competitions.

We arrived back at the dome in time to watch the final bands. These bands simply took my breath away. A few bands that stuck out:

• One band paid tribute to Elvis
• Another band didn’t have flashy props or Color Guard, but their formations were tricky and there were points where the band was RUNNING to get into perfect alignment, it was quite impressive.
• Another band told the story of the Berlin Wall coming down. The band began their show by marching onto the field like the Hitler German army used to march. It was quite shocking, but made total sense given the rest of the show.
• One band actually had band members lowering their instruments and singing. That was cool.
• One band paid tribute to Japanese culture. Their Color Guard girls were dressed up in the traditional kimonos and used fans as their props – another spectacular show.
• But the pièce de résistance of the evening was hands down, the Broken Arrow band in Oklahoma (in fact, a lot of the bands that made finals were from Oklahoma). First of all, the band is HUGE. I overheard one woman say they had 267 kids and that was only HALF of them. Overall, they have over 400 band members and have actually had to break their band up into two teams (I also researched the band when I got home, their kids actually audition to be in band. Any of the kids that are interested in playing in our band are allowed to do so. AND people in Broken Arrow make a bigger deal out of band than the rest of their sports – which personally I think is warranted. But I’m biased. 🙂 )

  Secondly, the Color Guard girls donned long, black tails, yes tails (the piece was something to do with Raptors – though the tails looked like snake tails to me), and “lured” the band members into their trance. They seduced them to give up their instruments, in essence. I was a bit disturbed by the overall sexual connotations and the whole temptress theme, but I must admit, seeing all of those tails wiggling out on the field, it looked like a snake pit out there. And the band didn’t march off the field at the end of their performance, the sirens lured and teased them off the field by taking their instruments away from them. It was quite spectacular and not at all something you would expect to see at a marching competition. The music was also very seductive and eerie. Broken Arrow ended up winning the entire competition and I must say, rightly so. They were really something to watch.

In comparison, our kids’ show is pretty traditional and blah. But I’ll be honest, I don’t think I’d feel comfortable with them doing the kind of show the Broken Arrow band performed. Though the show was impressive, unique and interesting, it was dark and I didn’t like the underlying message behind the performance. I’m not sure that show was inspired by all things good, if you catch my drift.

I couldn’t believe the fan support for Broken Arrow. Nearly half the stadium was there to cheer them on! And judging by their props and costumes, they have a lot of monetary support from the community. I wish our community would put more energy into the band (our website doesn’t even mention them!!) as opposed to sports. No offense to the sports enthusiasts out there.

I do hope that our band director takes something away from this — I hope our show next year is a bit more … well, showy. We’re going to have to be in order to be serious contenders, I think.

Again, I’ll be honest. I was jealous of these other bands. They were really quite impressive and that makes me all the more determined to see our kids at least make the finals in the next three years that Jazz is in band. I really want them to bring home some trophies and the fact that I’m THAT into this sort of thing confuses me. I’m not usually quite this passionate about something, but I don’t know, these kids work so hard, I just really want them to leave a lasting impression. I’ll tell you what Jazz thought about the performance later.

Sixty-two bands performed and only 14 make it to finals. That means our kids only have a 22% chance of making finals. Those aren’t great odds, but not impossible. We’ll see if we can’t do a little better next year.

When it was time to announce the winners of the competition, they had all of the bands come out onto the field. It was quite something to see them all lined up, in various modes of dress and colors.

Here they are coming out onto the field.

Here are all the drum majors lined up and waiting to hear results.

And here they are on the jumbo-trons. (Did I mention there were two jumbo-trons? They were fun to watch, too. They would zoom in on the kids and then pan out so you could see the formations – very cool).

As I mentioned, Broken Arrow won. They won quite a few awards, actually. Unfortunately, our kids left before the awards were presented so they didn’t see all of the bands out on the field. That was disappointing. When we showed these pictures to Jazz, he acted like he would have liked to have seen that.

We headed to back to Springfield at about 9:30 again the next morning. We were a bit stressed because I knew the kids were scheduled to take off for home at about 9:00 a.m. and we wanted to beat Jazz home, otherwise, we’d have to call a family member to come pick him up and keep him until we got home.

Coincidentally, the hotel they ended up staying at was right off I-44 (which is our route home), and as we passed the hotel, we noticed that the buses were still in the parking lot. Whew! We were ahead of them.

However, I noticed that my low tire light had come on, so we stopped to check them (all of them needed air – I love that low-tire indicator!) and get gas. We got back on the road and it wasn’t thirty minutes later that we noticed we were BEHIND Jazz’s buses.

What?! How did that happen?

At any rate, we soon passed them (we called Jazz to see if he could see us passing them – he didn’t see us) and once again, whew! We were ahead of the game.

I soon lost track of them and I assumed they were going to pull over and have some lunch on the way back. So, we got into Springfield at about 12:15 and went straight to Wendy’s to grab some lunch. We had just gotten our food and were pulling out of Wendy’s when my cell phone went off and again (because I’m setting an example to Dude here!), I asked Kevin to answer it.

It was Jazz – he was back in town!! So that meant we were literally fifteen minutes ahead of him – we couldn’t have cut it any closer if we tried!

So, I turned back around and we went through the drive-thru again to get Jazz something to eat since they did not stop for lunch.

We arrived at the school in time to see all of the kids getting off the buses and grabbing their gear.

I helped Jazz gather his stuff and made sure he took his instrument back into the school and secure it before we took off for home.

I still can’t believe we only beat him home by 15 minutes. (I was a little freaked out about that).

To my surprise, Jazz wasn’t that tired. He said he and the guys (he roomed with three of his buds), actually went to bed at 1:00 a.m. and were back up at 6:30, so they got about five hours of sleep. Jazz also said that he and his buddies pooled some of their money and left a tip and a note in their room thanking the management for allowing them to stay in their hotel.

I thought that was incredibly sweet and mature of them.

Jazz said he had a blast and though he was disappointed they didn’t make finals, he wasn’t surprised. He knew they had performed badly. In fact, he said that one of the tuba players actually fell, which none of us saw happen. He bent the tuba, too. *cringe* Actually, Kevin and I saw quite a few band members (from other bands, not from Jazz’s band), trip and fall down. I saw one person fall so heavy that she actually slid across the field. Poor thing.

When I asked Jazz why he thought they did so poorly he said that everyone was sort of freaked out by the venue. He said that the jumbo-trons were incredibly distracting and the field judges were so close to them they got nervous (the judges actually walked/ran into the middle of their formations. They had some sort of microphone strapped to their chests and were talking into them. I can see why this would be distracting!)

I also think that the fact that they got there so late and had to rush to get ready and rush through their practice threw their stride off, too. And Jazz also told me that a lot of the band this year are freshmen, which explains a lot, actually.

Anyway, it was a learning experience and the kids had a ball – that is all that really matters in the end.

The kids go back to the dome in St. Louis this Saturday for the Greater St. Louis festival. They are competing against a lot of the same bands (though not Broken Arrow, thank goodness), so it’ll be interesting to see how they do given they now know what to expect. I’m not sure if we’ll go or not – I’d like to, but another trip to St. Louis? Ugh, I don’t know.

In the meantime, I need to drop his uniform off at the cleaners today (it’s pretty dusty), and try and find some fabric glue so I can hem his pants a little better. I had been using safety pins, but it just looks tacky – I need a more professional-looking alternative. But it can’t be permanent because the uniforms are passed on from year to year so …

Thanks for sticking it out with me. I know this post is super long but I wanted to make sure I documented the experience – it’ll be fun to go back and read WHEN our kids win future competitions. (I’m very optimistic!)

We went to a football game last night because Jazz’s band had to play and it was unseasonably cold. We sat in the stands, on camouflage seat cushions (they are supposed to retain heat and make your butt warm and I have to say, they work!), shivering under turtlenecks, hoodies, coats, caps and gloves. We took our heaviest sleeping bag with us and all three of us (me, Kevin and Dude), shared it. Though we were bundled up, we were are numb by halftime.

But that was nothing compared to poor Jazz. He had to get out on the field, in paper-thin britches, the kind where the wind just blows right through, and not only play, but focus on his formations.

We heard, through Jazz, that his band director was not happy with their 4th place win last week in the Valhalla Festival. All he said was, “we can do better.” I was a bit annoyed that he said that, especially since they didn’t even make finals in last year’s Valhalla. But whatever. I think the kids know in their hearts they did well and I know Jazz feels proud of their accomplishment.

The band director complained that the judges didn’t know what they were talking about. I don’t know what those constructive comments are, but suffice it say, one of them must have been something about the band not moving enough because in last night’s performance, they had some new moves.

And they were awesome.

I think the director is really on track with these new additions. It transforms the whole show and makes it not only classy, but fun as well. In addition, they now have an announcer who explains the importance of color and how it affects our lives. (The show’s theme is “Light Evolving.”)

Jazz is supposed to go back to school today for an afternoon practice. I hope the kids can really tighten it up before next weekend’s big Band of America competition in St. Louis.

Luckily, the band director dismissed the band after halftime so we were able to hobble back to my car and drive home. It took my toes a good hour to thaw.

I’m taking his uniform in to get dry cleaned today. It’s looking a bit grungy and the gauntlets (the funky things on his sleeves) are downright nasty.

Jazz also mentioned that he might like to ask a girl to the homecoming dance next Friday night and I’m totally panicking about this. Not because it would be his first “official” date, but because I have no idea, NO CLUE, how to dress him. What do the boys even wear to homecoming nowadays and where do I go to him set up?

I’m totally freaking out about this and will likely do a little research on area men’s dress shops to get ideas. (Did I mention I’m a little freaked out??)

In addition, last night was the first time we’ve had to dig our winter coats out and Jazz’s coat is embarrassingly small. In fact, his friends teased him because it looks like a little boy’s coat and I must admit, it does.

Jazz is not a little boy anymore. *sigh* So, I will also spend today trying to find a decent coat at a decent price for him, too.

By the way, the pictures from the Valhalla Festival are back. I was pleasantly surprised to see they had taken so many of Jazz. Of course, he’s on the front line most of the time, so …. 🙂

Here are the pictures. We’ll likely pick the best one and buy copies of that. They’re expensive!

Pic One

Pic Two (love the expression in this one)

Pic Three

Pic Four (he’s not happy with this one, he’s not supposed to be leaning like that).

Pic Five (I really like this one)

Pic Six (this one is good too, though. I like how it captures more band members in background)

I had no idea band was going to be this expensive. Between making lump payments (to help pay for trips, truck rentals, uniforms), the price of OUR tickets to get into these places AND pictures and DVDS, wow. But hey, we’re making memories here and Jazz is loving every minute of it, so it’s totally worth the money.

We’ll just have to budget for the next three years. 🙂

Marching bands have come a long way from just playing the marches of John Phillip Sousa, as demonstrated by a battle of the bands Saturday at the Valhalla Marching Band Festival.

There wasn’t so much as a toot of Sousa’s “Washington Post” march to be heard from just before dawn to the festival’s end near midnight.

Instead, performances by some bands included an homage to Michael Jackson — complete with drum majors in black fedoras and suits and sequined silver gloves — fistfighting horn players in a cowboy-themed performance and even knights in shining armor.

My heart started pumping hard Saturday morning and it didn’t stop until late Sunday.

What a weekend. What-a-weekend.

Today, I feel like I’m recovering from a marathon. And I didn’t even run it!

Jazz had his first band competition Saturday. It started at 8:00 a.m., but they weren’t scheduled to perform until 4:45 p.m.

They lumped the participating schools into classes starting at A and ending at D – the class determination depended on the number of winds and brass in the band. Since Jazz goes to a larger school, his school was categorized as D.

His band director wanted the kids to go through the routine one more time before it was time to head to the stadium, so we dropped Jazz off at the school at 1:00 and they spent an hour warming up and going through their songs. At 2:15, he called me and we came back home so he could change. (He actually took his uniform to school with him, but didn’t know he needed to change first before we arrived to pick him up – but it was all good, we had time. Poor kid was so scatter-brained and excited, he didn’t know which way was up).

We arrived at the designated area and dropped him off. Me, Kevin and Dude then went up to the stadium and paid our $7.00 bucks each (yikes!) and took our seats. We arrived just in time to see the last few bands in the C class perform.

They were spectacular. In fact, every single band we watched was absolutely spectacular. I can’t IMAGINE being the judges, talk about tough decisions!!

Our kids were the first band in the D class to perform. And they did great. The Color Guard gals really looked beautiful and though our songs were slower and quieter than most of the other bands’ songs, they were classy, elegant and really, really beautiful. I had serious doubts about the music selection going into the competition, but I can now see why the director picked those pieces. They were unusual and really difficult for a marching band to perform, and perform well.

And our kids? Played them perfectly. I couldn’t have been more proud of them.

But the problem with being first? You have to sit through and see the rest of the competition.

And OH. MY GOSH. The bands that came after our kids were phenomenal. No seriously, they blew me away! They had PROPS, and BIG MOVES, and FUNKY, UNUSUAL music and it was all IN YOUR FACE sort of entertainment so that by the time all of the bands had performed and we were waiting to hear who won what in the prelims and who would go onto the finals, I was depressed and absolutely terrified. Our kids were fantastic, and their talent certainly measured up to everyone else’s, but I was worried the actual show wasn’t flashy enough. Our Color Guard girls wore classic white, flowing costumes and our drum majors wore all white, smart drum major uniforms, which is great, but when compared to the sparkly and outrageous costumes that some of the other Color Guards wore, or the actual ball gowns that some of the other drum majors wore (my brain shut down at that point – BALL GOWNS?!), I was seriously worried we wouldn’t get into the finals.

Here is a short mash-up of the prelims – our kids aren’t on here, but you’ll get a general feel for what sort of entertainment we had the privilege to watch that day.

Thirty-two bands performed, only 12 would go to the finals. I was chewing my fingernails, I was so nervous for our kids.

The time came. All of the drum majors lined up to hear the results. I should have taken pictures of them all lined up, but I was honestly so focused on what was going on, that thought never even crossed my mind.

They began announcing awards for outstanding winds, marching and maneuvering, drum major, soloist, percussion, and Auxiliary.

Our Color Guard won the outstanding auxiliary!! This was quite an honor considering ALL of the other creative performances!!

Then it came time to read which bands placed and which ones would go on to the finals.

I felt faint. All of our kids had gathered across the field and were sitting in the away bleachers. I thought it was so classy of them to stick around and watch the other bands as opposed to going back to their base and changing out of their uniforms, like all of the other bands did.

Fourth place was announced. It went to the school the boys’ friend attended.

Now the pressure was really on.

Third place was announced.

AND IT WAS OUR KIDS!!!!!!!

Oh my gosh, the entire band were on their feet and cheering, it was so exciting!!

But we weren’t out of the woods yet. According to the rules:

The first place band in preliminaries in Class A, B, C, & D automatically make finals. The next & highest scoring bands, regardless of class, complete the finalist bands.

So even though we placed third in the prelimiaries, it didn’t necessarily mean we would go onto the finals – it all depended on our scores.

And I meant to keep track of our scores, but like a dolt, I didn’t buy a program until after finals started. Yeah, I’ll be more prepared next year. (No I won’t).

They began announcing the eight bands who would go on to the finals (because remember, the bands that placed first in their class were automatically entered).

Name after name was called and my heart continued to pound harder and harder with each name called. I had to hold onto the railing (because by this time, we were standing on the sidelines) to keep from keeling over.

I lowered my head and with each name called, I kept saying our kids’ school name hoping that would somehow make the announcer call our band.

And then it happened …. THEY CALLED OUR NAME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

WE WERE IN THE FINALS!!!!!!!!

Oh my gosh, just typing that makes my heart pump hard again. I’m also still hoarse from yelling my fool head off. 😀

They called for a break and we walked across the field to meet Jazz. The band hadn’t been excused yet so we stood around and listened to their band director caution them about eating heavy, greasy, fatty foods and to stick to water, no carbonated drinks (it would dehydrate them). He then asked everyone to meet up at “their” place at 9:15 p.m.

It was sort of a mad house to get out of there, but we took Jazz to Taco Bell (making sure he didn’t order anything greasy and making doubly sure he didn’t spill anything on his overalls). He was too excited to eat, but I made him scarf down a chicken taquito and drink some water.

After bathroom breaks, we headed home.

Yes, home.

I didn’t allow him to compete in finals. It was getting late and he was looking so exhausted that I didn’t think it was in his best interest to continue.

PSYCH! AS IF!

No, the temperatures had plummeted by that time and we were all freezing. So we ran home to grab a sleeping bag, I could change my shoes (I was wearing these and my toes were frozen solid) and Dude wanted to grab a stocking cap.

After we grabbed our extra gear, we headed back to the meeting place and dropped Jazz back off. Since the bands were using one of the other high school stadiums (a bigger and better facility), all of the competing bands were stationed all over the area. Our band actually happened to be using a neighbor’s yard. I’m sure that wasn’t annoying for the poor guy. lol

We headed back to the stadium and watched the bands compete for the “hardware” (i.e. trophies), one more time.

Finally, at 10:30, our kids were back on the field.

I don’t know what their band director told them, but I can honestly say, these kids never played so hard, or concentrated so much on doing a great job as they did in this last performance.

They were perfect. The songs they played require them to get really soft, then go loud, then go really soft again and oh my freaking gosh, it was so pretty I had tears in my eyes (of course, it could have been the cold wind or the fact that I was emotional, but we’ll go with touched). And I’m not just saying this because it was MY kid in that bunch; they were breathtaking.

Two more bands performed after our kids and then it was time to wait to hear the results.

Again, the place was sizzling with electricity, the place was so on edge. The announcer began speaking …

Twelfth place goes to …

Eleventh place goes to …

Tenth place goes to …

Ninth place goes to …

And still, they hadn’t called our school. My heart rate jacked up into over drive.

Eight place goes to …

Seventh place goes to …

Sixth place goes to …

Fifth place goes to …

I was near breaking point. We made the top five?!?

Fourth place goes to …. US!!

Our kids placed fourth!!! Out of 32 bands!!!!! OH. MY. GOSH!! It was so exciting!!

They then announced the top three and I have to say, I totally agree with their choices. The top three schools were … I don’t even know what adjective to use – they were THAT good. And they certainly deserved their wins.

Again, our kids sat on the away bleachers and though they cheered, they really didn’t cheer that much – they were reserved. Which I thought was odd. Maybe they were in shock?

People began filing out of the stadium and we began the journey back across the field again. It was only when, after the drum majors had made it back over with our trophies (because our Color Guard? Made Outstanding Auxiliary again in finals!), that our kids came alive and screamed with excitement. Everyone paused as they were leaving to look over and smile.

Our kids were so …. CLASSY!!!

Needless to say, our first competition was just ….. indescribable. I checked the results from last year’s competition and our school didn’t make it to finals. So, the fact that not only did they make it to finals but placed fourth is A FREAKING BIG DEAL!!

YAHOO!

Here is a picture of Jazz after we located him and gave him his much deserved congratulations.

Saturday was one of the most exciting days in recent memory. I’m still recovering. Jazz was just exhausted yesterday and actually felt a little sick. But after getting plenty of rest, he felt better today. I think it was all the adrenaline and the excitement that got to him.

Next weekend, we head to St. Louis for the Bands of America competition. I can’t wait.

I hope my heart can take it.