Band Camp Week One - Done.

Band Kids are the BEST

What an excellent week. The kids have worked diligently day after day, with great attitudes and work ethics throughout. I'm so pleased with the willingness to jump in and get things done. I don't really need to teach the meaning of initiative, it already happens in every situation. Our band students are such great workers.

Group talk after a week of good work.

What We Learned

This first week was about setting a foundation. The main goal was to get our basics down and understand the process about how we do everything. From how we stand at attention to how we set drill. All sections pushed forward with learning and memorizing the first "Fire" movement of the show. We will continue next week and hopefully have the first movement ready for the Community Preview on Friday, August 12th!

Character Building

Aside from learning how to work hard and focus during rehearsal, we had several guided lessons throughout the week. I believe that developing students' character is as important as anything we do in band...and life lessons are amplified in marching band! 

Words of the Week

Day 1 - Excellence
Excellence is the word of the season. Throughout the first day and the week, we always came back to excellence. This word drives all of our decisions in and around rehearsal. It helps the directors, staff, and students realize that there's a driving force behind all that we do. It also helps steer us to our end goal of being the best we can possibly be. Regardless of how any results ever turn out, if we have pushed ourselves to excellence, then we can always be proud of the outcome. 

Day 2 - Tenacity
Tenacity is essential in marching band. Marching band doesn't happen at the snap of the fingers and sometimes it takes a while to get it correct. We must have done some drill moves 20 times to get 80 people to do it correctly...but we did get it correct. We will be tenacious and we will accomplish our goals.
(Note: tenacity is an SAT word, so we're also increasing our vocabulary)

Day 3 - Integrity
Our main focus with integrity is doing the right thing. There are so many situations in which students are present with several options of actions. Doing what we should do is not always what we want to do. We spoke at length about how to navigate situations to better ourselves and have integrity. 

We also discussed taking responsibility for one's actions. When you make a mistake...own up to it! I was AMAZED at how this took hold. When in rehearsal, if someone played something incorrectly, the student would often raise their hand, take responsibility and we'd move on. What and incredible amount of maturity in high school students (this situation happened multiple times in every rehearsal). So proud of these kids!

It was truly a wonder to watch these students make selfless decisions for the betterment of the group, time and time again.

Day 4 - Patience
There's not a lot to write about patience other than we are constantly working on being patient in these times of instant gratification. Marching band is the antithesis of instant gratification!!!! We have to put in long hours of hard work that almost never pays off immediately. Sometimes you have to stand still and wait patiently for 10 to 15 minutes at a time! Yet again, our students do so well with this concept and it really is amazing to watch them rehearse. 

Day 5 - Community
I started speaking about community a lot last year. I continued this word after a week of band camp where we really worked on getting to know one another while working together. As I told the students, the band room is home. Students should always feel that they belong, with endless possibilities of friends and people who are there when needed. In the years (high school) of one's life that can sometimes be hard to find sincerity in all the people they meet, I hope we can break that mold in our band community. I hope that we can create a place where all students feel welcome at all times. I hope that students, directors, and parents are able to make great memories that will last a lifetime.

The band is a good place to be and I'm excited to see where we go. I'm excited for week tw0 of band camp.

Where all band kids belong...