Competition Season is Here! Part 2

Balancing it all on the head of a pin. That’s what I call it, making a rehearsal schedule for a competitive marching band in an academic high school. How much to rehearse, how many shows to do, how we rehearse, and how to handle attendance are key parts of running this marching band which I deal with every day. Balancing the schedule of a competition marching band is a delicate endeavor. Meeting the needs of the students is the priority however we do "compete" so we need to maximize our rehearsal time, and get as much done as is possible so that we can be competitive. We need to utilize every minute without hurting the quality of our group. The balance is as tricky as balancing something on the head of a pin. I have been asked many questions from parents and students about how I schedule rehearsals and competitions so in the spirit of communication I have posted my philosophy of rehearsals, competitions, and how we have built our schedule.

How Many Hours to Rehearse

I have had some parents ask me why we rehearse so much. I have had even more parents ask me why we don’t rehearse more. Well, when starting the competitive marching band here at Roslyn, they rehearsed 2 nights a week and Saturdays, and did a show every weekend. They even added some rehearsals if the band needed it. Coming here in 2003, I decided that we would go with a 1 night rehearsal format, very few Saturday rehearsals, and try to add an hour or two of rehearsing on show days, before we leave the high school. This is the least that I felt we could practice and still be competitive. By having great communication among the staff, proper planning, and efficient rehearsals, I felt we could build a dynasty with this structure. Hicksville HS in the 90’s had the highest scores on Long Island and had this exact schedule. I observed them frequently and they were efficient, there wasn’t a minute of wasted time in their rehearsals. It amazed me that they could have the highest of scores and rehearse so much less than the bands they were scoring above. I used them as a model when I came here to Roslyn.  Remember, every band we compete against rehearses two to three times more than us.  Go to their websites and look at their rehearsal schedules.  

Why No Shows on Columbus Day Weekend?

I always schedule a break weekend in the middle of the season to recharge our collective batteries. I copied this from some of the upstate bands. Playing the same music over and over can be daunting and create a malaise among band members. By taking a weekend off to visit colleges, or just spend time with our families, we can create another peak for our band, hopefully at the dome. I feel that this avoids us getting into a plateau where we stagnate.

Back to Backs

Why not do two shows in a weekend like all the other bands in our area? We don’t do “back to backs,” a Saturday and Sunday show weekend, and here is my reason. I have always, throughout my 29 years of doing marching band, avoided doing two shows on a weekend. Many bands do this and feel that it helps them keep the momentum going. I feel it becomes too taxing. In my formative years, I had a famous band director upstate tell me “never do back to backs.” I asked why, he said “look at your kids on Sunday night after doing a back to back and that will answer your question.” Two years ago, not sticking with that advice, we did a “back to back” for the first time, the New York Championship at Griffin Field the day after the Denton Avenue Show. I looked at our kids after the Sunday performance and now I totally agree; I feel one show a weekend is definitely enough. As a side note on this issue, the upstate bands do Saturday night shows, and nothing else on Sunday and those bands are amazing. Rarely do you see one of the top upstate National Bands double up shows on a weekend.

Formulating the Schedule

I build the schedule in April, put it up online, finalize it in mid August, tweak it and add times in September and stick to it. I do not schedule anything on the “off weekend." I will not add anything after school starts because I feel it is unfair to the band members to require them to be at everything and then add something. We get many requests to perform at various events in and out of our district with only a few weeks notice. My policy is clear, we will perform if given the dates prior to band camp. Requiring perfect attendance, which we must do since we have a drill where every person is of the utmost importance and our lack of rehearsals, creates this policy where we don’t add performances after the schedule is finalized.

Rehearse Less? Rehearse More? 

For the parents that say we need to rehearse less, I submit that it would greatly hinder us to even take a few hours out of this schedule. We are at a bare minimum in terms of being a competing band. Any less would mean going to a “home game and Newsday band” format, where we only perform at the home games and Newsday Festival, which is what most bands on Long Island do. Any more rehearsing, and we would burn out, not be fresh with the show, and it would hinder our academics and not leave time for jobs, other activities, etc. Personally, I feel that a competition band teaches so much more about music and life. I feel that the schedule we have is perfect for our school, students, parents, and community.

Is Our Schedule Working?

I feel that our schedule is clearly working. We are very successful, being one of the most talked about bands, getting exponentially better each year. Our competitors, virtually every one of them, rehearse two to three times as much as us. We are certainly among the top 3 or 4 bands on Long Island, regardless of the scores, so this schedule works for us.

Constantly Learning and Tweaking

As a band director I am constantly learning about maximizing rehearsal time, meeting with the staff regularly, and tweaking our schedule year to year. I welcome parental and student input and have used it regularly. Right now, I feel we are on the right track with our schedule. Our kids are excited, fresh, and love the marching band, which is the top priority!

Competition Season is here! Part 1

I will be posting three pretty lengthy blogs, today, tomorrow and Sunday.  It explains just about everything about the marching band.  It is a good idea for everyone to read these sometime before we perform on Sunday.

These are recycled blogs from years past.  I have changed and added some things to them.  Both old and new parents should read these posts.  

As the season starts I will start posting about our up and coming competition season. This year’s show is based on “Wicked” on Broadway.  We have a crowd pleaser here and hopefully a “judge pleaser” as well.

This year I will be posting the weekly detailed schedule on the last page of the website roslynband.com.  You can reach it directly at roslynrehearsal.com.  I will do this every single week.  I will also blog after each show so you can come right here if you want to know what is going on.

Twitter - I give twitter updates.  You can have every one sent to your cell phone as a text, or simply bookmark our twitter site to see what is going on throughout the season.  I will be tweeting more on competition days this year so put your phone on vibrate.  This year I will not tweet out the score from the back judges room if I know before it is announced.  I did this last year and it got mixed reviews.  Some loved it, some didn’t, so I am not doing it this year.

As a director I am tremendously proud of how far the Marching Bulldogs have come in terms of their development. The students have worked so hard, from the first step at band camp through the night rehearsals and the competitions.  As most of you know, I treat band as a leadership training, character development, and goal setting class in addition to the marching and music instruction.

Many bands choose not to compete. They choose to perform a less involved and simpler show at only the Newsday festival and their home games. We, the “Roslyn Marching Bulldogs” compete. We are better for it and will accomplish great things by being a competitive band.  Short and long term goals are an important part of life and through this great activity, we will “shoot for the stars.” 

I will be posting the weekly seedings in our class which are based on the scores throughout the state that weekend.  There are 7 bands in our class.  If we are in 1st or 7th, throughout the season remember that at the dome “ANYTHING CAN HAPPEN.”  When we received 2nd out of 12 we were ranked dead last all season in the competitions in 2006.  The dome brings in the best judges and doubles the slate to minimize the impact one judge can have.  Judges from outside our area are more likely to make the call and lead the local judges to do the right thing when we are at the dome.

The local judges have obviously boxed us into the lower part of the class.  This is not controversial that I am stating this, it is a fact.  It is even more obvious when an out of state judge puts us up high in a caption while the local New York judges bury us year in and year out.  Remain patient, stay positive, and don’t complain.  Those same judges will come around, see our program’s development and reward us, hopefully sooner rather than later.  There is no way to complain about this, it is part of the program and built into any subjective, judged activity.  It is a learning process for everyone and teaches us about life as well.  We are constantly judged throughout life and much of it is subjective.

And now a paragraph about all the band shifts this season. We are in Small School 2, which is a higher class than Small School 3 or Large School 3.  We get an automatic bump up for being in that class, or at least that’s what should happen.......    The Field Band Conference did a spreadsheet of average scores over the past 5 years and adjusted, moving some bands into our class, some bands up a class, and some bands up a class.  Mineola got moved up to Small School 1 and Malverne got moved to Small School 2, our class.  Copiague moved out of the National Class last year and competed in Large School 2, then this year petitioned again and was moved down to Large School 3.  So yes, a National Class band in two short years moved to Large School 3, go figure. Jordan Eldbridge got moved to Small School 2 so that they could score higher, they were scoring low in Small School 1.  They are currently seeded at the top of our class along with Malverne, who won both classes at the dome the past 2 years.  We usually go on later in the local shows because of our more prestigious Small School 2 class.  We go on after all Small School 3 and Large School 3 bands, which is most of the bands who compete on Long Island.  That should pop our score a bit.  Should.....

The Dome order within classes is done by a draw upstate.  This year, for instance, we are first in Small School 2 at the dome, last year we were last.  Some bands compete in their home show.  If they are scheduled with their class they compete. If they are at the end, then they are just doing an exhibition.  Brentwood didn’t compete at their show last week, Malverne just decided that they are not competiting at their show, so we will win our class at the show next week in Malverne.

You need to be competitive but remember, this is totally subjective, like figure skating.  I always tell the kids that in figure skating they even throw out the high and low scores, which is fully acknowledging that it is somewhat unfair.  People who are sports people and are new to our idiom may have some trouble with this.  You may see our band, hear the score and wonder what happened.  Yes, the judges TOTALLY make the call, in fact, they decide everything, total subjectivity.  

Remember, we are great, look at how far we have come and everybody in the Marching Band community, judges, other band directors, audiences, and the public fully knows Roslyn as a “powerhouse” marching band.  We are proud as ever and I as director feel truly privileged to run such a great group of kids and great parents.  We had parents who bring out our equipment, parents helping to run our band camp, and the largest contingent of spectators go to the dome from Roslyn each year.  Our parents even cheer for our neighbor competitor when they win the class over us!  We are the greatest people anywhere!  Total team players.  The kids are perfect!  They give up part of themselves for the team every single day! Hard working, fun, smart, bubbly, and love band!  What more could I ask as a director?  A fair read from the judges?  YES, I want it all!  I want our kids to get the score they deserve!  I am very positive, a “glass half full” kind of guy!  It will happen, at some point, and you will know when my post simply says “YES, HERE WE GO.” It may be this year, next year, or 10 years from now, but it will happen.  It is inevitable. We are on the right track!

Marching Band Attendance

As always with our marching band, there are severe ramifications to missing anything on our schedule.  In a band like ours, attendance is just about 100%.  Missing one rehearsal in our band is the equivalent of missing a week of rehearsals with any of our competitors.  It would assure removal from any of their groups.  Please fully realize that missing any event or rehearsal - anything on this band schedule - will just about guarantee you not receiving any leadership position in the marching band.  People with one or more misses over their years in the band aren't even considered for these positions.  Any band members who are excused told me in April that they had a major attendance problem and I worked the program around them and excused them or told them not to be in the band.  Major family issues are pretty cut and dry as to what we consider an excusable absence.  Weddings, Bar mitzvahs and Bat mitvahs, Communions, Baptisms (all of immediate family members) are usually told to me right after the schedule goes up since these are set up years in advance.  Obviously, deaths in the family are excusable.  Concert tickets, other concerts, tickets to sporting events, SAT prep classes, studying, etc are considered unexcused absences.  This is like being in an RCP or Spotlight show.  It is your job to stay healthy, get plenty of sleep, and be there for everything on the schedule. People are depending upon you. It is also your job to do your academic work around our one weekly rehearsal each week. Anyone who is in this band already knows this. We have band members who work family events around our schedule.  We have about 20 people who are not in the band because they were unable to come to one of our events. This is a very special group where every single person has a very important position.  We only have 12 events and need every person at every one.  Here is it directly from our band booklet.

Marching Band Rehearsal Attendance

During the fall season, rehearsals are held on Wednesday nights from 6:30 to 9:00 pm, and on competition days for an hour or two prior to leaving for the competitions.  Attendance at rehearsals and performances is MANDATORY. Students who have a conflict with any rehearsal MUST SUBMIT a parental note at least TWO WEEKS in advance.   Students with ONE ABSENCE will be given a WARNING from the band director.  Any additional absences will result in removal from the Marching Band.

Marching Band Competition Attendance

Band members must attend all competitions and shows. As in a school musical, each position is crucial to the success of the entire unit.  The show is custom written for the exact number of people in the band, and even one hole effects each member’s drill, which must be modified at the competition, which is not acceptable.  Anyone who has a conflict with one of the shows may not be a part of the marching band. In a competitive marching band, every person has a leading role.