The first day at band camp has been incredible! We reported to the high school at 7am and were on the road by 8:05am. The band members all helped get onto the busses, we had plenty of room to get all the new drum equipment on the truck and trailer, and the departure was smooth sailing. We hit a little traffic, stopped at the Ramapo rest stop to hit the bathrooms, and arrived at the camp at around 10:45am. The unloading at camp was professional and swift. The drum majors and officers organized the band and absolutely everyone helped get set up. I've never ever had a band work together so well in my 26 years of doing this. We were all set up in Olympic hall, the pit unloaded, and into the pavillion for a quick band kick-off meeting at 11:30am. I talked quickly about our goals, to be in the National class, and to win the class this year so that we can move to Small School 1 next year. This is totally achievable for us if we work hard and focus. I also pointed out that we are two years ahead of schedule with the long term planning goal sheet (you can download it on the roslynband.com website) which slates us to win this class in 2010, so there is really no pressure. I went on to state that in order for the judges to put us over bands that have been established, a win is simply not enough. We learned that last year. Our band needs to be absolutely breath taking, to leave the judges no other options. The students set up their rooms for 15 minutes, we ate lunch, grilled cheese,a great salad bar, and other sandwiches and were back in the pavillion at 1pm for Mr. Bennett’s drill instructions. Mr. Bennett has 18 championships under his belt with two DCA Corps, the Caballeros and the Sunrisers, and two great High School Programs, Huntington and Sachem. He was the drill writer and visual caption head in all of these groups, which he now is for us! Mr. Bennett, along with Jim Downey, will bring our drill and visual program to new levels, our band will march like never before, they already are! We also have an incredible instructor, Megan Segarra, who will be running the guard with Roslyn’s own fabulous Kerri McMahon. Megan is from Logan High School in California, where they built a national championship band and colorguard/winterguard program. Megan also marched 2 years with the DCI championship Blue Devils, the most decorated Drum Corps in the world with many many championships. Megan recently designed a huge portion of the work with Mineola, who has a great guard. Now she is with us! We are totally psyched to have her choreographing and teaching our colorguard this year. She is positive, motivating, and a truly great instructor.
The band then went outside on the field from 2 to 4:30, did basics, and learned the first 5 sets of the show. Then pie mafia, pool time, dinner, spaghetti and meatballs, salad bar, etc. At 7 we were back to the field for drill rehearsal, pounding out another 4 sets, and inside for a musical run of the entire show. This year we are moving much more, up from 31 sets (my drill) to the masterpiece drill of Mr. Bennett with 63 sets, twice as much movement. We are set to win and do great things this year. We had an unbelievable first day of camp. The kids are working so hard. Our goal is simple, to Win Win Win, and to bring home many trophies! Keep checking this blog, I will have some pictures up tomorrow!
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