Day 6 - Running the Show with Music!

This is the first time we were ever able to run the entire marching band show with music at band camp! In addition, it happened on the 6th day, leaving us day 7 to work run throughs and embed it into the band members from 9 to 12noon and 1 to 4pm on the last day which is incredible. Mr. Bennett is a genius, one of the best ever and with Mr. Downey assisting him, they are simply one of the best teams of visual people around. The drill is an absolute masterpiece and the show works absolutely great. In addition, the basics program we put into place last Spring, along with starting the music at the end of last year, has put this band in a position it has never been in. We are doing amazing things out here! The dynasty is coming to fruition! Roslyn will be a major player this year! In addition, Frank Mauriello, our new pit person has done phenomenal things with our relatively new pit. Remember, a few short years ago the pit had two members in it. Now, under the direction of Frank Mauriello, it is a force in the program. With 15 members, the pit is exciting, precise, and Mr. Mauriello has brought about a mini dynasty in the pit! Mark Carman, fresh off the DCI tour with the Boston Crusaders, who are one of the top corps in the country, brought the drumline to new heights. They are doing incredible moves while playing, which you can see in the video above. Ms. McMahon and Ms. Miller worked with the guard, learning many moves with the new equipment, in fact the guard won the "outstanding section award" today. Mr. Gazzo and Ms. Miller worked on the music in sectionals to clean up the notes throughout the show. The video above shows some highlights from the rehearsals today and tonight. The night ended with the famed candlelighting ceremony, where the seniors each talked in a breathtaking scene by the lake, with the fireplace. It was a perfect night and many parents came up from Roslyn to see the seniors in their famed send-off. Wait, we still have a season to compete, and win. And that's what we're going to do this year, bring home trophies. We can all feel it.

The 5 drum majors, and Day 5!

My innovation, a new idea which I piloted this year, was going with 5 drum majors. This is a great idea and now, with camp almost complete is a trend I believe will catch on all over the country! These 5 drum majors, Marissa, Jenn, Ashley, Lara, and Alexa were incredible this week, driving the band to success. Student leadership is crucial and our drum majors, officers, and captains are piloting this band to future success. Our entire student leadership team has driven this band to new levels!

Day 5 went incredibly well, as has all of band camp. We went through two thirds of the drill with music and wow, it sounds like one of the top bands in the state! The drill is great, with many moves which will blow everyone away. Breakfast was french toast and cereals, lunch was philly cheese steaks, and dinner was an incredible roast chicken meal. We did basics and drill in the morning, sectionals and ensemble in the afternoon, broke early for pool time at 4pm, and worked the music and drill, doing run throughs from 7pm to 9pm on the field. The kids walked off the field totally pumped about how great we are this year. We truly are building a dynasty which is apparent to everyone here at the camp. The night ended with skit and song night, where our new band anthem was sung!

Done with the Drill, Finished Set 61!

Here's a picture of Mark Carman, Frank Mauriello, Jim Downey, and Gene Bennett, some of our instructors with the marching band. We finished the drill! Now we have to put it all to music, which we did with the opener tonight. This year's drill is twice as difficult and twice as many pages as last year's drill. Mr. Bennett wrote a very challenging drill, the effects in it are mind boggling! You will be blown away when you see all the different things they are doing drill-wise on the field. In addition, the band sounds great. The music is powerful, yet beautiful. The winds are singing. The percussion is powerful and clean. The Pit, under the direction of Frank Mauriello is incredible as well and will clearly be one of the top pits on Long Island. We are setting our goals high, to win, win, win!

Breakfast today egg mcmuffins and many cereals, lunch was tacos and salad, and the dinner fare was pasta with meat or marinara sauce, again with great salad choices. The night ended with the famed Monte Monte game where Mr. Pilnick was once again the king. The kids went to bed at 11pm, the regular time and were sound asleep within minutes, resting for another day of drill and music, building the dynasty!

Great Weather, Great Day!

Sorry about getting this blog up a day late, I had trouble getting it to load and could only spend some time trying to fix it. Today was a great day, we had incredible weather, not too hot and sunny. We learned the drill all the way up to Set 49. Frequent water breaks, checking the sun screen constantly, we worked hard and worked on the music as well. The meals were great, as usual, we had a bar-b-que for dinner which was very good. The attitude of the kids are very high and positive. We are working hard but it will pay off, we can all see how much better we are this year. The band is absolutely incredible!

Another Incredible Day! Up to Set 25!

Today was simply the best band camp day ever! We learned up to set 25, over one third of the show. The band worked very hard and sounded great! Smooth camp day, great weather, and alot of very hard work on the field. Mr. Bennett and Mr. Downey, our incredible visual team, worked the band masterfully as they meticulously went set by set, adding the music to it at night. It is a different band, better than ever, and clearly on the path to Victory! The weather has been cool and cooperative. A few minutes rain from 8 to 8:30 in the morning, stopping just in time for rehearsal. Our staff is amazing and has been doing great things, motivating the kids throughout the day! Our meals were, many cereals, scrambled eggs, and hash browns in the morning, mac 'n cheese and salad for lunch, and chicken fajitas and tacos for dinner. All meals have side sandwiches and a large salad bar. For activities we had the crazy hat activity, where each cabin has to go and find certain items to make a hat. The normal pie mafia in the afternoon and the pool in the afternoon as well. We worked 8 hours on music and drill and the kids worked very hard! We are having a great camp!

First Day of Camp - Rockin' Out of the Gate!

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!

The Power of Positive Reinforcement!

Positive motivation unifies, emboldens the human spirit, and makes people's self worth surge. 

We are keeping up our "positive approach." I am very excited to announce that this year we are continuing the giving out of trophies at band camp but have added some more to the mix.  Each of the 5 drum majors will give out a trophy each day called the "Drum Major's Choice" award. It is a really cool little trophy that says you were giving a special effort and that it was noticed.  In addition, we will continue our daily "Outstanding Section" and "Most Improved Section" trophies.  Each day, the captain of the two sections will get a little trophy if their section wins. If a section gets a second trophy, the captain has the option of giving that trophy to a member of the section who they deem did incredible work on that day.  Also, each day of camp I will be giving out the new "Pat on the Back" award to one member of the marching band who I feel went that special 200% for the band.  

Realize that some bands use negative reinforcement to motivate, punishing the entire unit when someone doesn't "get it done".  "Mass punishment" also pits the group against each other which is divisive and counterproductive; it also makes people sad.  It is true, this type of extrinsic motivation gets quick results but is based on fear which, in the opinion of the Roslyn Marching Band, is not what life is all about.  I totally feel that our positive approach is the reason why our band has been getting larger each year while others dwindle.

Remember the Fish Philosophy! I  will go over this for our new members at camp.  

1. Have Fun

2. Choose Your Attitude

3. Make Someone's Day

4. Be There

More about this at band camp!  The fish philosophy refresher course!

Get Psyched! Get Psyched! Get Psyched!  We're going to have a great year!

Getting Psyched for Band Camp

Yesterday I spent all day in the bandroom getting ready for the new season.  Aaron Kersch, Ross Drucker, Grant Margolin and Jenn Feldman spent hours helping to put the new drum racks together and organize the bandroom.  We will be doing that on Thursday, if you want to come early at 5pm you can help out as well.  Getting the equipment ready and reflecting on the growth of our program over the past  few years, I became totally psyched about this upcoming year.  We are moving the band to a whole other level, moving more, up from 32 to 63 sets, doing more involved music, and working on our marching to make the band better than ever. Our goal is simple.....to win!  We are in a competitive arena, competing every week through October and we are here to do the best!  Get psyched!  We have already went through a vigorous basics program this spring, the music is all learned, and we are on a mission!  I will be blogging frequently at this point so check this website to see what we are doing, and where we are going. Look at the goal sheet, it is online, to prepare for the year and our future!  What we are doing is exciting, intense, and great.  We are building a dynasty!  

The "Bullets" winner!

This year I had each of the student leaders do 10 bullets on how they helped their section or the band. All the bullets were incredible but one of them totally made my day. I learned a few things from these bullets and I felt excited and psyched about Zach Goldsmith's entry. Check this out, especially the last paragraph!

Ten things I have done for my section:
1. I taught my section to breathe properly.
2. I made my freshmen feel comfortable entering the band as respected members.
3. I taught Gabe how to mark time.
4. I'm having my section bring a mouthpiece to buzz on if they go away to stay in shape.
5. I let my section know that they can always play louder.
6. I made my section somewhat afraid to put their horns down until Mr. Bennet tells the enitre band to.
7. My section has 4 Drum Major's Choice awards. That's 40% of the section. I doubt there is another section with a percentage that high.
8. My section is never told to be quiet. We are one of the few sections who can say that.
9. My section looks up to me as a role model and something that they strive to be.
10. I have turned Ricky into one of the most dedicated members of the band. His attendance is better than any drum major's and he now marches better than a lot of people older than him. You (Mr. Patterson) don't have to go out of your way to publicly compliment him. He knows he has vastly improved but also knows there is still improvement to be made, as is for everyone.

Overall, it is not out of the question to say that I am co-running one of the most competent and hard working sections in the band. I can promise you that you (Mr. Patterson) will not hesitate to claim my section most outstanding early and often in band camp. They are aware that I hold them to a higher standard than receiving a drum major's choice or being complimented by someone of higher authority. I work them incredibly hard, knowing that they are aware that it is all to achieve an end, that end being total victory. I don't allow complacency no matter how successful and proficient they become, and they will be just that. You have my word, so much so that if they don't blow you away, you may strip me of my position.

Zach Goldsmith

Rehearsals During AP Exams

Several students and parents have asked me if they can miss the rehearsals these next two weeks due to the AP exams.  I said that everyone has to come, that we only rehearse 20% the amount of time that the other bands rehearse even with these spring rehearsals.  Missing them would hurt us from a competetive standpoint. We need to finish the music in the show and learn all the marching basics of the new visual program prior to camp.  I do understand that this is a high pressure time of the year, my daughter took all of the AP exams as well. However, realize that all sports, clubs, and activities are in full swing during these two weeks, and nobody would ask the coaches to be excused however, since our marching band is not into the season yet people think the rehearsals aren't as important.  But they are!  We are trying to move our band to win the class each year and since we start at camp behind all the other bands who rehearse all summer, we are trying to put ourselves in a position where we can be on a level playing field when band camp starts.  Here at Roslyn, summer rehearsals are out of the question.  Too many band members are away for large chunks of the Summer, either at academic camps or college SAT classes, etc.

A few weeks ago people simply stayed home and needed a break, I wrote a whole blog about that.  I excused band members for RCP, sports practices, games, studying, SAT prep classes, and many other things.  These rehearsals are only one per week.  They are very important.

So here we are, trying to get to the point where we are competitive.  If you are stressed out, totally unable to come to the entire rehearsal then come to the first or second hour these two weeks as a break from studying.  Realize that if your attendance has already been sporadic, you will want to be here for all the remaining rehearsals to achieve or maintain a leadership position.  These are the times that I really see who is putting in that extra effort.  Like a sport, we have to compete and achieve, and these rehearsals once a week are really not that much in terms of what competitive marching bands do.  We have already made huge concessions with the schedule as is, as well as excusing many of you already from a rehearsal.  Look at the other bands websites and you will see what I am talking about.  They rehearse much more than us. Much more.

As usual, if there is an extenuating circumstance, e-mail or call me.  If you can be there for the entire rehearsal, please do so.  Make it your break from the rigors of studying.