Embarrassing but Funny Band Memories

[MadisonBandMan1]

Do any of y’all have memories from your band years that were/are embarrassing but hilarious? This seems like it would be an interesting topic to pass time with, so have at it. I’ll start.

 

So, my freshmen year I was new to the district and didn’t even go to summer band. I had no idea where I was going to school until the week before school. So, I ended up becoming a prop.

 

When I was being fitted for a uniform they didn’t have any spare shoes that fit me properly so I had to deal with a pair way too big for my feet.

 

Fast forward to our UIL Region competition. We were in the middle of the ballad, in a set that I had to pull the heavy 12 - foot chandelier backwards at about a 6 to 5 interval. What happened is in the process of pulling backwards the center wheel underneath the prop ran over my shoe and slipped right out. As you can imagine, my partner and I were freaking out. I knew I had to keep going no matter what, whatever it takes, so that’s what I did. With one shoe on I performed the rest of the show, with plenty of marchers running the shoe over. At the end of the performance you can clearly see in the video one of our seniors bend over and pick it up as he was marching off of the field. To this day I haven’t heard the end of it, although it’s not nearly as bad now. Someone tells me before every performance now to not lose my shoe, though.

 

As I look back at it now I think it’s hilarious even though I was embarassed then. Any way, I hope you find that story interesting. I have others I can tell but that will come later.

[J-Mike16]

Haha thats funny. I got a funny story.

 

This happened during my junior year, my band was at area prelims, at the end of our show we had a HUGE tarp that went over us so then it looked like we disappeared, but since it was windy that day, the tarp was flying wrong so me and several others who were at the end, got separated from the rest of the band bc the tarp completely went out of control. I ended up being the only one who didnt end up under the tarp. Like I said there were others but they picked up the tarp and went uder it, I didnt have enough time to so i didnt, and I ended up a few feet from my band so I was by myself and it was awkward but I didnt move. I stood there and sang (yes we sang a song at the end of our show) and after that my director came up to me and congratulated me for not moving. Apparently the judges loved it that I didnt move. We got 3rd out of 36 that day bc of me. If i had moved, we would've gotten around 5th or 6th. Nowadays when someone messes up, we say "oops you just pulled a Jon-Michael" (my name). I still laugh at that incident.

[LeanderMomma]

I love a good humiliating story.  

 

When I was a young mom, I was driving to work one day and as I was approaching a traffic light, I decided to run it (it had just turned yellow).  Then I noticed a cop in the lane beside me.  So I slammed on my brakes, and my car slid completely sideways into the intersection.  (Remember, I was YOUNG).  I had to sit at that dang light, sideways, until it turned green again.  The cop and everyone around me had a great laugh at my expense I'm sure!

 

Okay, I know that wasn't band related, but I thought you guys might enjoy it.  

[Dog885]

Whenever there's a camera in front of me during the show, I wink at it.

Also, during Waco 2 mic stands fell down during the ballad. The second one to fall was falling down directly towards me and my board, so I very nervously stepped back and it fell right in front of my keyboard and didn't hit. Apparently it hit our pit tech's foot which prevented it from hitting me.

The last one I have was from our concert performance for UIL at Hays. I forgot to put on my dress shoes, so the whole time I had my black and grey tennis shoes on at UIL.

[Guest]

Last season in dci being run over by another member and having a youtube video of the show where all the comments were about me.

[MadisonBandMan1]

Wait, if I may ask, who did you march with? If you aren’t willing to share publicly maybe pm me please? I knever knew you were a mm. And don’t worry I won’t make fun of you.

[SpartanBandAlum]

Area Prelims in 2017, I got thrown off by a woodwind feature being extremely out of tune (because it was 35 degrees out and we warmed up inside). Ended up stepping off in the wrong direction at the beginning of our closer and came close to falling over trying to sprint backwards to correct it. Still cracks me up because it’s very clear in the performance video

[BlackJesus]

Do any of y’all have memories from your band years that were/are embarrassing but hilarious? This seems like it would be an interesting topic to pass time with, so have at it. I’ll start.

 

So, my freshmen year I was new to the district and didn’t even go to summer band. I had no idea where I was going to school until the week before school. So, I ended up becoming a prop.

 

When I was being fitted for a uniform they didn’t have any spare shoes that fit me properly so I had to deal with a pair way too big for my feet.

 

Fast forward to our UIL Region competition. We were in the middle of the ballad, in a set that I had to pull the heavy 12 - foot chandelier backwards at about a 6 to 5 interval. What happened is in the process of pulling backwards the center wheel underneath the prop ran over my shoe and slipped right out. As you can imagine, my partner and I were freaking out. I knew I had to keep going no matter what, whatever it takes, so that’s what I did. With one shoe on I performed the rest of the show, with plenty of marchers running the shoe over. At the end of the performance you can clearly see in the video one of our seniors bend over and pick it up as he was marching off of the field. To this day I haven’t heard the end of it, although it’s not nearly as bad now. Someone tells me before every performance now to not lose my shoe, though.

 

As I look back at it now I think it’s hilarious even though I was embarassed then. Any way, I hope you find that story interesting. I have others I can tell but that will come later.

Similar story actually, my sophomore year I had this move where I had to roll on the floor, kinda like a guard type of roll. I was never any good at it, and at HEB prelims I took my shoe off partly while doing the move. I tried to put in back on but only managed to slip it on, basically squishing the back part of my shoe. I managed to keep it on for a couple minutes, but then I started to march backwards. That's when it fell off and for the last minute or so marched with only one shoe lol

Same thing as you where I was told almost every performance till I graduated to not lose my shoe

Also, a parent took a photo of it on the field, and it's been on my director's wall ever since

[CTJBandPops]

my first instrument was a baritone - started that in 4th grade and also did percussion. as a freshmen in High School, I was moved to Tuba as a shadow and never marched with a sousaphone. the night before the first performance, I was informed that I would march the show. 

 

The next day, I had got little help in understanding what I was doing. I put together my white fiberglass sousaphone (yes - this was 1981) and when I attached the bell and started moving on the field,  I realized the bell was not straight as it was not screwed together in all 4 spots. I went through the entire show with my bell moving to the right. I would try to straighten it during the show. by the end of the show, the tuba bell was pointing to the right side of my body and playing into someone's ear.

 

I finished that season know as "silly straw" - got an award for it at the band awards that year.

 

Needless to say - I went back to percussion for the remainder of my high school marching career.

[LeanderMomma]

These are great stories. Looking forward to hearing more!

[Nny14]

In 2014 at the San Antonio Super Regional I really had to use the restroom, but we just performed for finals so I had to use a portapotty. The only ones were in the warm up area where LD Bell was currently warming up, and the configuration of the toilets were such that they were a hair away from whatever band was there. It was so awkward toe tipping to the porta potty as every single LD Bell kids eyes were on me. Its also the first time I've had live band music while I peed.

[LeanderMomma]

Haha I love that one! Why are we so silly about going to the bathroom? I mean everybody goes! Right? Hopefully...

 

 

[LanghamCreekEuph]

This year at UIL Region Marching Competition, our band had a set where we had 6 straight diagonals so everyone was in a line and if you were out of it, it was obvious. So I’m the closest to the back sideline out of the whole band, so when we turn around, I’m the first person in the line. So like a not smart person, I’m thinking there’s no way I mess up the turn around so I’m not going to memorize the next dot. At the competition, I turned too wide, causing me to go off on my own. I don’t know I’m wrong because I don’t know the dot and from that angle, I see no marchers. Next, we march forward for 32 counts. After that, we turn around and start marching again. So I turn around and I’m 5 yards away from anyone on an island of my own, completely exposed and out of the line. However, I did recover pretty nicely but I did get a lot of talk from the people that I’m in line with. The directors didn’t call me out, but when we practiced that set at rehearsal later that day, the head director was standing next to my dot.

[SpartanBandAlum]

That reminds me of another story I have

 

So because the third movement of our show this year had such high visual demand, we only had about half of it cleaned before a game one week. The directors decided that instead of stopping after our ballad, we would march the part of the closer that we’d learned, and then perform the last half as a standstill. The last set we had cleaned was the end of a box rotation in the center of the field, in which I was on the back line.

 

I think you can already tell were this is going.

 

As with my last story, I was already a bit frazzled by the time my mistake happened (I had stepped on a flute player’s toes earlier in the show), so my mind wasn’t quite there. We hit the last set, froze.... and I was a full two steps off my line. So I stood there for a full minute and a half, blatantly incorrect. Didn’t quite have the head director standing at my dot when we recleaned, but our assistant director was watching me pretty closely.

[TheTuba]

This was during one of our rehearsals, and i still get it even today.

 

Our schools sousaphones are pretty old, and some of the bits doesn't properly fit nice and tight like they should, and during the end of the first part, my WHOLE mouthpiece came out with 1/2 of the bits attached (there was 2 bits). We still had 4 more parts to go, and while i welcomed the chance to improve my marching and dot accuracy, worse things happened.....

1/2 way twords the end of 3rd part, my dot book fell out of my pocket ( i didn't have time to throw it into my bags before the rep started), and i found out later that a color guard girl tripped over my nice and shiny silver mouthpiece. I still have the black mark to this day.