Leaderboard

it's Leander ISD's world and we're just living in it.

New Braunfels will be there

Wakeland HS also was invited! I hear there's one more BIG Texas school that got an invite but hasn't publicly announced yet.

So that's 3 Leander ISD schools that are going to midwest this year?

Apparently Leander and Vandegrift are also going.

I think the notifications are out. I know that Stiles Middle School (feeder to Vista Ridge and Rouse) is going.

conceptually J.B. Alexander has been one of my favorites over the last 3 years. I am excited to see what they bring this year.

Yep. And they have an actual GN championship to show for it. That year’s show (Crossing Boundaries-2013) and this past season’s are my two favorite Woodlands shows ever. In fact Crossing Boundaries was the first show to really grab my attention and astound me as a BOA newbie in the fall of 2013.

I had a similar conversation with some friends a few weeks ago. Back in the 90s into the middle of the 2000s, there was an understanding that there were Four Horsemen of Texas Bands: Tom Shine of Duncanville, Scott Mason of Coppell, Phil Geiger of Westfield, and Scott McAdow of Langham Creek. These four directors had a strong hold on marching band--especially for UIL, but also for BOA in the case of Westfield--and pretty much a complete lock on concert band until Bell, Reagan and Marcus started to really shake this up. In particular, Duncanville had an unrivaled consistency in both marching and concert band, Westfield had an unmatched two decades of dominance in marching band, Langham Creek had a reputation for legendary concert performances while also fielding a consistently strong band, and Coppell set numerous and continuous all-state records in multiple classes. Now that all of these directors are retired, or sadly deceased, we tried to put together the next four for now. We came to more or less a consensus on: Mike Howard, Vandegrift Andy Sealy, Hebron as the two most obvious choices. Even if they weren't your one and two (though there's plenty of reason both should be), there was no way they weren't in your top four. Brent Biskup at Flower Mound seemed to emerge as a third. The fourth spot got interesting as there were clear pros but some slight cons to move into the fourth (or third) slot. We ultimately had five names that kept getting thrown out. George Trevino, Lopez (undeniably strong concert band, marching band very overshadowed by the others) Dan Morrison, Reagan (no big wins yet outside SA just this year, but clear and consistent strength across categories) Jarrett Lipman, CTJ (all state numbers only rivaled by FloMo, generally strong BOA performances but no medals yet at GN, weaker in UIL than others) Joni Perez, The Woodlands (GN win, dominance in region of state, representation, but concert side behind the rest of the groups) Steve Wessels, Cedar Park (dominance in class, but slight backsliding against the 6As recently) At that point, it was just what did you prize most in a band. If you cared about concert band above all, Trevino would take a spot. Consistency? Morrison. Class representation? Wessels. Big wins? Perez or Lipman. Strong cases for all, as all are amazing directors in their own right. And of course, there's still Selaiden at Leander, Christian at Vista Ridge, McGahey at Keller, and the list goes on and on.

These conversations never seem to end well.