takigan

Based on overall performance (BOA, UIL, invitationals, Concert Band with more emphasis on Marching Band) 1. Stephen F. Austin 2. The Woodlands 3. Spring 4. Clements 5. Hmmm.....I can't pick. Either Langham Creek or Cy-Falls. This is depressing only because it doesn't hold a candle to the DFW list.

We had a thread like this last year so I figured I'd resurrect it. Who's getting new uniforms this year? Pics also encouraged. Allen's getting new uniforms. These are just the jackets.

There's always 1 or 2 bands I'm really rooting for every season. In 2006 it was Westfield. In 2007 it was LD Bell. In 2008 it was Mansfield Legacy. In 2009 it was Cedar Park and Marcus, and last year it was Vandegrift and McNeil.....this year it's Vandegrift again and CTJ. Claudia Taylor Johnson has been rising the ranks in leaps and bounds every year, much like Vandy.....it'll be interesting to see just how far they get on the national stage.

There are 61 schools on this list. The list in the original post contains 19 shows. I'm looking for the list of 19 schools that are playing each of the 19 shows, not the full list of past clients. I suppose if I'd been keeping a steady tally of the past client list, I probably could have figured this out myself by comparing the lists year to year...but I've completely lost track of who he's still writing for or who he's no longer writing for. EDIT: Btw, Montoya.....you spelled "Vandergrift" wrong

Shot in the dark, but could you at least post the list of schools who're performing your work this year? (not who's playing what...just the list of schools)?

For 2A there are 3 very strong schools that have the chance to win it based on previous reputations. Queen City (wasn't eligible last time because they were the 2008 2A Honor Band...Queen City was also 2A State Marching champion in '09), Krum (Honor Band runner up during the last go-round) and Howe (Top 5 during the last go-round).

Yes . But considering there are only 6 total Saturdays during a typical "marching" season between late September and early November, the ones you pointed out are the busiest Saturdays for invitationals and the fact that there are probably somewhere between 40 and 70 total marching band invitationals in Texas each year that fall on one of these 6 Saturdays, the fact that you're pointing this out is kind of redundant. It's pretty much like that every year.

I'm just going to call my State champions right now: 4A - Cedar Park 2A - Queen City CCC - McCullough JH CC - Hildebrandt Int. 3/4 of them from Area D. Yeah, I went there. Let's see if I nail any of them even though the Area results aren't all in yet.

Annoyance

Someone beat you to it: http://www.txbands.com/forums/index.php?s=...ost&p=79609

Love me some Shosty 10 . 'Vide Cor Meum' is a bit overrated, but you know it's going to be the heartmeltingest part of their show. The fiery red wings are interesting....especially with the picture of them attached to a dancer, and also abstractly interwoven with what seems to be the emblematic representation of "The Circle's Edge" (looks like some kind of Event Horizon or something). Of course it leads me to wildly speculate. Could the wings mean Stravinsky's "Firebird"? Could it mean we'll be seeing colorguard members wearing wings? This of course leads me to the mad speculation that Whitacre's "Paradise Lost" might finally make it to the field (a mere pipe dream sadly, but I still dream nonetheless). Tantalizing....can't wait til Fall. Also a shame we won't see a Grand Nationals realization of the concept, since they won't be going this year.

HQ link? Not sure what you mean. The TMEA concerts are recorded in standard-definition, so there isn't going to be anything better out there. There is some pretty high-quality stuff on Youtube. Or you could buy the CD itself from Mark Custom Music

I like how your profile says you're from Dripping Springs, though you actually go to Friendswood and are a member of the Symphonic Band (2nd band) there. What would Mr. Brown say if he knew if one of his students was talking smack about other schools?

Very few recordings exist...It's relatively new (1998 I believe) and was popular when it came out, but since it didn't find a permanent spot on many of the big state PMLs, it fell out of common performance. Because it didn't make the PML cut and due to its combination of being too difficult for [non-Texas] High Schools to add to their Spring rep in addition to their prepared contest reps, and also because many colleges that could play it found it lacking in musically redeeming qualities, very few notable recordings have been/are being made. The UNT Wind Symphony performed it live at the 1999 WASBE conference held in San Luis Obispo, California during that year. That recording is available on Mark Custom for $15. I have no clue how it sounds, though if it's UNT I imagine it's pretty good. http://www.markcustom.com/ Poteet did a marching version of it.....I think back in 2005 or 2006.

What a great year for Texas! We're spread all over the map, from California to Georgia! There will be Texas bands attending 7 Regionals across the country this year plus Grand Nationals! I don't have the time to go and check my sources but I think this is the first time we've had Texas bands attending 3 of the 4 Super-Regionals plus Grand Nationals all in the same year! In addition to the 3 Texas Regionals, the Grand National attendees (CTJ, The Woodlands, Pflugerville, Spring and Hebron) and the Atlanta attendees (Winston Churchill, James Bowie and Clear Brook), also of note is Birdville, who hopes to continue their Finalist success at the St. Louis Super Regional in Missouri. In addition, 2 El Paso schools will be going out of state: Bel Air will be traveling to the St. George Regional in Utah while Americas HS will be attending the regional in Hemet, California. Good luck to all of these bands!

Definitely a heartdropper not seeing Bell in the lineup, though as consolation it's great to see some unexpected new faces. Indeed it's too early to start calling finals, but if we're just going on past successes, I'd say that The Woodlands is a lock with Hebron being a very likely finalist. CTJ and Spring are bubble bands while Pflugerville is basically too much of a loose-cannon right now to place assuredly. They could make finals, they also could be at the bottom of the Semis block....it's too tough to say. I also do agree that it's a safe bet that all will be in Semis. It's also heartwarming for me to see Spring HS finally making their BOA homecoming 18 years later since they won it all back in 1993.

Sure.....if you're talking about who wins and who takes 2nd and 3rd, then yeah....it's been mostly the same bands across the past decade. But I sincerely hope that your scope of interest in this activity extends beyond just "Who won and who didn't". If you're talking about trying to predict who all of the finalists will be of a particular contest, I've found that this has gotten extremely tough over the past 2-3 years....ESPECIALLY with BOA. It didn't used to be this hard. You used to be able to pin all of the finalists with the exception of 1 or 2 even before the contest began, and the interesting part came down to how they ranked. These days you've got lots of new faces showing up/re-entering in the ranks (Mansfield Legacy, Claudia Taylor Johnson, Spring, Pflugerville, McNeil, Vandegrift), and bands that used to be shoe-ins are now loose-cannons (Churchill, Ronald Reagan, Clear Brook, Richland, Westfield etc.). You used to have 7 or 8 heavy hitters show up and the other 20-ish were just random bands from 1A-5A. Now almost the entire pack is 4A/5A and it's gotten much easier to predict who's going to be in the bottom 5 than it is who's going to be in the top 15.

You know, there have been many great concertos (solos with band/orchestra accompaniment) written by popular living band composers (James Curnow, Philip Sparke, Brian Balmages, Julie Giroux, Frank Ticheli etc.), but they're almost never mentioned by anyone. Ever since Joe Alessi premiered Harvest, I'm seeing people talk about it all the time, just as much as any other Mackey piece. It's even rarer to hear people mention concertos to be among the finer works of a specific composer. It's a great piece. I just thought it was an interesting thing to point out.

http://uil100.org/archives/music/marching-band.php

La Procession du Rocio? That's the first title that popped into my head when you said Procession. I don't know what Cedar Park played before 2005, and nothing on their 2005 program aligns with your hints.

Wow....what a terrifying lineup! It's like having BOA San Antonio a few weeks early. Granted I think we could see a couple of the heavy hitters drop out before contest (Bell is signed up for both Arlington and Conroe....I highly doubt they'll attend both). Locks: Bell Marcus The Woodlands S.F. Austin Cedar Park C.T. Johnson Vandegrift (what was once a loose cannon I think will now be a laser-guided nuke) Bubble: Pflugerville Winston Churchill Ronald Reagan McNeil Cypress Falls Brazoswood Friendswood Legacy Lafayette Clear Brook I'd also be wary of both Cedar Ridge and Westwood. Cedar Ridge made finals at SHSU last year with what I believe was just 9th and 10th graders...Last year was their first year and they will be adding 11th grade this year so we should expect a stronger showing from them. McNeil and Pflugerville have been around for awhile and have good programs, but were both general unknowns before making a name for themselves in BOA Regionals these past couple years. Westwood is also a new, old face coming from a similar background from the same neck of the woods, so it's quite possible we could see something amazing come out of them as well.

Pretty much anything by John Mackey (Asphalt Cocktail, Redline Tango, Undertow, Kingfishers Catch Fire, Aurora Awakes, Hymn to a Blue Hour) Pretty much anything by Eric Whitacre (October, Lux Aurumque, Sleep, Equus) Other favorites of mine: Young - Tempered Steel Gillingham - Galactic Empires Grainger - Lincolnshire Posy Grainger - Molly on the Shore Vaughan-Williams - English Folk Song Suite Holst - The Planets (Mars/Jupiter) Holst - First Suite in Eb Holst - Second Suite in F Maslanka - Symphony No. 4 Ticheli - American Elegy Ticheli - Sanctuary Ticheli - Vesuvius Husa - Music for Prague Balmages - Summer Dances Jager - Esprit de Corps Nelhybel - Trittico Ewazen - Hymn for the Lost and the Living Lauridsen - O Magnum Mysterium Tchesnokov - Salvation is Created Margolis - Terpsichore Camphouse - A Movement for Rosa, Symphonic Prelude/Fanfare (actually....pretty much anything by Camphouse )

Look familiar? This is the Cedar Park HS Top Band's 2006 UIL program: Easter Monday On The White House Lawn (Sousa / Gore) Aegean Festival Overture (Makris/Bader) J'ai ete au bal (Grantham) The title of the Grantham is obviously french, and they also played Aegean Festival, so maybe you're merging the 2 together. None of these pieces are multi-movement though, so it's probably not what you're thinking?

Positions: http://www.bcband.org/BCHS/information/fin...ts/trombone.gif Music Theory Crash Course: The Bass Clef Staff - The lines of the staff read GBDFA (Good Boys Do Fine Always). The first 4 spaces of the staff are F (starting below the staff), then A, C, E (They spell FACE). The last 2 are G & B. Key Signature - Order of Flats in Key Signature - BEADGCF (Spell 'Bead', then think "Greatest Common Factor" [Like in Math]) Order of Sharps in Key Signature - FCGDAEB (Fat Cats Go Down Alleys Eating Birds) Time Signature (the fraction looking thing next to the Key Signature) - Top Number - How many beats in each measure (1,2,3,4,6 or 8 most of the time) Bottom Number - The note that gets the beat (2-Half, 4-Quarter, 8-Eighth) Finding the exact positions on the Trombone is a little more complicated than this (check them with a tuner), but here's a rough idea: 1st position - All the way in 3rd position - Handle of slide lined up with bell 4th position - ring-hole of slide lined up with bell 7th position - ring-hole of slide lined up with marker that's etched into the silver tubing on the horn-section at the very end of the horn (I can't remember the name of it). 2nd position - 2 inches out from 1st 5th position - 3-4 inches out from 4th 6th position - a little less than halfway between 5th and the etched marker that designates 7th. I taught a kid once who forgot everything he learned in the 6th grade over the summer break (he had never really learned it that well to begin with). I made a set of flash cards for him of all the notes in the staff with a cut-out of a staff with the note-heads glued to the front of the card, and the name of the note and fingering written on the back. I had him start out with cards of the basic 6 notes (Bb, F, D, Eb, C, High Bb), and run reps of just those until he had them burned in his memory (also quizzed him by showing him the card, and have him answer by telling me the note-name and playing the note on his horn), then gradually would add in a card or 2 until he had a full Bb major scale, then C, then eventually the whole chromatic scale in 1 octave. Once you've learned yourself a nice chunk of the notes, start hacking through scales that contain all the notes you know (Start with Bb Major, then do C, then Eb, then G, then Ab, then F). http://www.sizemorebrass.com/files/Scales_...phonium_001.jpg Add notes to your flash card routine for the scales that you don't know yet and rehearse yourself. Then try the scale on the horn. Building lip strength: Spend a lot of time on the mouthpiece each day before playing your horn. You want to keep your teeth open wide enough so that you can slide your tongue between your teeth. Start each note with a 'T' sound, using the tongue (think "Too"). Slur High and then slur down low (like a siren or rollercoaster) on the mouthpiece. Start warming up with a Remington Warm-Up sort of like this one: http://image.rakuten.co.jp/actus/cabinet/b...remington02.jpg . Once you've learned how it goes after practicing it on Trombone for awhile, start beginning your daily mouthpiece warm-ups with it before playing on the horn. Do it slurred first, then go back and tongue it. I wish I could find the Chicowiz Flow Studies in Bass Clef, since they're really great, but that's mostly a Trumpet thing so they're mainly only available in Treble Clef (though I'm sure there's a Bass Clef versions out there). I've arranged some Stamp Flow Studies myself for some of my students but they aren't exactly accessible to someone who's just getting back on the horn. Slurs build lip strength. That's the basic idea. Any kind of moving notes that don't have you using the tongue as leverage will help build those muscles. I'd dig up some beginner songs or just easy resources for you, but nothing comes to mind and I don't really have the time right now to research. But this stuff should at least get you off to a good start. Also a note to the more knowledgeable who might read this, yes, some of the things I said aren't exactly entirely 100% true and could probably use some more elaboration to be fully correct or concise, but I tried to make it simple and fast enough for the guy to work together a patchwork job on his playing so he'll be as ready as possible for what he has to do 4 weeks from now.

Considering the very next sentence mentioned Woodforest Bank stadium in the Woodlands and that they've only hosted that Regional once, I think he meant to say 'The Woodlands', not Arlington. And it is a nice stadium...though I'm curious as to when you were last there, Danpod?