TWHSParent

Going to be a tremendous night. Finals will be so fun! So very glad I was able to make the trip this year. So proud of our kids and the work they put in overcoming the massive adversities this year threw at us and the Houston area. Away we go!

Our new ending is much better and more effective. It has a much stronger visual and musical effect.

Just starting the last leg of this season's adventure sitting in the airport. So many ups and downs. Withdrawal will be a problem!

Leandermomma - we go on at 10am eastern, 9 am central.

Just got back from our send-off. If you tune in Friday morning and remember our show from Saturday you might notice a few alterations. I would go as far as adding the word significant in front of alterations. My personal take is that it is an improvement. I would also like to say thank you to the members of the other local bands that attended and showed their support. I sat directly beside some students from College Park, and they were great and highly complimentary of our show.

Makes sense for a Thursday performance. Our trucks are leaving tonight after the send-off.

As Takigan inferred, you'll be posting on a marching band forum (or the equivalent at the time) 30 years later. My senior season of marching band was 1988, so I'm almost there. Things have changed, but it is still marching band at the core. Life is going to present you with opportunities and challenges, and you'll start focusing more on those. Some years you won't pay much attention to marching band season, and some years you'll do nothing but watch the shows and countdown to the next contest. Ups and downs...

(The other way to like a post).

Sigh. I just hit my quota of likes for the day as well....

Wondering if anyone else saw the Avon guy in costume? He came down and led their cheer during finals. Thought it was great!

I know our school district only allows travel outside the state once every 2 years, otherwise I think we'd go more often. I'm now trying to figure a strategy to catch the TX bands (plus Avon as an honorary member) for prelims. That 11 pm Churchill on Thursday then 7:30 am Flower Mound on Friday plus working with our kids makes it tough. Most years all the TX bands go on Friday - what happened this year with Marcus, Round Rock, and Winston Churchill? I also saw on the MFA forum that Churchill is flying in Thursday morning. Marcus and Flower Mound are taking buses and leaving on Wednesday. We are flying out Wednesday night. Anyone know about Round Rock and Prosper?

Avon, Flower Mound, Marcus, and The Woodlands all just got to go through something that was directly equivalent to Grand National Finals in almost every way 1 week early. Not sure if it will make a difference, but sometimes having such an experience will help the mental state of the performers that have never been on that kind of stage, with that kind of intensity. Every band member now knows what they have to bring to the table next week (only better, if you can imagine that). I think that is something that could be an intangible for these bands, especially the Texas bands that don't go every year.

I've said it before, but their Semi-Finals performance at Grand Nationals in 2015 was the single best thing I've ever seen in marching band. Everything lined up for that, and the crowd was so responsive. No other show that I've seen live (granted limited exposure) even comes close, including last night (and those were great too!). That they set the record score ever in BOA with that performance speaks for itself, and I feel honored to have been there to see it.

Absolutely exhausted after Friday night away football game, getting to bed around 1 am, getting up at 4:45, getting to the band room at 6:00, riding the bus to SA, absolutely tremendous super regional, getting back on the bus, and getting home around 4 (really 5 thanks to the time change). And we are already into planning the Indy trip today... Busy, busy, busy. Super fun though! I'm also glad that we've finally pretty much settled on our show, and won't be making massive changes (I say that, and then something big changes of course) - we'll spend our practice time at home and at the convention center in Indy this week cleaning it up. In case anyone was curious as to why we weren't present at prelims awards - they were rehearsing at Comalander stadium and didn't get back in time to attend. Trying hard to get back the time lost, and I think we are getting that gap closed to where we aren't a week behind everyone anymore. Our send-off performance is about 9 pm Tuesday at Woodforest.

Agreed in general with one caveat - sometimes the parents that get up and leave after their band performs are chaperones or have some other function that requires them to go. Otherwise this seems to be the norm in my experience too. I sat near parents from Marcus, Flower Mound, Avon, and Leander much of the day yesterday and had some really good conversations. It is always enjoyable to discuss band with people from other schools to get their perspective. I think all from yesterday fit in the first category.

I never saw it, but did a quick search and found this: Could this be the one you are remembering? Saginaw Band.

I don't find the performance nerve wracking - I find the awards announcements nerve wracking. You never know what that particular set of judges think of your show that particular day. I find the shows fun to watch, and I try to sit back and just enjoy what is presented while doing a little critical viewing of each.

I think especially Avon - "Just one brick" vs "Just another brick". Hmmm, the contrast is interesting....

I'm taking 6 days off work for San Antonio and Indianapolis, so yeah!

BOA San Antonio is basically a single-class Texas state championship. Every top program attends, so the level of performance required to make finals let alone win is astonishing. For me there was a big adjustment when we moved to The Woodlands and started understanding this program. I was never associated with a program that expects to excel at this level (my wife was, so she had less adjusting) and I'm still not comfortable with assuming we'll make finals (or semi-finals and finals) at every contest we attend. Texas has the most high level marching bands in its borders than any other state (at least in BOA AAA and AAAA), so just being in Texas means the competitive level is extraordinarily high in those classes. To your point, it really depends on the goals of the program. What would a successful trip to San Antonio be? How does the program define the growth it is working on? Are the directors and students learning what it takes to break into the top levels of competitive band in Texas? BOA awards execution and showmanship, while UIL is much more about execution with some showmanship. Which does the program value more? Isn't getting better the goal, and measuring yourself against some of the best and getting feedback to improve yourself and your program the real payoff? If programs drop out because it is too hard, I personally think that says more about that program than about the activity. I think you learn more about yourself from your failures than your successes, but you must be open to learning from them and not getting too defensive and doubling down on a failed approach. As I tell my kids - you set the goals for yourself, and you set what counts as success. You then have to find the path that gets you there, and it may not happen in the next 5 minutes. It is a journey, and lots of twists and turns, ups and downs, are coming your way. Take every opportunity to learn and become better at something, and you'll be closer to that goal, even if that learning came from a failure of some type. I personally prefer BOA, and one of the things I really like is that it is a national circuit. I think Texas is a little too insular at times, and I think it is great that bands from other states can come here and compete. Of course, there aren't many large school bands that can come here and be strongly competitive for the same reasons you point out with programs in Texas - Carmel, Avon, Broken Arrow, Blue Springs, Wando, Castle, Homestead, Ayala, William Mason, Union, Owasso and a few others. Since Texas is so large-school heavy, top A and AA bands (other than Tarpon and Marian, as they can compete with the big classes) can come here and have a good chance to win their class and perform at least a second show in exhibition. So really I see your points as a symptom of the success that Texas as a whole has had in marching band. BOA is limited mainly by time constraints in the numbers that make finals and I don't really see a way around this, but others may have some ideas. A prelims/semi-finals/finals has been suggested, but I also agree that only Grand Nationals should have that format since that is the pinnacle and main showpiece for BOA. Yeah, currently I'm affiliated with The Woodlands, so I suppose all the above is easy for me to say, since this program is at the highest competitive level in Texas. But I've been on the other side, and was just as frustrated as a student performer in my day that we couldn't get over the hump (and we had a director change between camp and season starting during my junior year, so I've been through that too - ugh, that was awful). Of course, about 5-6 years after I graduated, my high school won the KY state championship in their class (after changing directors yet again). They apparently took what they learned and kept applying it, and getting better. They still compete strongly in their class 2+ decades after their first state title (and won 2 more in that span), and just finished 6th this year. But BOA finalists they aren't.

That's it. Much too long of a day yesterday. I'm not getting any younger...

As a former brass player in the midwest the key to avoiding that tongue-stick feeling is to keep that mouthpiece as warm as possible. When you aren't playing or trying to keep the whole instrument warm take it out and keep it wrapped in your hands or a pocket, or something that isn't the surrounding air.

Something Blach music I believe. The name is not coming to me tonight.

Band kids rock!

It's called In the Garden of Cosmic Speculation. Off the top of my head I can only remember two of the music pieces - Adoration of Veles and Ala from Scythian Suite, and How Great Thou Art. Inspired by the actual garden located in Scotland. Edited to add musical selections: Adoration of Veles and Ala from Scythian Suite All This Shall Be Yours How Great Thou Art Temen Oblak