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Why I Loved Marching Band

The Very Beginning - Jr. High School
I don't remember now why it was that I wanted to join the band at Wilson Jr. High (now Wilson Middle School) in Lubbock, Texas - maybe my friends were all going to be in it, or perhaps it was a presentation I saw - who knows? But the fact is, I had friends who were in band and I made new friends when I joined band, which was very important to me as a 7th grader in the mid 1970s.

My Instrument
Ask my mother - I was constantly rapping or whacking or drumming on almost everything! I am told that we owned a vinyl recording called “Persuasive Percussion”, and that every time it was played, I stopped whatever it was I was doing and came to listen. And so it seemed logical that when it came time to choose an instrument to play, I should play the snare drum. Of course!
However, many other boys had the same idea. The band director (Rex Shelton) finally told me that he had too many people playing drums. If I wanted to be in the band, I would have to play - the French Horn. “Great”, I thought. “What's a French Horn?”

Learning to play
I learned the same way everyone else learns - one note at a time. I really wanted to do well, so I tried. It was a little frustrating because of the wide range of notes that can be played on a horn with a change of ombisure. Once I figured that out, it became a little boring, sitting in class waiting as the director went through every section one instrument at a time.

First band chord
One day we did something different (and this is where I really started to pay attention). Mr. Shelton ran the whole band in unison through the basic notes in a scale as he had done many times before, then he had one or two sections play a particular note. A different section was given a different note on the scale to play and so on, until the entire band had an assignment of different notes. We were instructed to play the note we were given when the baton dropped.

I can still hear the band room reverberating with the end of that single first chord as we held it as one body for a few moments, and the powerful feeling from the playing of the chord as it died away.

Quite a few other students felt it too, judging from the number of ‘wow's I heard out loud.

After that, we began to learn entire songs and then the ‘real stuff'. We developed favorites from some of the music we were being taught.

A little more about the music
I was blessed(?) with band directors who would arrange music for the entire band. Not the long hair classical stuff we had to play, but popular current music. Mr. Jeff Whitmill was an avid Chicago fan (the band, not the city). We must have played every Chicago tune recorded! Plus, at that time “Star Wars”, “Rocky” and many other history-making movies were being released that made a huge impact on the movie box office. We played several movie theme songs.

High School Marchers
I still remember the high school students that came to the jr. high school I attended to talk to us about high school marching band. They were section leaders. They played for us and showed us the rudimentary steps of marching, and told us how much fun they had at the football games. I was interested!

Band Camp
It was with a great sense of wrong-ness that I got up early during the week while still on summer break to begin attending band camp. Wrong because, after all, it was still summer! I should be home in bed, or parked in front of the TV watching cartoons... But as that may be, I was placed in a position on the practice field and assigned a section leader to march with. Along with guidance from my new high school band director, I was taught the style of marching we would display, namely, something called “8 to 5” (8 steps to cover 5 yards). We also marched high-step (chair-step) style - with each step we took, the knee was raised upward until the thigh was parallel to the ground, toes pointed downward. Try playing a horn like that sometime!

Kidnapped for Initiation
Part of the fun of band camp involved initiation. No one had to be initiated, but it was terrific fun to hear about what happened to each section for initiation. I remember one year the entire flute section was kidnapped from their homes (with pre-arranged parental permission), taken to a local all-night Whataburger and made to get up on the tables and sing the school alma-mater. This while still dressed in robes and nightgowns! They were fed breakfast afterward.

Band Parties
Band parties are about getting the entire group together to get to know one another. Make no mistake, these parties are the lifeblood of the band. I suspected that it also served as an opportunity to allow us to talk and get it out of our system (and thus cut down on the amount of talking during rehearsal). We had swim parties, skating parties, watermelon parties, bonfire night, dances (held in the band room since it contained a big sound system). I also remember a few gender-separated slumber parties and a huge scavenger hunt.

About My Band Director
Mr. Philip Anthony was the head band director at Coronado High School. Most people called him simply “Mr. A”. He and the other directors stayed mostly on the 2nd-story roof of the school auditorium and used bull horns to yell instructions at us. I remember they yelled a lot! We (ok, I!) didn't take any of the yelling personally; after all, we were part of an organization, and we all wanted to perform well. Off the marching field, he was a round, friendly man who was quick to laugh or tease. I got a lot of good-natured teasing about my girlfriend, plus the fog on the inside of my car windows in my senior year, mostly from him. He challenged us to step up our skills and allowed us the freedom to have fun while maintaining the discipline marching band requires.

The music
We had to learn each piece of marching music and play it by memory to the satisfaction of our section leaders. As we were not allowed to use flip-folios while marching, this made sense. Memorizing and playing off our music also had a direct impact on chair position. The same director who made musical arrangements also arranged some of the scores we used in our shows.

Marching AND Playing
Because we did not have marching horns until my senior year, we used our concert horns in the half-time shows. Combining that with the chair-step style of marching we employed made for an interesting experience, trying to march and maintain a tone. We discovered that if we cushioned each step by dropping from the ball of the foot to the arch, then the heel, we could come closer to getting the tone we wanted.

Football Games - how we did it
We had one neutral-territory football field in Lubbock where we played all our games - Lowrey Field. After school on Fridays, we arrived at the football field any way we could - arrange rides with older band members who had access to automobiles, or get rides from good ‘ol Mom or Dad, as a last resort. Everyone converged in the parking lot as soon as possible to get a parking space. Under our uniforms, we usually wore a band T-shirt, and some cut-off shorts.

Stupid Stuff We Did
Before each of our home games, the announcer would say the number and name of each football player. Kind of borring... so the head drum major would choose a number at random. When the announcer came to that number and player, the whole band would cheer wildly - then stop. More fun - On kickoff, the whole trombone section stood. As the football made its trip through the air, they would follow its trip with a trombone slide note from one end to the other.

The Show
Knowing that all our classmates would be critically watching the show made me extra nervous as I approached the field to begin the marching show we learned for the first time. Our reputation as a quality organization was on the line - if we ‘inhaled profusely', that would set a negative tone for the rest of the season... Plus there were so many people all in one spot and we were going to perform in front of them! Of course we all overcame the first jitters enough to concentrate on the show and we always did well. I think.

‘School Spirit? What's That?'
I remember seeing a senior student who was giving her all cheering on our school, and I remember asking her why she was yelling so much. “School spirit!” she said shortly, hoarsely. Wow. I couldn't figure that one out. Later on, I learned that the result of your pride in your school is - school spirit. And it wasn't necessarily loud.

After the game
First thing after the game - we streamed out to the waiting cars, ripped off our uniforms (to be wadded up in the back seat), and headed for the nearest agreed-upon location, generally for pizza. The band had almost 300 members at one point in time, so when we chose a place to meet, it was a serious bit of business for that owner! Afterward - home, exhausted, to bed.

Fundraising
We sold giant-sized "Black Cow" caramel suckers for $5 each. We also held Spaghetti Suppers and sold tickets to them. We played for our parents (that got them to buy tickets too, knowing we had to be there to play). Candle sales were another source of revenue. Car washes were always fun! Never sure if we wet the cars or us more.

Our Contest Shows
Looking back at some of the shows, I am very proud to say we performed some extraordinarily difficult moves! The fact that we received very high marks said a lot for our marching ability. I remember most a show in which we formed a giant flower, then marched in and out to make the flower rotate. The shows were created by the directors as opposed to todays' shows that are purchased.

Road Trips (ROAD TRIP!)
The Main Objective (to get first dibs on the back row of the bus)
Bus sign-up lists went up at least a month before the trip. There was no assigned seating; you signed up for a bus to ride on, and that was it. Primary objective was to get as far toward the back of the bus as possible so we were out of sight from the sponsors and directors. Many a band student learned the fine art of ‘making out' in the darkness of the back rows of bus seats

Where we went
It wasn't so much WHERE we went that mattered, although that was a consideration. Getting there truly was a large part of the fun! From Lubbock we went to El Paso and Corpus Christi. We also managed to make a side trip to Carlsbad Caverns in New Mexico. A short ride across the border from El Paso was Ciudad Juarez, where we went to the local market building to shop, and toured a glass-blowing factory. The trip to Mexico was a risk in that any student could do something to endanger his or her ability to return to the US by purchasing a “legal in Mexico but not in the US” item and trying to take it back across the border. Fortunately, either no one got caught or thought better of taking the risk.

Staying at the Hotel
Free room-to-room calling was great, as long as you remembered what room numbers the band directors were in and didn't call them by mistake. Making prank calls on your friends in the middle of the night was a great source of entertainment! All of the directors threatened us with the most dire warnings about the consequences of damage to the hotel caused by band student... The places we stayed generally had Olympic-sized swimming pools, and we were allowed to swim for a few hours each day of our stay.

Over The Years...
There is an invisible sort of kinship that is formed when people put musical parts together to contribute to a piece of music. Abilities develop, and mutual respect for those abilities comes. Realization of your own talents creates self esteem. So much time spent together allows people to get to know each other in a fairly intimate way. How else could it happen, then, (like the joke) that you can walk up to any band student and help them fix their uniform without saying anything other than giving them your instrument and saying, "Hold this"? Maybe these are the reasons that I remember marching band as the best thing I did in school.

Everyone goes their different ways after high school ends. For some, it's off to college and perhaps a different band; for others it's into the workforce to start their life. For me, it was joining the Air Force and travelling around the country to learn a trade because I couldn't afford college. And yet I still remember the friends I had from high school, mostly from band! From the time I graduated until the time my own children joined marching band in their high school years, those were some of the closest bonds of friendship I held, and still hold to this day.

My advice to you?

Take lots of pictures. Things fade with time, including details of fond memories. Be proud of the organization you are a part of, support it with your cooperation. You won't regret it.