Rain, Rain, Rain... and Belts and a Show!

It’s been a busy few weeks in the marching band world. You could summarize it in just a few words – more rain, belts, and a competition.

Recently, Joe, our marching instructor, had counted 12 out of 14 rehearsals having rain. That’s just terrible! Even as I’m writing this blog, it’s raining outside and there’s apparent flooding happening around Ferndale. We just can’t get a break!

Of course while I’m complaining, there are lots of positive things that happened for us and we saw a lot of new things. Among them are new guard flags, this year’s guard uniforms, bodywork, and … the belts!

After another week of a mix of rain and not rain, our belts finally arrived. The kids, and the staff (at least me), were eagerly waiting for this day. Not only because it was really a cool concept, but also because we were approaching our first competition and we needed to get used to wearing them. It’s not every day you walk around being attached to about 68 of your friends… and have to march a show while doing it.

There were a group of parents that had been solving the puzzle of how to attach these contraptions to a belt in a way that would be stationary. They landed on using a Velcro belt around the waist, and rivets to hold the mechanical part on to the belt. That thing is really heavy, so it had to be attached really well. 

The kids just couldn’t help themselves, heck, neither could I, from pulling the cord out of other people’s backs. We had to lay down a few ground rules to keep this equipment from breaking, as the total cost was close to $2000. This money often goes to props that we have put on the field, but we aren’t using anything like that this year.

We started off slow in rehearsal with basics to just get used to the concept. Then we had to go through the 1^st and 2^nd movements of our show one page at a time until the kids stopped feeling so intimidated by the belts. Yes, there was some silliness and distraction, but by the end of the night we were doing really well. Nobody even fell… yet. Hopefully that doesn’t happen because they will take down their friends with them.

Friday we had a football game, which was the first time we used the belts in uniform (and only the second day we used them at all), and the first time the guard was in their new uniform. 

On Saturday we had our first competition! The kids are always so excited and the new kids are usually very nervous. I talked to one student on Sunday who said she was shaking while she was on the field. This is pretty normal for the new marchers, but they still love the experience when it’s over!

Our first competition was in Novi. We spent the morning and a part of the afternoon rehearsing at home – we definitely needed more time with those belts – and loaded the buses to head to Novi. Our rehearsal went really well so we were feeling really positive.

When arriving at a competition, the kids all go to a “home room” where they either get into uniform or finish getting into uniform. This time is also spent unloading the truck, which carried all the large instruments and guard equipment to the show. After settling in, we get about an hour to warm-up somewhere on the school grounds. We do both a visual (marching) warm-up and music warm-up along with individual tuning. I was laughing with the drum majors because every year at this first show they spend this warm-up time making sure their salute is together and looks good. That’s how they deal with their nerves at the first show.

Marching over to the field is always very cool because the kids are quiet and focused. It’s an energy that I love to see coming from a large group of high school students. Most people don’t get to see this, which is part of the thrill. The first time the crowd sees them is when they walk in the back gate and line up at the end zone, waiting for the pervious band to finish.

The performance was so exciting and went really well. The band scored the highest number we ever had for a first show – 73.55. While that may look like a “D,” for this activity it’s a really good number to get this early in the season.

So our kids went home winning all the “captions” – best music, best marching, best general effect, etc. – along with first place in our flight. I hope this is a sign for a continued great season!