Asked if that means they’re not like the characters on the Fox television program, “Glee,” about 20 students from the Sanford High School marching band answer in unison, “No!” and then trail off into laughter, pointing and giggling at each other, each one realizing they had blurted out an answer without intending it to come across as a chorus.
But if “Glee” is not so much about geeks as it is about different types of people with different backgrounds bonding over a shared interest, then the Sanford students are exactly like those characters.
“It’s like a family atmosphere. We’re just all so close,” said sophomore Victoria Blow
“We bond with each other a lot,” agreed Madison Caron.
On Saturday, all 53 members of the Sanford High School marching band came together to earn a bronze medal at the Maine Band Directors’ Association state finals at Old Orchard Beach High School.
“This was the culmination of 2½ months of really hard work from, at least in my case, a really great group of kids,” said 20-year veteran director Matt Doiron, following the team’s performance. “I was really thrilled with their performance. We have clearly improved every week. That’s the one thing you focus on.”
From mid-August, when the students first gathered at band camp, through rehearsals totaling as many as 20 hours in some weeks, to six Maine Band Directors’ Association competitions – on top of appearances at Friday night football games – the students progressed from learning basic positions to mastering movement while playing selections from “Hadrian’s Wall.”
“It’s a miracle when you think, about how much has been accomplished in just a few short weeks,” said announcer Roger Painchaud, referring to all 12 schools in Saturday’s competition.
Sanford did not post the highest score at the event. In fact, theirs was the lowest overall. But once a school had played a presidential inaugurations, as Sanford did for Barack Obama in 2009, it’s pretty hard to get flustered over a little thing like a number.
“That still hasn’t made us immune to budget cuts, but we’ve been really lucky in that the community has really identified our program as something important, and they do a decent job taking care of us,” says Doiron. “That’s been nice.”
At the events, each band is judged on its own merits against a slate of six criteria, including performances of the drum majors, the color guard and the percussion section, along with the entire band’s mastery of the selected music, the visual impact as the individual players move across the field in unison, and the general effect of the performance. Each category is given a score between 1 and 5 by a team of judges, working from atop the bleachers and on the field. The sum of all six categories generates a score which, in the final event of the season, results in a medal from each band member.
“Up until several years ago, there used to be a winner – first place, second place, and so on,” explained South Portland Band Director Craig Skeffington. “But then we realized that this is more about the performance, so now each band competes against itself, rather than each other.”
Like cheerleading, the marching band is a school activity that has long since progressed from part of the support system for a school’s football team. Today, it’s an activity in its own right.
“Bands don’t just play the school fight song as they march done the field anymore,” said Doiron. “Today, it’s really more of an artistic endeavor.”
That’s partly why Doiron and his fellow band directors prefer to remove the competitive aspect from the state finals.
”You have to be dedicated to do this,” said Kayleigh Verrell-Peters. “You have to really want to do it and everybody has to work together.”
As Sanford took the field for the medal ceremony, with the temperature plumenting and the snow beginning to fall from the first storm of the season, the Sanford students did not seem at all disappointed with their bronze showing. After all, said Verrell-Peters, “This was our best performance so far.”
No comments:
Post a Comment