I was very pleased with the brass performances, which included a standstill music run directly followed by a full run, complete with the drill.

Now that the season is over and we all – Kenny and I, as well as all the members – can breathe a little for the first time since November, I’m going to take a break and savor the free time to relax. I intend on writing a full, honest analysis of the season though. I aim to capture the highs and the lows, the successes and failures, lessons learned, and everything. Until then, though, I’ll just leave you with my thoughts about this Saturday:

Call time was 5pm, so we would have about an hour to leisurely warm up before the show began [at 6]. I fully expected us to be the first to perform, but in talking with Newman prior to the show, I found out we were the closing gig. That posed a problem because we would need some warm up time just before performing, but yet I wanted all my kids to see the guard units perform. It ended up working out, but I’ll get to that later.

By 5, only three members and one conductor were there. Over the next 30 minutes, everyone else shuffled in. One member mistook the call time for 5.45, another completely forgot about the performance. Thankfully, all ended up showing up, and by 5:40 we were in the arc warming up. We sounded good. Not as good as the day of WGAZ Winter Guard Championships, but given the circumstances, we were doing well.

Warmup lasted about thirty minutes, and then we snuck in to the gym just in time to catch the first guard performance. Newman holds the Indoor Showcase to give all the indoor units one last opportunity to perform, and to give the parents of members the chance to see their children perform, as many are unable to make the shows throughout the season for various reasons. For her guard in particular, though, the Showcase serves as a final test [winter guard is considered a class at Cienega], where members get together and choreograph their own short guard shows to music of their choice. They perform these at this show, which lasts about 90 minutes total.

After a number of this self-created guard performances, the Cienega Winter Guard performs their 2008 production, “Visions of Opposites”. Following that, it is Cienega Indoor Brass’ turn to perform!

Newman handed me the microphone to introduce the group, which I’m not expecting. I fumble through it with about as much grace as an elephant performing “suicides”. I thank the members for giving of themselves throughout the season, the parents for letting them, Tom Broccolo for giving Kenny and I the opportunity to make this happen, and Newman for holding my hand along the way. My speech is trite and sugary, which I realize halfway through but don’t have the skills to correct it. Only afterwards do I realize that I did nothing to really introduce the unit. The trials and struggles that we faced from the start to the end. The fact that the group began at half the size we intended it to be. The fact that we lost a number of members throughout the season. The fact that we purposely wrote the music and drill at a level above the member’s skill level. Or that five out of the eight members were freshmen. That four were playing on something different from their main instrument. That two had never played any instrument before this year.

While that might have sounded overly apologetic; maybe, just maybe it would have told the audience our story – giving them insight into OUR journey.

But I didn’t mention any of that. And, because I saw the audience getting bored, I cut my speech short and got the hell off the microphone. And then the performances began!

After a bit of individual playing on their own, the ensemble was ready and the member’s performed a standstill run of the music. I will admit to being very nervous, with as little ensemble and individual warmup as we had, on top of the fact that we hadn’t rehearsed in over a week. But the members committed to their performance, and did a fine job. There

It’s always a good thing when the time spent hacking away at a mess shows up in a performance. 

We don’t have a performance next weekend, but instead, the weekend after.  This gives us two weeks to throw on as much show as possible.  The goal is to have the first four minutes on the floor by the end of Tuesday night and be able to run through it all.  These two weeks are also spring break, so we’ll have people floating in and out of rehearsal, unfortunately, but, well, there’s not much that can be done, except push ahead as quickly as possible and hope for the best.  My goal for the next performance is to do all of Movement One and Two with movement, and as much of Three as we can.  I’m aiming for up through the first big hit, just so we end on a strong note.

At this point, we’re waiting on the kids to master their music to a level where they can add movement to it.  Our progress is completely dependent on the effort they put into learning new material.  I know they’re more than capable of taking some giant strides here in the next two weeks, but I’ll keep my mouth shut and wait and see where we’re at two nights from now.

On February 9 we had our second learning camp, also lasting 12 hours.   We put the next several segment of show on the floor and continued cleaning what we had already learned.  It was yet another very productive day, as we added over another minute of show to the floor.

Finally, over the last several weeks, we have added another 30 seconds to our show, painted the floor we perform on, and begun reviewing the second movement [of three].  Last weekend marked our first performance ever, at Millennium High School in Goodyear, Arizona.   It was a long day for all involved, with a call time of 5.30AM, a three hour bus ride [each way!], and over five hours of rehearsal before our performance.  The performance itself was a memorable one, filled with the raw energy and jitters that can only be found in a group’s first performance of the season.  And while there were several moments to be proud of throughout the show, it was also a moment of realization of how much work lies ahead of us in order to get to a point where we feel positive about how we are performing.

Our next performance is this weekend, this time [thankfully!] the venue is located here in Tucson, just up the road from us, actually.  A welcome change, indeed.  After discussing amongst ourselves, Kenny and I decided several changes and revisions needed to be made to the show in order to help the members achieve the best possible success.  This involved cutting several gaps of silence down and eliminating several portions of the music/drill altogether.  This week we have focused mainly on learning these revisions, and cleaning up spots that were problems this past weekend.  We fully expect to come out stronger than before, and are excited to make our second showing Saturday at Sabino HS!

Cienega Indoor Brass is not marching band.  The venue is different:  a gym instead of a football field.  Because we are a new type of ensemble, the traditional military-based, ultra-disciplined look and feel does not necessarily apply.  This is not to say we won’t look and be disciplined and precise, only that we are free to define our look and movement as we see fit.

There will definitely be a physical element to this ensemble.  We are playing with tempos much higher than one typically encounters in marching band here in Arizona, playing music that is much more reliant upon each individual rather than a section, and we do not have a full-fledged drumline or percussion ensemble to fall back upon in order to get a breather throughout the show.  In short, we are playing harder music at faster tempos for much longer periods of times without the typical breaks one might find in the typical marching ensemble setting.

We are going to need to be strong enough in our upper bodies to carry our instruments with ease and without creating additional stress and tension in the body, which would affect one’s playing ability.

We are going to need strong lower bodies to push us through the fast tempos while maintaining precision timing and technique in the feet.

We’re going to need lungs of steel in order to blow through phrases and create a variety of dynamic music shapings without letting feet and weakness creep into our sound.

We are going to demand much in the way of physical fitness from the members in order to successfully pull off what we’re asking of them.  Everything is attainable,  but only with hard work and smart work.

Now is the time to start all this.  46 Days until First Performance. 

« Ben »

We feel this ambitious schedule is a fine-tuned balance between rehearsals and performances.  It was decided early on that there would be no point in doing this unless we felt we could be successful at it.  And if we were successful, we would want to be as visible as we possible could be – that meant we needed a good share of performances both in Tucson and Phoenix in order to show as many people as we could what we were all about.  If the members were going to work hard, they deserve as many chances to perform and prove their stuff as they can get.  In order to be successful though, we needed to ensure we had enough focused, intense rehearsals to help us reach our goals.

We ended up with eight performances – all in exhibition.  There are three Tucson-area shows, including our own Indoor Showcase/Family show here at Cienega HS in Vail.  There will be four Phoenix-area shows, including the Winterguard Arizona Percussion and Guard Championships.  And there will be one in between, in Casa Grande.  This schedule ought to provide lots of great opportunities to perform in front of a number of different types of crowds, in a number of different venues, as well as some fun travel opportunities.

We have thirty-two scheduled rehearsals this season, with the majority of them spent prior to our first performance on February 23 so that we may show up with a strong, confident presence.  Both the rehearsals and performances will be spread across five months [January thru May].  We wanted to limit the number of rehearsals to what we felt was the minimum necessary to reach our first-year goals.  This enabled us to demonstrate the importance of attending each rehearsal, as each one would be incredibly important.  It will also allow this not to be a huge drain on the members, so they can have plenty of time for other school activities, appointments, homework, sleep/relaxing, etc…

The schedule is another reflection of how this ensemble aims to up the standards and expectations of its members.  Ambitious?  Yes!  Possible?  With the right attitude, absolutely!

Less than two months until our first show!   The reality is starting to sink in.

« Ben »

+++ Put together member & parent forms
+++ Begin obtaining copyrights / permission to arrange
+++ Write the brass warmups
+++ Put together the membership handbook
+++ Write the brass/music resource manual
+++ Finish out the first movement

Yeeeeeeeeeeah…better get started on that…

« Ben »

Last Friday – the first audition – was rough. Afterwards, Kenny and I hit up Carls Jr to try and figure things out over some burgers and fries. One of the top questions on our minds, besides where we went wrong in the whole recruiting area, was what was needed in order to make this ensemble still work…

How many members would we need minimum in order to still give it a go?
Would the focus and purpose of the ensemble need to change?
Would we have to change the program?
Would we have to change the actual music?
Was this even worth doing if we ended up half the size we planned on being?

By the time we were done eating, we knew we were going to push onward. We had to. Because a handful of people fought the urge to simply say “no” to indoor brass. They took a risk on us. And after having spent weeks and months and in a roundabout way, years, planning for this moment, it became clear we needed to also take a risk: throwing those plans out the window and finding a way to make this work for these kids.

So over the course of the this past week, we talked about what needed to change in order to set these members up for success. I dropped the third trumpet, second mello, and tuba parts from the score. Our ensemble will now consist of trumpets, mellophones, and baritones only.

The turnout for second auditions was better than the first. Kenny held a visual rehearsal detailing the technique and posture to be used throughout the indoor brass season while I auditioned two of our three conductor candidates. We then moved from the band room to the gym so we could rehearse the first 35 seconds of show music.

We gave them some time to look over the music and work out some issues on their own before piecing it together: this music is probably more difficult than what many are used to, which is no coincidence. This ensemble is meant to stretch the limits of its members both musically and physically/visually. After a few minutes on their own, we began to chunk the pieces together. I’m happy to say that by the end of the audition, we were able to begin and end together. Everything in between is, well, not quite there yet…

In the end, we will be brilliant. And everything learned and fought for between now and then – the journey – is what this is really all about.

What a difference a week makes.

« Ben »