LD Bell March and Play?

[Skippy]

  takigan said:

I think there's a problem when High School Music programs water down the difficulty of their shows to create something more musical or something more entertaining....for difficulty creates growth. And the point of Music Education is to educate and make students experience as much growth as possible.

 

I agree that students should be challenged as much as possible., and should improve as musicians and performers through a semester of marching band.

 

Here's another point to consider. While I completely agree that difficulty creates growth, too much can create frustration and failure. There is such a thing as doing a show that is too hard for a given group (my senior year for example, although we survived). I don't have a problem with people watering down shows, because for most groups watered down is challenging. But if the end product isn't something that you can look at and feel good about, it doesn't really matter if the students improved, because they'll have had a frustrating and unenjoyable experience.

 

But from what I've observed over the years (not just in marching band, but in all aspects of education), kid's are capable of doing far more than what they are typically demanded. An average kid from any high school could march an L.D. Bell show, it just comes down to his quality of instruction.

[rpd]

  Skippy said:

I agree that students should be challenged as much as possible., and should improve as musicians and performers through a semester of marching band.

 

Here's another point to consider. While I completely agree that difficulty creates growth, too much can create frustration and failure. There is such a thing as doing a show that is too hard for a given group (my senior year for example, although we survived). I don't have a problem with people watering down shows, because for most groups watered down is challenging. But if the end product isn't something that you can look at and feel good about, it doesn't really matter if the students improved, because they'll have had a frustrating and unenjoyable experience.

 

But from what I've observed over the years (not just in marching band, but in all aspects of education), kid's are capable of doing far more than what they are typically demanded. An average kid from any high school could march an L.D. Bell show, it just comes down to his quality of instruction.

 

While I do agree a good program comes down to good instruction, I will disagree, respectfully, with the point of any average kid being able to come in and being able to march a show of LD Bell's standards. The best band director in the world will not be able to make State Champions out of a normal band in their first year (at least in Texas). And probably not in their first 4 years either, when all of his or her students have been under the same director. I think you must change the culture of the band, making the students you have work harder.

 

By doing this, your upperclassmen will help the underclassmen on their own time. No matter how good of a director the band may have, its impossible to spend sufficient time with everyone to make them good musicians. That's where the culture change comes in. If the freshmen see's what the upperclassmen are capable of, they will work harder to accomplish what they are doing. If the underclassmen knows they have high standards to live to, they will match it, and eventually succeed it. Each graduating class, ideally, should be better than the last.

 

On to the point of difficulty. I come from a band that is currently doing many things that may be out of our reach. I really hope this doesn't come of as conceited, or egotistical, but in my opinion our drill and music is much harder than anyone in our region, and one of the top in our area (keep in mind I come from Area G). Once we got moving (I didn't move for the first 20 measures) there wasn't a stand still for anything more than 16 beats. For the first time since I've been in marching, I was required to do 16th note runs while moving, and our closer had a lot syncopation. As exciting as our show may have been, it was dirty. Our band just wasn't up to the standard the show required.

 

I really do believe that if we had a show a little bit easier, our competition results would have been much better. But in a way, my band is humbled by this. Every time we performed our show, we got a reception that made us feel great. And we believe that we got these receptions because our show was difficult, it was different than what people have seen from my district. Which definitely took away from the frustration factor.

[takigan]

  Skippy said:

I agree that students should be challenged as much as possible., and should improve as musicians and performers through a semester of marching band.

 

Here's another point to consider. While I completely agree that difficulty creates growth, too much can create frustration and failure. There is such a thing as doing a show that is too hard for a given group (my senior year for example, although we survived). I don't have a problem with people watering down shows, because for most groups watered down is challenging. But if the end product isn't something that you can look at and feel good about, it doesn't really matter if the students improved, because they'll have had a frustrating and unenjoyable experience.

 

But from what I've observed over the years (not just in marching band, but in all aspects of education), kid's are capable of doing far more than what they are typically demanded. An average kid from any high school could march an L.D. Bell show, it just comes down to his quality of instruction.

 

An average kid could march an L.D. Bell show because compared to most shows past and present, their show isn't all that difficult. Did they work hard to produce what they produce? Sure, they worked harder than just about every school in Texas. But difficult? The shows that demand the most out of students are ones that deprive them of oxygen while at the same time making heavy mental demands of them in both music and motion. The ones that combine fast tempos with constant motion and maneuvers that take incredible mental precision to execute (pass-throughs, block drill, backwards follow-the-leader), and to make it even more difficult; take the oxygen deprived wind players and give them something that requires them to expend mass amounts of oxygen out of their mouth that would otherwise be used by the body to take on the more mechanical aspects of the show (many of the Russian composers fit this bill quite nicely...but really anything that's loud, and has lots of runs- all at fast tempi). L.D Bell's show has very little strenuous movement, in fact many parts of their show have hardly any movement at all......their tempi aren't slow, but they're not exactly cruisin' either.

 

Most older military shows are more difficult than what's being put on the field nowadays. Not that I've ever marched military, but I know people who've done both styles, and say the military style is more demanding.

 

Regardless of all of that, I do acknowledge that there is a difference between a program halfheartedly taking on a show that was designed to be extremely difficult, and pouring their heart and soul into making a not-as-difficult show perfect. Students can become more disgruntled at being pushed too hard to make something easy look really easy than making something difficult look easy.

[whitewing09]

I still think bells shows looks hard

[bluebellbrass07]

I would say Bell 05 was a harder show than my first year of drum corps. That show was ridiculous...

[whitewing09]

Was that the Ascension show?

Edited December 22, 2008 by whitewing09

[Xenon]

  whitewing09 said:

Was that the Ascension show?

Yes.

[bluebellbrass07]

Yes it was, though it didn't really even come close to the show I marched this summer.

[Skippy]

  rpd said:

While I do agree a good program comes down to good instruction, I will disagree, respectfully, with the point of any average kid being able to come in and being able to march a show of LD Bell's standards... I think you must change the culture of the band, making the students you have work harder.

 

I used "quality of instruction" as a broad term to encompass all the possible influences an instructor could have, regardless of the time factor. The point I was trying to make is that the kids in Hurst are not drinking something in the water that makes them superhuman. They are like many other kids across the state from a physical and mental capability standpoint. There are certain qualities that extremely gifted teachers have that go beyond teaching and can completely change the attitude and motivation of the program that they step into. For example: Andrea Peterson, the 2007 national teacher of the year.

 

  Quote

The best band director in the world will not be able to make State Champions out of a normal band in their first year (at least in Texas). And probably not in their first 4 years either, when all of his or her students have been under the same director

 

Amanda Drinkwater - 2nd year as director of bands at Marcus (4th year at the school) was a 5a state champion show. (never previously having made state finals).

 

Dean Westman - 4th year at SFA High school and the band won the BOA Houston regional and 5th at grand nationals. Before Mr. Westman, the band was getting 2's at UIL region marching contest.

[heavyduty16]

actually bell won the Houston regional .. i believe SFA was 2nd

[whitewing09]

Doesn't Cedar Park have a young director also

Edited December 26, 2008 by whitewing09

[GuitarJoe]

  heavyduty16 said:

actually bell won the Houston regional .. i believe SFA was 2nd

 

He's not talking about 2008.

 

 

Jeremy Earnhart began teaching at LD Bell in 1998, and they won their first state title in 2000. He wasn't named head director until 2002, but he was still in charge of the marching band.

Edited December 26, 2008 by GuitarJoe

[Xenon]

  GuitarJoe said:

Jeremy Earnhart began teaching at LD Bell in 1998, and they won their first state title in 2000. He wasn't named head director until 2002, but he was still in charge of the marching band.

 

And LD Bell made 10th in State Prelims in 1998.

[GuitarJoe]

They would have made finals if it weren't for some inconsistent judging, but what else is new.

[rpd]

  Skippy said:

Amanda Drinkwater - 2nd year as director of bands at Marcus (4th year at the school) was a 5a state champion show. (never previously having made state finals).

 

Very true, and I'm not putting down Amanda Drinkwater's success, but Marcus was a fairly successful band before her. I should have put the best director wont be able to take an average band, and make them state champions. With ~250 5A schools in Texas, I would consider bands that finish near the bottom of Area as average. Marcus was 2nd in Area B in 2004, which I believe was the year before Amanda Drinkwater took over.

[Xenon]

  GuitarJoe said:

They would have made finals if it weren't for some inconsistent judging, but what else is new.

Actually. . . . They only made it that high due to inconsistent judging.

 

Bell's votes were:

Music - 14, 21, 1

Marching - 11, 5

 

And they were 8 rank points out of making Finals.

 

The 1 in music is the one that is most inconsistent amongst the Music judges. Although, yes, all of the judging for Bell was all over the place.

[bluebellbrass07]

  Xenon said:

Actually. . . . They only made it that high due to inconsistent judging.

 

Bell's votes were:

Music - 14, 21, 1

Marching - 11, 5

 

And they were 8 rank points out of making Finals.

 

The 1 in music is the one that is most inconsistent amongst the Music judges. Although, yes, all of the judging for Bell was all over the place.

 

Actually if you average those numbers together you get an average of 10.4. The 21 was the most inconsistent, with the 1 being 2nd most. So really neither of you are right, I think the point he was trying to make that the judging was inconsistent..

[Xenon]

  bluebellbrass07 said:

Actually if you average those numbers together you get an average of 10.4. The 21 was the most inconsistent, with the 1 being 2nd most. So really neither of you are right, I think the point he was trying to make that the judging was inconsistent..

 

Remember, you can only compare ranks within the same caption. So, 14+21+1 = 36. Divide by 3 and the average is 12. 21 is only 9 away from 12 while 1 is 11 away. The 1 is the odd man out. You can also look at it as 14 and 21 are only 7 apart while 14 and 1 are 13 apart.

[treblemaker]

My head hurts...

[bluebellbrass07]

  treblemaker said:

My head hurts...

 

Its just simple addition and division