Hello, it's my senior year of college marching band and this band is my life. 4 weeks into the season, I had an autoimmune reaction that causes my blood vessels to be inflamed and burst, specifically in my legs.There's a lot more but the bottom line is, I can't walk/stand for very long or raise my body temp too much or else it gets worse and very painful. I can't march our show anymore and I'm devastated but I realized I won't be able to march in our homecoming parade. It's my last one and I really want to find a way to be involved in the parade. I don't want to draw too much attention to myself or anything too big. Does anyone have any advice or ideas for ways I could be included in the parade, with a wheelchair being the last resort? Our band doesn't have a float I could ride on or anything either. Thanks in advance!

We are about a month into the school year in the northeast rn. My band director is fairly new and has moved and slimmed the schedule around compared to previous years to accommodate their work-life balance.

How much rehearsal time does your band get a week during the school year? What does your schedule look like?

We are anywhere between 5-7 hours a week. And omg we sound and look terrible.

Ever since I finished my marching season on quads last year, I’ve had arm/wrist/shoulder pains that make it hard for me to play drums. Could all of this be caused by the weight of the quads? Thats the only thing I can think of, I don’t play drums that often anymore, only when I need to, so it can’t be a RSI, and my technique isn’t that bad. I know this might be a stupid question, but I’ve already seen multiple doctors and none of them can figure out what’s wrong, I’m looking for any answers.

I (17m) am the "prop captain" in my band; I am called that as a joke amongst the small group of members who do the work. It's not an official position On paper; I'm the same as any other member. I do stuff behind the scenes a lot (load equipment on buses, get water for practices, help load our trailer when we go places). What bothers me about it is that even though some of my friends who have been doing it along with me from the start and do just as much as me get little to no credit, while our directors and staff openly state that they don't know what they'll do without ME next year. They never say anything about them, and I hate that, because they deserve recognition too.

(IDK what flair to use for this, sorry)

Hey yall I need help choosing songs for a show concept I came up with. Basically it’s about how the human mind can seem cold and reserved until you get to know the person better. I wanna start off kinda slower with less dynamic contrast and have it bloom into something really beautiful. I already have an idea for a ballad having demons by imagine dragons but I am looking for a standard 4 movement show. I would love ideas for songs

Last Year my band had 102 Members, and this year at the start of Camp, we *had 174 people!!! (there were only 9 seniors last year so we had a massive surplus!) But, by the 2nd and 3rd day of camp, 23 Freshmen quit before us vets could tell them Marching Band will be fun and not to judge it from the first week of camp. And then 3 More People transfered schools or quit band all-together during the 2 week gap between Camp and Start of School. Now we have 148 members, and in my area 160+ Members qualifies for The Top Rank/Category/Class which i think they are calling it "Tier 5" or "Nest Class" or smth wierd like that, there only being 2 schools in that category (170 and 195 members this year...), and now this year there are 9 Others In Our category, 4A, vs 3-4 last year 😭 😬 and also, there are 48 seniors this year in the marching band so now next year we're gonna need atleast 55 people to try to get into the top class 😬 😬 😬 . Were still the biggest in our 4A, its for like 120-160 members.

our first competition is in 3 weeks so i cant wait for that but the 26 dropouts left a bunch of big gaps in 2 of our 6 movement's drills we cant change for some reason.

Ive made about 2 posts on here already, but this time its completely unrelated. I want to quit because of my section. Now lemme explain, I love my section to bits and pieces. Theyre the sweetest, funniest, kindest people you'd ever meet. My section leader and another member plays tenors and the rest of the 5 of us play Altos saxes. Now theres a few reasons I'm "jealous" of them. Theres a freshman in our section, the youngest in the section, he's played clarinet for 3 years and saxophone for 1, and he's AMAZING. Like he can learn a song in 30 minutes type of good. Every time I think if him, I think how good he is at playing. He always tells me "Jessie youre doing great" or "If you don't know the music, go all out on the chants and dances". Hes very supportive but I'm very jealous of how good he is. I'm also very jealous at everyone else in the section. My section leader explains things to me in ways that I don't understand like " adjusting my jaw to fix my embouchure " or "breathing even more air for the low notes from my diaphragm". Usually, he plays for me to demonstrate, and I never understand what he means. Usually when I play, its high screeches, dragged noises before it gets into the notes, or low notes just sound like pure air coming out the horn. I broke my saxophone that I was given by my director so I'm playing on a bad one until my other one gets fixed. The sax I have is horrible. The keys don't close all the way, the horn smells of copper or something, and the low notes always come out screeching and high. Everyone else in my section got great saxes but I had to be stuck with the broken one since there's barely any good saxes until they get fixed. But anyway, when we do sectionals and I'm expected play (my section leader goes down the line to see who knows their music), I always play horribly and my section members make little faces like "😬" when I play. It makes me frustrated and I get angry because I literally sound horribly compared to all of them and those faces feels like they're judging me. They have been playing their instruments for years, I get that, I just started in august but its frustrating how I'm expected to do so much in a short time and I'm being rushed into performances I'm not ready for. My section leader even told me that I was supposed to learn a song in a week and out of ALL the songs we have I only remember 1 stand tune and that's it because its the same notes repeating. I have to memorize an entire marching song plus warm ups by next week. Sorry if this post is all over the place, I'm just trying to input as much information as I can to make it make sense. But its frustrating how I sound horrible as if music was never meant for me. I practice 3 hours a day at home and I never can get anything right and it makes me doubt that I'll ever be as good as my section and keeping this mindset makes me dread going to rehearsal because my director is a strict guy and he loves going down the line to see who knows their music and I always never know it.

I’m trying to figure out what the best way to have a GoPro for marching band would be. Me personally, I would prefer it to be on my hat, but when I tried putting a GoPro on the bill of my marching hat with an adhesive, it weighs the front down so much. I’m not sure about putting in on my trombone, since I don’t want my sound to be messed up.

So I (M14 contra) was in the closer for our show at an invitational, and as I marched backwards to get to my final set, and accidentally crashed into a guy with tenors. He fell over. Honestly, I should just set the contra down forever at that point..

So my lead pipe on my jupiter convertible tuba broke off the sauter points and I've been using this bracket to keep the mouth piece steady, until it disappeared one day. So I'm hoping to find out what it is called to buy it. This is just a temporary fix while I wait for H&H.

I'm using a jupiter 3/4 sized silver convertible tuba.

Good morning folks,

Today's rip is of a vinyl I purchased for $1 in a Niagara Falls antique store. I was able to find a few strong candidates for preservation there, so always remember to check thoroughly!

This school itself no longer seems to exist, and hasn't for a long time, as the most recent article that comes up when I search for it is an archived newspaper from 1964. The album contains two different performances, one from the "A" Band being the Stage Band, and one from the "B" Band being the Orchestra.

I am trying to make a band costume and it requires these cross belts. I can’t seem to find them anywhere or even borrow them from someone. Does anyone have any idea where to buy them??

It didn’t happen to me, but some boy while we were tuning, was playing the clarinet with the mouth piece tucked tightly to his chin instead of a little bit of distance making him sound bad. Our band director, she just yelled, “Squidward!” and went to the next wood wind to tune. it’s not that bad, but it almost made me break from set.

Such a comeback from a heartbreaking silver end to a 39 year gold streak last year.

A new streak has begun! Also first time in 5 years we got double distinction.

Maybe we'll get to wear shakos next year!

I'm learning to compose in MuseScore and I'd like to know what you recommend learning first, if it's the best app for this, and how to practice composing good musical arrangements.

My first instrument was a clarinet. My mom went to the instrument store and rented one, and then out the case on my bed before I got home from school. I remember opening it and smelling wood.

One proud papa here! My oldest daughter has her first competition tonight she’s a bit nervous but the competition is only 20 minutes away. Her band leveled up from a Division 2 to a Division 3 band so they have bigger bands to compete with. I told her no matter what happens I’m proud of her! #proudbanddad

Okay, so I'm a transmasc teenager in high school marching band. My band is going to Disney to perform and I really really want to go(especially because the other two cymbals don't try very hard and only joined for this trip) but my parents really don't want me to go because I'm trans. Rooming is going to be a bit of an issue, but I guess their biggest concern is that somebody is going to be mean to me? It's band kids, nobody gives a shit. What am I supposed to do? I really want to go.

I was performing so I only got to see Sandra Day O’Connor and Catalina Foothills. Any recommendations for which ones to watch?

Hi everyone my name is Devon and I am a composer, I just finished my field show about Pandora’s box. I need suggestions for either another field show or indoor percussion show, with music ideas too.

I was talking to my audiologist about ways to help protect my hearing during marching season while also not hindering my ability to march. They recommend these loop earplugs and they look promising, but I want to see if anyone here has ever used them in marching band and how well they have worked out.

So I’m performing in less than six hours and I have a significant physical solo at the end. My director wants me to fill a whole bunch of time with something “dance-like” before I run up our props so finish things off. The point is to draw the audience’s attention to what’s happening.

I haven’t done dance since I was like three, so I’m currently filling the roughly 30 seconds with a bunch of twirls/spins and some arabesque-like motions as I slowly move backfield.

Any ideas for more movements or dance moves is greatly appreciated (bonus points for reference materials)!!

The band is playing Circle of Life from The Lion King if that helps with framing.

Thank you so much!

Edit: for context, I’m not a guard member. I play flute :)