Marching to the beat of no drummer
It's been a long week. Family thing Sunday, band Monday, work thing Tuesday. I've barely been home. And I have a work thing tomorrow as well.
So far, I think Monday made me the most tired, since I did lots of walking. It was a pleasant afternoon until a cold front blew through, literally. I walked at the walking forest preserve for over an hour, and probably would have kept going had my left foot not been really uncomfortable. I was wearing the less-comfortable pair of my new shoes, but my right foot was fine. It was like my left foot was cramping; I'm not sure why. I did get to take a particular trail for the first time, which was nice; perhaps the next time I go, which likely won't be for two weeks, I'll tackle the major trail. This is the one where once you start, you can't stop because there's no place to stop. I'm figuring it'll take me an hour and a half from start to finish. This time, I was done after the shorter routes and just wanted to sit down. I ended up staying at that preserve afterward, as there are a number of picnic benches surrounding the lake on the preserve's north end, and things were okay until the sun started dipping behind trees. It coincided with the front coming through, which brought a cool wind, and temps probably dropped by at least 10 degrees. It got chilly! I tried to find a part of the preserve that had more sun, but the wind just made it unpleasant, especially since I was in shorts and a tank top at the time. No go. Retreat to warm car. I did have a little sweater to wear over the tank top for band, but I knew I'd want my jacket, too.
So, band. T-minus one week until the parade. It's time to practice! The past couple years, we've had several significant practices, but this was the only real practice this year. It wasn't pretty. The previous week, the drum major couldn't come to band until it would have been too dark to do anything, so we just practiced corners, no playing. This time? We played. I did wear my jacket since it was that cool outside, but I still had shorts on so I probably looked pantsless to the people behind me. We have these three songs we cycle through, a traditional march, a medley of patriotic songs, and a medley of Armed Forces songs. We did the Armed Forces one first. It was said that we'd have an 8-measure drum cadence between the songs. Half the band, including me, thought that meant between all three pieces we were performing. Unfortunately, it was actually between the songs of the medley. Also, we were turning a corner in the middle of this. So, you have half the band playing, half the band not playing, and we're all attempting and I'm guessing failing at making the turn, and all of a sudden there's no more percussion at all. The band just stops in the middle of the street, and as I turn around to figure out what's going on, I see a woman on her front porch recording us. The recording, I'm used to. The recording while we're having a massive marching band fail, not so much. Goody. I'm waiting for it to appear on YouTube. (I just checked--it's not there under an obvious search.) The drum major clarified things and we went on, where the song went okay (we're going to play it as written after all that), but at the next corner, while we were playing again...fail. The DM will whistle to signify a turn, but when you're playing, and playing an instrument that has the same shrill sound as the whistle, *AND* wearing earplugs so you don't go deaf because the drums are behind you and very very loud, it's not easily heard--and I was only three rows back. So, all of a sudden, I realize we're in the middle of the turn. I wasn't the only one. And so the band stopped again, but at least this time it was on purpose, as the ending cadence was played. (Earlier, it was sudden and jarring.) The DM again clarified things, and also said that they try as much as possible not to play while turning corners, but sometimes it's inevitable. What's interesting is that the last part we did, which involved two corners, quickly, while playing the next song (due to the mixup, we only played through two of the three songs), things seemed to go okay. Strange. I will say that our corners are confusing to begin with, and then we had two empty spaces in the second row, so that the lady next to me and I didn't have people in front of us; that didn't help. I'd inadvertently end up in the second row after a turn, which likely messed up the people behind me, leading to a chain reaction. Hopefully this won't happen during the parade. But all in all, it did not go well.
Part of me wonders if our lack of director was part of it. He's older, in his mid-70s, and I think he had a procedure recently that prevented him from walking with us like he normally does. The director doesn't march--that's why we have the drum major--but he strides alongside typically. This was the first time I've seen where he didn't go with us. And, while he made a brief appearance at the beginning of the inside rehearsal, he went home soon after. Hmm. Hope he's feeling okay. This meant we had the assistant director, which is fine, but he's not the most assured of directors, I guess you could say. Like, if you're conducting a band, you should have an idea of what you want and express that clearly to the band. He...doesn't always. That gets frustrating. Take for example the last piece we worked on, this tough Russian song we played at the last concert and one we're taking with us to Texas in two months and won't have much chance to practice once we get into summer concert season, which, for all intents and purposes, we are. (We practice pretty much just the music for the next concert during rehearsals, then play the concert the next day. This time between the spring concert and the parade is for cleaning things up.) We'd gotten through the Russian piece pretty decently last time, and I'd worked really hard on it; this is the song that has the ungodly high notes in it. At one point the music changes from being in one to being in two. It's marked l'istesso, which is described on Wikipedia as "the same tempo, despite changes of time signature." There's even a marking of half note equals half note. The conductor, instead of beating time in one, simply changes to a two pattern. This was what the assistant director has been doing all this time. Inexplicably, he's now decided to do it in one. WHY, GOD, WHY?!? This makes ZERO sense to me, and apparently the rest of the band, as it was a disaster. Woo-hoo, crash and burn both inside AND outside! Yeah, I was cranky upon leaving rehearsal. I was literally repeating, it's l'istesso! It's l'istesso! as he was conducting, because it blew my mind that he'd want to continue in one when clearly it should have been two. I did that because I'd honestly stopped playing because my mind was just going, what the hell is he doing? So that was extremely frustrating, and I know he wasn't happy with it and saying he would work on things. Don't work on things; GO BACK TO WHAT YOU WERE DOING! Don't fix what ain't broke. Especially when this is supposed to be our showpiece song in Texas. Tweak it, sure; smooth out the rough edges; but don't reinvent the wheel six months into it. Seriously. What are you thinking?
I'm not sure if I'm looking forward to the parade, but at least I know I have no plans for Saturday and Sunday, and once I finish the parade I can go home and enjoy the rest of the day off. Of course, they're predicting rain, with a big yellow bullseye over where I'm marching, so it probably won't be that enjoyable. So long as we get through in one piece, we'll probably be fine.
So far, I think Monday made me the most tired, since I did lots of walking. It was a pleasant afternoon until a cold front blew through, literally. I walked at the walking forest preserve for over an hour, and probably would have kept going had my left foot not been really uncomfortable. I was wearing the less-comfortable pair of my new shoes, but my right foot was fine. It was like my left foot was cramping; I'm not sure why. I did get to take a particular trail for the first time, which was nice; perhaps the next time I go, which likely won't be for two weeks, I'll tackle the major trail. This is the one where once you start, you can't stop because there's no place to stop. I'm figuring it'll take me an hour and a half from start to finish. This time, I was done after the shorter routes and just wanted to sit down. I ended up staying at that preserve afterward, as there are a number of picnic benches surrounding the lake on the preserve's north end, and things were okay until the sun started dipping behind trees. It coincided with the front coming through, which brought a cool wind, and temps probably dropped by at least 10 degrees. It got chilly! I tried to find a part of the preserve that had more sun, but the wind just made it unpleasant, especially since I was in shorts and a tank top at the time. No go. Retreat to warm car. I did have a little sweater to wear over the tank top for band, but I knew I'd want my jacket, too.
So, band. T-minus one week until the parade. It's time to practice! The past couple years, we've had several significant practices, but this was the only real practice this year. It wasn't pretty. The previous week, the drum major couldn't come to band until it would have been too dark to do anything, so we just practiced corners, no playing. This time? We played. I did wear my jacket since it was that cool outside, but I still had shorts on so I probably looked pantsless to the people behind me. We have these three songs we cycle through, a traditional march, a medley of patriotic songs, and a medley of Armed Forces songs. We did the Armed Forces one first. It was said that we'd have an 8-measure drum cadence between the songs. Half the band, including me, thought that meant between all three pieces we were performing. Unfortunately, it was actually between the songs of the medley. Also, we were turning a corner in the middle of this. So, you have half the band playing, half the band not playing, and we're all attempting and I'm guessing failing at making the turn, and all of a sudden there's no more percussion at all. The band just stops in the middle of the street, and as I turn around to figure out what's going on, I see a woman on her front porch recording us. The recording, I'm used to. The recording while we're having a massive marching band fail, not so much. Goody. I'm waiting for it to appear on YouTube. (I just checked--it's not there under an obvious search.) The drum major clarified things and we went on, where the song went okay (we're going to play it as written after all that), but at the next corner, while we were playing again...fail. The DM will whistle to signify a turn, but when you're playing, and playing an instrument that has the same shrill sound as the whistle, *AND* wearing earplugs so you don't go deaf because the drums are behind you and very very loud, it's not easily heard--and I was only three rows back. So, all of a sudden, I realize we're in the middle of the turn. I wasn't the only one. And so the band stopped again, but at least this time it was on purpose, as the ending cadence was played. (Earlier, it was sudden and jarring.) The DM again clarified things, and also said that they try as much as possible not to play while turning corners, but sometimes it's inevitable. What's interesting is that the last part we did, which involved two corners, quickly, while playing the next song (due to the mixup, we only played through two of the three songs), things seemed to go okay. Strange. I will say that our corners are confusing to begin with, and then we had two empty spaces in the second row, so that the lady next to me and I didn't have people in front of us; that didn't help. I'd inadvertently end up in the second row after a turn, which likely messed up the people behind me, leading to a chain reaction. Hopefully this won't happen during the parade. But all in all, it did not go well.
Part of me wonders if our lack of director was part of it. He's older, in his mid-70s, and I think he had a procedure recently that prevented him from walking with us like he normally does. The director doesn't march--that's why we have the drum major--but he strides alongside typically. This was the first time I've seen where he didn't go with us. And, while he made a brief appearance at the beginning of the inside rehearsal, he went home soon after. Hmm. Hope he's feeling okay. This meant we had the assistant director, which is fine, but he's not the most assured of directors, I guess you could say. Like, if you're conducting a band, you should have an idea of what you want and express that clearly to the band. He...doesn't always. That gets frustrating. Take for example the last piece we worked on, this tough Russian song we played at the last concert and one we're taking with us to Texas in two months and won't have much chance to practice once we get into summer concert season, which, for all intents and purposes, we are. (We practice pretty much just the music for the next concert during rehearsals, then play the concert the next day. This time between the spring concert and the parade is for cleaning things up.) We'd gotten through the Russian piece pretty decently last time, and I'd worked really hard on it; this is the song that has the ungodly high notes in it. At one point the music changes from being in one to being in two. It's marked l'istesso, which is described on Wikipedia as "the same tempo, despite changes of time signature." There's even a marking of half note equals half note. The conductor, instead of beating time in one, simply changes to a two pattern. This was what the assistant director has been doing all this time. Inexplicably, he's now decided to do it in one. WHY, GOD, WHY?!? This makes ZERO sense to me, and apparently the rest of the band, as it was a disaster. Woo-hoo, crash and burn both inside AND outside! Yeah, I was cranky upon leaving rehearsal. I was literally repeating, it's l'istesso! It's l'istesso! as he was conducting, because it blew my mind that he'd want to continue in one when clearly it should have been two. I did that because I'd honestly stopped playing because my mind was just going, what the hell is he doing? So that was extremely frustrating, and I know he wasn't happy with it and saying he would work on things. Don't work on things; GO BACK TO WHAT YOU WERE DOING! Don't fix what ain't broke. Especially when this is supposed to be our showpiece song in Texas. Tweak it, sure; smooth out the rough edges; but don't reinvent the wheel six months into it. Seriously. What are you thinking?
I'm not sure if I'm looking forward to the parade, but at least I know I have no plans for Saturday and Sunday, and once I finish the parade I can go home and enjoy the rest of the day off. Of course, they're predicting rain, with a big yellow bullseye over where I'm marching, so it probably won't be that enjoyable. So long as we get through in one piece, we'll probably be fine.