Life of a band member

Life+of+a+band+member

By 1 a.m Sunday morning, The Dragon band returned from an 18-hour day.

Their day began at 7 a.m with a show run-through before they boarded the buses to travel to the area competition at the Kelly Reeves stadium.There, they competed against 26 other bands for the right to advance to state. By the time they returned back to campus they were exhausted, but qualified for state. 

This is just one weekend out of eight that the band will use for competition. For members, band is a sacrifice and a labor of love. 

“Band is what my entire schedule is centered around,” senior Brindley Gable said. “Everything else, like work or church or clubs, has to fit with my band schedule or I won’t be able to do them because band is always my priority.”

Time management is key when it comes to band as students might have other band related activities. They have rehearsals outside of school and private lessons before, after, or during school.This causes band members to plan out when they can do homework, chores or other activities that aren’t band related. 

 “I’ve pretty much sacrificed the past seven years of my life to my instrument and my craft,” Gable said. “I also care about my instrument a lot so I’m willing to keep giving up that time. Also, adding conducting to my practice time since I’ve become a drum major has taken even more of my time, but it’s all worth it to me.”

Grand Nationals is the final competition that band members participate in. Facing schools from Texas and other states, this is the ultimate test for a marching band. Being able to participate in this competition the band must miss six days of school. One day is BOA San Antonio. They will miss Monday and Tuesday for UIL state and finally Wednesday through Sunday is Grand Nationals.This is not normal as these competitions don’t usually happen on the same year

“Normally we miss the last few days of the school week,” junior Nick Del Pozo said.“Then missing an entire week of school there is physically no time to do any of the home work we missed so it requires hours and late nights to make up all the time that we missed and this year the expectations of me are a lot higher as I’m also expected to do my job as a drum major 100 percent without making a single mistake.”