The marching band is performing well and also enjoying their show, Director of Bands Chris Hoefflinger said. At times in the past, the students of the marching band were not enjoying their performances, he added.
The students did their best and he appreciated it, but they were not connected to the show, Hoefflinger said.
“I and my volunteer staff wanted to make sure that the students felt connected. They could feel bought in. It’s a very visceral show, and so that’s something that I think we succeeded very highly in that we made a show that the students could connect to while also being able to perform it at a high level,” Hoefflinger said.
The marching band placed second out of five in their Dublin Competition, drum major Aidan Quiroz, a junior, said.
“We had productive rehearsals leading up to it and we got rewarded for it,” Quiroz said.
The marching band placed third place out of three in their competition on the Nov. 16th competition at James Logan High School in Union City, Director of Bands Chris Hoefflinger said.
“It did not go as intended as we had power issues during the performance, Quiroz saidThe soundtrack that we had in the beginning cut out due to the lack of power in the venue, but overall, it went pretty well.”
At the Western Band Association (WBA) 4A/5A Grand Championships hosted in Fresno, the marching band placed 16th out of 19th, Quiroz said. The Marching Band was up against bands like James Logan and Chino Hills High School: renowned high schools in their marching bands, he said.
“Placement was not a big concern for most of us as we know that we are competing against some pretty fantastic schools,” Quiroz said. “Our satisfaction came from putting on the best possible show regardless of our placement. Nothing really went wrong honestly.”
This competition was especially special to the marching band being the last competition of the season, Quiroz said.
“Overall, it was a very emotional run-through of the show,” Quiroz said. “This season was very special to many of us,myself included, so seeing it come to a satisfying end meant a lot.”
To prepare for competitions, the marching band rehearses on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays, Hoefflinger said.
“We rehearse on the football field,” Hoefflinger said. “That’s kind of(the) main method, and we kind of make sure that we are teaching the material in a way that’s very approachable but starts to challenge the students a little bit, to make sure that we are definitely giving them something to really move forward with and achieve at a high level.”
Specifically, the woodwinds and brass section will warm up and then start their athletic breathing exercises, Hoefflinger said. Afterward, the marching band will start practicing their show, Hoefflinger said.
“We will take some of our parts of our show, and we’ll run those,” Hoefflinger said. “We’ll get a few reps on them and run through certain chunks of the show, give comments, and then we’ll put it all together with the rest of the ensemble. That includes snare drum, and the xylophone, and our color guard, and then we end off our rehearsal with a full run of the show.”
Band members could also work more on their communication, Quiroz said.
“About communication, it is pretty good, but you could always have more communication, more clarification, like responding to comments rather than just standing there, listening to it – having verbal responses to show that you actually understand what‘s going on, and you’re actively listening,” Quiroz said.
The marching band has a hierarchy system to deal with communication problems, Quiroz said.
“Within the marching band, we have section leaders, which are leaders of that same instrument group that would help keep the section in check,” Quiroz said. “So we would go up to the leaders, and then address the issues that we have been facing to them, and they would go to the members individually. So it goes down the hierarchy. It goes from the director, to the drum majors to the leaders to the individual members.
The high school’s marching band holds multiple positive attributes: their high level of trust in each other, their relatively smaller size, the higher number of experienced players, and good show writing, Nguyen said. The marching band’s relatively small size compared to competitors allows them to coordinate in a way that others could not, drumline section leader An Nguyen, a senior, said.
“As in the past years, our average scores have been increasing throughout the season. So we’re starting to build a name for ourselves. So I do see us winning again or winning in the future,” Quiroz said.