![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Week 17: A Banner Year
Dec. 14th, 2025 05:20 pmThis is one of my entries for Week 17 of LJ Idol: The Wheel of Chaos. This is our Portfolio week, which involves a couple original entries plus some other things. Here's the link back to My Portfolio Page. This entry tackles the prompt, "Banner Year."
(If viewing this entry on your phone, turn it sideways for the best view of the photos.)
Like heavy-footed kangaroos, the members of my son's competition marching band bounce down the metal stands to the field. Usually at the end of a competition, only the drum majors and section leaders go down to represent the band for results. But today was the season-ending championship, and the announcer has invited all band members to the sidelines to support their leaders and watch results.
My husband and I remain in the stands, along with a handful of adults from the other bands. We've been the voluntary "stand parents" throughout the season: keeping the band company in the stands after their performance, just in case they needed any adult help or guidance.
This has been my son's first year in the competition marching band.* Watching him from the sidelines reminds me of my own days in high school marching band.
"I need to figure out how to make a C-3PO costume," he told me, one sweaty day after band camp. In response to my questioning look, he explained: "Each section will be dressing according to a theme on Thursday. The trumpets are dressing like Star Wars, and I'm going to be C-3PO."
We brainstormed for possible ways to pull off such a costume in the dog days of summer without sweating to the point of heat stroke. After consulting with a crafty friend, we settled on a yellow T-shirt and yellow shorts, with added-on cut felt to imitate the droid's physique.
KFP dressed as C-3PO, in yellow t-shirt and shorts, with felt affixed to resemble C-3PO's torso, and with one white and one gold sock to indicate his two-toned legs.
That Thursday, when I picked him up at the end of the day, he regaled me with stories about the different groups. The trumpet section's "Star War" costumes were a hit: complete with Princess Leia, Yoda, Darth Vader, and even BB-8.
In addition, he related, the practice field was full of color and whimsy, with characters from "Family Guy," "Peter Pan," "Scooby Doo," and "Clue," along with cowboys and a whole flute section of Tinkerbells.
Despite the exhausting heat, he related, that day transformed into one of playful camaraderie. They were no longer trudging through to their marks but gliding in character.
While it would have been far easier to dress as Alice in Wonderland, that connection was a little too much on-the-nose for me. Our director had encouraged us to wear costumes for our participation in the annual Halloween parade in a nearby town. I was going as the Mad Hatter.
For my costume, I'd studied the original illustrations by Sir John Tenniel. I got myself an oversized top hat, affixing the label reading "In this style 10/6." In addition, I wore an oversized shirt to resemble his ill-fitting suit jacket, and tied a polka-dot tie around my neck. As I remember, my mom helped me make one out of painted cardboard and elastic.
Because I lived in a time before Instagram, I'm not entirely certain there were ever any photos of my fabulous costume. But I know that, of all the costumes I wore in high school, that one was my favorite.
I didn't care that people had no idea who I was, as I ran around insisting that 'We're all mad here" and asking people why a raven was like a writing desk.
My best friend, who was in the color guard and dressed as a black cat, followed me around, purring and mewing until even those who had no idea what was happening joined in on the fun, acting in character as Frankenstein's monster, or a witch, or a heavy metal star. We rocked that parade!
The announcer makes her way through the results for each division, and we shuffle our feet in the cold and clap for everyone. As the bands, in turn, receive their results, their contingents of band leaders salute and step forward, to cheers from their band mates.
Gradually, the announcer works through the smallest divisions to reach our school's division, Liberty A, for bands with 51 to 70 students. As far as I can remember, that's roughly the size that my marching band was, as well, although it felt larger at the time.
The announcer reads out the rankings, starting with 15th place. For each, she reads the scores, along with any special awards that group won. We know the competition is tight, as this comprises not only the bands my son's band has already competed against this season, but also some they've never met. While his band has always done well, today, they were competing in a much larger pool.
As the announcer makes it to 10th place, and creeping higher, the scores climb, as well. We know that the previous week, we'd been in the high 80s, and the scores soon overcome that mark. No matter where we land now, we've improved.
My husband and I cross our fingers and wait while the band, barely visible across the field, stomp their feet in anticipation.
Competition marching band today has changed in key ways since I was a high school student 40 years ago. Our shows resembled the kind of half-time shows that college bands still perform, with precision marching between set forms, playing traditional marching band instruments.
Even then, the practices and expectations were changing. One year, for example, we used an amplifier in order to allow a piccolo player (also our drum major) to play a solo during a John Philip Sousa piece. (Our band director was a huge Sousa fan). Other bands sometimes threw in fun moments, like a dancing drum line. But those were the exceptions, not the rule.
Now, all these years later, inspired by innovative techniques and driven by a new generation of directors, the field performances most closely resemble a theatrical performance. Nearly every band wheeled out set pieces that sometimes acted as mere backdrops and sometimes became a part of the action, such as a pirate ship that could be stood on by members of the color guard. Often, band members would dance while playing or move between their marks either at double-time or with dramatic movements, such as lunging like zombies for a show set in a world overcome with those monsters.
The use of traditional marching band instruments has also been augmented. Some bands used amplifiers to play sound effects, or recorded narration, or to allow them to field an electric guitarist and bassist, for example.
My son's band performed a show called "Desperado," with a cowboy theme that included wooden fences that could be wheeled around. They wore black cowboy hats and western-style shirts with their black uniform pants. The color guard wore pink hats and a fabulous pink and purple jumpsuit with dramatic white blousey sleeves.
At the beginning of the show, many of the band members danced without their instruments, modern style, with graceful reaching arms, telling a story with their entire bodies. My son was one of this group and was proud to have been picked. He and his partner in the color guard appear in a photograph that was published by the Cavalcade of Bands, who run the competitions.
As my son explained, the story was a day in the life of a Western town, with a welcoming open number, active midday -- including a trombone solo with color guard framing the soloist with pink fans -- and finally, an end to the day, where everyone falls down again, asleep.
My son leans on one of the wooden fences, while his dance partner stands on it from behind with one foot on the bottom rung, one knee resting on the middle rung, and her large pink fan poised in her right hand.
My son relates another fun memory from the year, where they were practicing their field show. One of the trumpets made her way towards a chair that marked where one of the fences would be and, in a moment of whimsy, tried to vault the chair but collapsed on the ground instead.
Hearing about this later, one of the freshman trumpet players scoffed that vaulting a chair was easy. He tried to do so and also failed spectacularly. Seeing this, one of the tallest trumpet players announced he would jump up onto the chair in a squat. He, too, failed.
My son, not to be deterred by the previous failures, took his own shot at jumping onto the chair in a squat. "It was easy," he told me. That, however, was when the drum major took notice of what the trumpet line had been doing and shouted at them to "Stop jumping on chairs."
Sheepishly, they returned to their line, finding it very hard to play with smiles stretching across their faces.
I know we worked very hard on our routines and took competition seriously, but I'll be honest that I have no clear memory of any scores or standings. Instead, I remember moments like the one my son shared with me: silly jokes, shared between band mates.
Buying "Happy Meals" at a McDonald's on the way to a competition and playing with the toys in the bus aisles.
My friend and I making our fingers dance like can-can dancers on the back of the bus seat.
Crushing on one of my fellow clarinet players, and then finding out a different clarinet player was crushing on me. (He was a nice guy, but was relegated to friend material by my adolescent brain.)
Some of the more entertaining moments on the field, such as the show where we got to pull little flags out of sleeves and wave them in a pattern. Or "Fanfare of the Common Man," where our trumpet soloist always blew the judges away.
Or stories people would relate of judges being so close to them on the field that they nearly had to run over them to make their marks. (These days, I've been told, judges stay more to the sidelines to avoid collisions, which happened more often than you'd think.)
Along with the camaraderie, marching band heralded my growing awareness that I could be myself, as silly or as different as I wanted to be, and be accepted. Along the way, I developed newfound independence and confidence. I think for many of us, band was our safe space.
The announcer gets closer to the top. Whatever they get now, they've well-surpassed their original scores this season. I think of that first show, when they all seemed green and uncertain, compared with tonight's performance, where they hit their marks with precision. Their dance routines seemed more heartfelt than ever before, and the music both powerful and sweet.
So as the numbers climbed higher, and as they surpassed some bands they'd lost to in earlier competitions, our excitement grew. Then, the announcer said, "Placing 4th in the Liberty A division, scoring a 93.563," and read the name of our son's high school. Even from the stands, we could see the explosion of cheers and bouncing brown-pink-and-black figures.
The band director and assistant band director, who'd joined us in the stands, told us it was the best the school had done in nearly 10 years!
After all the competition results were delivered, the announcer invited all the bands to run onto the field and celebrate with their band leaders. Which, of course, they did. And since we were no longer needed that evening, the band director dismissed my husband and me. We walked through the cold November air on our creaky middle-aged legs, full of joy for the young people running like gazelles across the white-lined green field, riding waves of friendship, self-confidence, and excitement.
At left is me in my sophomore year of high school, wearing my black and orange band uniform and holding my clarinet. At right is my son, KFP, who's currently a sophomore, wearing his red and black band uniform and holding his trumpet.
* Unlike many other schools, my son's high school has two distinct marching ensembles. The football marching band is mandatory for anyone who will perform in the concert band the rest of the year. There are also color guard, who take the course as an elective, I believe. The football marching band learns a traditional half-time show, marching in formation to music. They participate in a couple community activities, as well, including an annual parade and performing at the Memorial Day ceremonies.
The competition marching band is voluntary and treated as an extracurricular activity instead of a class. There are additional practices, including an additional week of summer band camp. They learn a separate marching show, which is more theatrical and uses props, set pieces, and special uniforms. Throughout the competition season, they compete against other bands of similar size, gaining points that dictate their start for later competitions. For each performance, they receive points for Music, Visual, and General Effect, with penalties subtracted.
(If viewing this entry on your phone, turn it sideways for the best view of the photos.)
Like heavy-footed kangaroos, the members of my son's competition marching band bounce down the metal stands to the field. Usually at the end of a competition, only the drum majors and section leaders go down to represent the band for results. But today was the season-ending championship, and the announcer has invited all band members to the sidelines to support their leaders and watch results.
My husband and I remain in the stands, along with a handful of adults from the other bands. We've been the voluntary "stand parents" throughout the season: keeping the band company in the stands after their performance, just in case they needed any adult help or guidance.
This has been my son's first year in the competition marching band.* Watching him from the sidelines reminds me of my own days in high school marching band.
~~~
"I need to figure out how to make a C-3PO costume," he told me, one sweaty day after band camp. In response to my questioning look, he explained: "Each section will be dressing according to a theme on Thursday. The trumpets are dressing like Star Wars, and I'm going to be C-3PO."
We brainstormed for possible ways to pull off such a costume in the dog days of summer without sweating to the point of heat stroke. After consulting with a crafty friend, we settled on a yellow T-shirt and yellow shorts, with added-on cut felt to imitate the droid's physique.
KFP dressed as C-3PO, in yellow t-shirt and shorts, with felt affixed to resemble C-3PO's torso, and with one white and one gold sock to indicate his two-toned legs.
That Thursday, when I picked him up at the end of the day, he regaled me with stories about the different groups. The trumpet section's "Star War" costumes were a hit: complete with Princess Leia, Yoda, Darth Vader, and even BB-8.
In addition, he related, the practice field was full of color and whimsy, with characters from "Family Guy," "Peter Pan," "Scooby Doo," and "Clue," along with cowboys and a whole flute section of Tinkerbells.
Despite the exhausting heat, he related, that day transformed into one of playful camaraderie. They were no longer trudging through to their marks but gliding in character.
~~~
While it would have been far easier to dress as Alice in Wonderland, that connection was a little too much on-the-nose for me. Our director had encouraged us to wear costumes for our participation in the annual Halloween parade in a nearby town. I was going as the Mad Hatter.
For my costume, I'd studied the original illustrations by Sir John Tenniel. I got myself an oversized top hat, affixing the label reading "In this style 10/6." In addition, I wore an oversized shirt to resemble his ill-fitting suit jacket, and tied a polka-dot tie around my neck. As I remember, my mom helped me make one out of painted cardboard and elastic.
Because I lived in a time before Instagram, I'm not entirely certain there were ever any photos of my fabulous costume. But I know that, of all the costumes I wore in high school, that one was my favorite.
I didn't care that people had no idea who I was, as I ran around insisting that 'We're all mad here" and asking people why a raven was like a writing desk.
My best friend, who was in the color guard and dressed as a black cat, followed me around, purring and mewing until even those who had no idea what was happening joined in on the fun, acting in character as Frankenstein's monster, or a witch, or a heavy metal star. We rocked that parade!
~~~
The announcer makes her way through the results for each division, and we shuffle our feet in the cold and clap for everyone. As the bands, in turn, receive their results, their contingents of band leaders salute and step forward, to cheers from their band mates.
Gradually, the announcer works through the smallest divisions to reach our school's division, Liberty A, for bands with 51 to 70 students. As far as I can remember, that's roughly the size that my marching band was, as well, although it felt larger at the time.
The announcer reads out the rankings, starting with 15th place. For each, she reads the scores, along with any special awards that group won. We know the competition is tight, as this comprises not only the bands my son's band has already competed against this season, but also some they've never met. While his band has always done well, today, they were competing in a much larger pool.
As the announcer makes it to 10th place, and creeping higher, the scores climb, as well. We know that the previous week, we'd been in the high 80s, and the scores soon overcome that mark. No matter where we land now, we've improved.
My husband and I cross our fingers and wait while the band, barely visible across the field, stomp their feet in anticipation.
~~~
Competition marching band today has changed in key ways since I was a high school student 40 years ago. Our shows resembled the kind of half-time shows that college bands still perform, with precision marching between set forms, playing traditional marching band instruments.
Even then, the practices and expectations were changing. One year, for example, we used an amplifier in order to allow a piccolo player (also our drum major) to play a solo during a John Philip Sousa piece. (Our band director was a huge Sousa fan). Other bands sometimes threw in fun moments, like a dancing drum line. But those were the exceptions, not the rule.
Now, all these years later, inspired by innovative techniques and driven by a new generation of directors, the field performances most closely resemble a theatrical performance. Nearly every band wheeled out set pieces that sometimes acted as mere backdrops and sometimes became a part of the action, such as a pirate ship that could be stood on by members of the color guard. Often, band members would dance while playing or move between their marks either at double-time or with dramatic movements, such as lunging like zombies for a show set in a world overcome with those monsters.
The use of traditional marching band instruments has also been augmented. Some bands used amplifiers to play sound effects, or recorded narration, or to allow them to field an electric guitarist and bassist, for example.
My son's band performed a show called "Desperado," with a cowboy theme that included wooden fences that could be wheeled around. They wore black cowboy hats and western-style shirts with their black uniform pants. The color guard wore pink hats and a fabulous pink and purple jumpsuit with dramatic white blousey sleeves.
At the beginning of the show, many of the band members danced without their instruments, modern style, with graceful reaching arms, telling a story with their entire bodies. My son was one of this group and was proud to have been picked. He and his partner in the color guard appear in a photograph that was published by the Cavalcade of Bands, who run the competitions.
As my son explained, the story was a day in the life of a Western town, with a welcoming open number, active midday -- including a trombone solo with color guard framing the soloist with pink fans -- and finally, an end to the day, where everyone falls down again, asleep.
My son leans on one of the wooden fences, while his dance partner stands on it from behind with one foot on the bottom rung, one knee resting on the middle rung, and her large pink fan poised in her right hand.
~~~
My son relates another fun memory from the year, where they were practicing their field show. One of the trumpets made her way towards a chair that marked where one of the fences would be and, in a moment of whimsy, tried to vault the chair but collapsed on the ground instead.
Hearing about this later, one of the freshman trumpet players scoffed that vaulting a chair was easy. He tried to do so and also failed spectacularly. Seeing this, one of the tallest trumpet players announced he would jump up onto the chair in a squat. He, too, failed.
My son, not to be deterred by the previous failures, took his own shot at jumping onto the chair in a squat. "It was easy," he told me. That, however, was when the drum major took notice of what the trumpet line had been doing and shouted at them to "Stop jumping on chairs."
Sheepishly, they returned to their line, finding it very hard to play with smiles stretching across their faces.
~~~
I know we worked very hard on our routines and took competition seriously, but I'll be honest that I have no clear memory of any scores or standings. Instead, I remember moments like the one my son shared with me: silly jokes, shared between band mates.
Buying "Happy Meals" at a McDonald's on the way to a competition and playing with the toys in the bus aisles.
My friend and I making our fingers dance like can-can dancers on the back of the bus seat.
Crushing on one of my fellow clarinet players, and then finding out a different clarinet player was crushing on me. (He was a nice guy, but was relegated to friend material by my adolescent brain.)
Some of the more entertaining moments on the field, such as the show where we got to pull little flags out of sleeves and wave them in a pattern. Or "Fanfare of the Common Man," where our trumpet soloist always blew the judges away.
Or stories people would relate of judges being so close to them on the field that they nearly had to run over them to make their marks. (These days, I've been told, judges stay more to the sidelines to avoid collisions, which happened more often than you'd think.)
Along with the camaraderie, marching band heralded my growing awareness that I could be myself, as silly or as different as I wanted to be, and be accepted. Along the way, I developed newfound independence and confidence. I think for many of us, band was our safe space.
~~~
The announcer gets closer to the top. Whatever they get now, they've well-surpassed their original scores this season. I think of that first show, when they all seemed green and uncertain, compared with tonight's performance, where they hit their marks with precision. Their dance routines seemed more heartfelt than ever before, and the music both powerful and sweet.
So as the numbers climbed higher, and as they surpassed some bands they'd lost to in earlier competitions, our excitement grew. Then, the announcer said, "Placing 4th in the Liberty A division, scoring a 93.563," and read the name of our son's high school. Even from the stands, we could see the explosion of cheers and bouncing brown-pink-and-black figures.
The band director and assistant band director, who'd joined us in the stands, told us it was the best the school had done in nearly 10 years!
After all the competition results were delivered, the announcer invited all the bands to run onto the field and celebrate with their band leaders. Which, of course, they did. And since we were no longer needed that evening, the band director dismissed my husband and me. We walked through the cold November air on our creaky middle-aged legs, full of joy for the young people running like gazelles across the white-lined green field, riding waves of friendship, self-confidence, and excitement.
At left is me in my sophomore year of high school, wearing my black and orange band uniform and holding my clarinet. At right is my son, KFP, who's currently a sophomore, wearing his red and black band uniform and holding his trumpet.
* Unlike many other schools, my son's high school has two distinct marching ensembles. The football marching band is mandatory for anyone who will perform in the concert band the rest of the year. There are also color guard, who take the course as an elective, I believe. The football marching band learns a traditional half-time show, marching in formation to music. They participate in a couple community activities, as well, including an annual parade and performing at the Memorial Day ceremonies.
The competition marching band is voluntary and treated as an extracurricular activity instead of a class. There are additional practices, including an additional week of summer band camp. They learn a separate marching show, which is more theatrical and uses props, set pieces, and special uniforms. Throughout the competition season, they compete against other bands of similar size, gaining points that dictate their start for later competitions. For each performance, they receive points for Music, Visual, and General Effect, with penalties subtracted.
