By Krystal Smalley
ksmalley@wbcowqel.com
The Wynford marching band may have been dealt a tough hand recently but the students believed that has just made them stronger for it.
Matthew Safford, who has taught band programs at three schools over the past 17 years, took over as marching band director in the fall of 2014 and since then, it’s been a learning curve for both him and his students.
“There’s both a good and bad,” Safford said about taking over a program that was helmed by a longtime director. “Good in that there’s a nice established routine, it’s comfortable for you in that regard but bad because you don’t know the routine yet.”
It took Safford a bit to catch up to the routine that most of his students already knew but he has settled in nicely.
“I’ve done things a certain way for many, many years – it’s not like that everywhere and I respect what’s come before me,” Safford said. “I enjoy it; it’s a challenge. Even if the kids might have difficulty with how you do things – maybe it’s a little bit different – they’re respectful. They make things a lot easier,”
Forty-seven students made up the high school marching band for the 2015 season, a number that has fluctuated some over the last decade. Safford sees those numbers growing in the coming years, however, as a portion of the junior high band – 53 members this year – move on to high school.
“It’s a work in progress. We’re still learning but we’re getting there. We’ve got great things in the future; the numbers are up and should be up a little more next year,” he said.
Safford teaches his students how to perform roll steps, a form of marching that controls the upper body, alongside complex, asymmetrical drills. Those skills, Safford believed, only enhanced the other areas that a marching band lends itself to.
“Not only do we teach the same things kids will learn in athletics – teamwork, the sense that everyone can contribute to the greater good – but we also have the aspect (that) we’re teaching language arts skills, we’re reinforcing those skills. We’re reinforcing mathematics skills by counting, diagnosing, reading rhythms. It’s absolutely essential and I recommend that anybody and everybody, if they can be in a music program, they need to be in a music program.”
“It’s hard to find a bad aspect of marching band,” said junior tuba player Caleb Rettig.
He thought that memorization of music and the roll step are two of the toughest things to learn.
“When you’re marching you have to keep your upper body completely level and not bounce around at all to keep a steady airstream going through the instrument so there’s not a really big waver in your sound,” Rettig described.
Senior Aryn Copeland, who can often be found playing nearly any type of instrument but settled with the trumpet this year, said challenges come in different forms for every instrument.
“When you’re playing percussion, it’s sometimes hard to stay in step and play the cadence at the same time,” she explained. “When you’re a wind instrument, like Caleb said, when you’re playing it’s hard to keep a steady airstream.”
Fellow senior Loagan Neal, a clarinet player, added that it’s hard every year, especially when new band members join the ranks.
“You’re always struggling with (the beat) every single year,” Neal said. “I’ve messed up every year. Year after year it gets easier and easier but there’s always that struggle of staying in step.”
Nevertheless, Copeland said marching band provides students with a lot of opportunities, like being able to play in honor bands or the state fair band, while Neal believed there’s not a moment that can singularly describe what makes being in the marching band so great.
“It’s not just one single moment you can pin it down to,” explained Neal. “There’s the very first game; there’s the exhilaration that every student gets with it being their first game, especially with the underclassmen . . . there’s no one point to pinpoint to make it the most.”
She knew exactly which moment is the hardest, however.
“It’s exhilarating for their very last game because of the fact that it’s the last game of your senior year. You’re never going to have this moment again,” Neal said.
Copeland said her favorite moment was during her freshman year when they did an Olympics show.
“The moment, the very first sound that came out – as a freshman in my first show, everything just kind of clicked and everything was just perfect in that moment,” Copeland said.
“I’m the only tube player this year,” Rettig said. “I find that during the third quarter when we go over to meet the other marching band, I have a group of people who search me out of the crowd . . . it’s like, ‘wait you play tuba? We’re friends now.’”
“Each section, whether it be from one school or multiple, they’re just all basically one big, giant family when it comes to third quarter chow time,” Neal said.
Copeland and Neal agreed that the Marching Royals have formed a family, especially as it dealt with a new band director coming in unexpectedly.
“We’ve been through a lot together and we all stick it out with each other. A determined family,” Neal concluded.