Middle School Honor Band Festival
The NEIBA Middle School Honor Band Festival will be held on Saturday, December 3rd at Oelwein High School, and you are strongly encouraged to participate in this fine event! Nomination rules and forms will be available through the NEIBA email list. We will email the membership when these are available. The guest conductors for 2022 are Debb Dunn (retired from Waukee MS) and Shawn Sandersfeld (retired from Excelsior MS).
The deadline for submissions is Monday, October 10th, and the selection committee will meet on Sunday, October 16th. Music folders for selected students will be delivered by your West Music representative. A description of the audition process and schedule of events for the day is included in the folders for students. Directors will receive a list of etudes that will be used for the All-Iowa Eighth grade honor band auditions which take place on the same day (Saturday, December 3rd).
Please contact me at vshanley@crschools.us if you have any questions.
Thank you!
Val Shanley
NEIBA Middle School Honor Band Chair
Links to nominations and registration will be sent via NEIBA News in the Fall. If you are a registered director of NEIBA, you should be receiving NEIBA News.
Reminder - you must be a registered, active member of both NEIBA and IBA to nominate students.
Questions? Email neibasecretary@gmail.com
All-Iowa 8th Grade Honor Band Audition Process
All 8th graders who are accepted to the District NEIBA Honor Band will have the opportunity to audition for the All-Iowa 8th Grade Honor band, which is held at the Iowa Bandmasters Association conference in May at the Des Moines Marriott.
Each district in Iowa will select 22 of their finest musicians to attend. This year's instrumentation will be added at the bottom of this page when it is available. Starting in 2017, students playing Eb alto clarinet will no longer be accepted into the All-Iowa 8th Grade Honor Band. They must play either Bb clarinet or Bb bass clarinet if they wish to audition for the All-Iowa Band.
Audition processes vary from district to district, but here in NEIBA, directors of students accepted into the District Honor Band will receive a list of etudes by instrument that students will learn if they wish to audition for the All-Iowa 8th Grade Honor Band. It is the director's responsibility to provide that etude to the student.
On the day of the honor band in December, students will complete their chair auditions with an auditor. At that time, any 8th grader wishing to audition for the All-Iowa Honor Band will have the opportunity to play the etudes for the chair auditor.
Auditors will select an "alternate" for each section provided there are enough students who audition who are capable of playing the etudes. Alternates are a way of recognizing students who play well enough to be selected but do not make it due to number constraints, and can be called upon to fill in students in other districts with shortage areas or if it is discovered that an accepted student cannot participate.
Accepted students and alternates will be announced at the District Honor Band concert that evening. Please contact Mike Davies mdavies@crprairie.org or Val Shanley at vshanley@crschools.us with questions.