Marching Band Leadership Training: Week Three

Parkwood Band Leaders Work Together to Create Innovative Solutions to Unique Problems

Welcome to this week's training. This week, we are going to go over the last two habits and continue preparing our leadership applications. I will publish the forms that you need for these applications on Thursday, and you will have until Wednesday, May 27 to submit your completed materials.

This week's format is going to look slightly different. I'm going to publish all of the materials for habit six Tuesday, as there is a unique project that will help us with our marching band planning for next year that might take a little longer to work on. On Thursday, we will attack habit seven, which is simpler and will not take much time on your part. We are going to focus this week on creating innovative solutions. We have already done this some, but the two habits that we are studying this week really give us the opportunity to look creatively at our situation and work together to create solutions to new problems. I will also publish videos to help you in preparing for your final leadership application throughout the week, just like I did last week.

Habit 6: Synergize

I have a confession to make. I hate buzz words. Do you know what I mean? Buzz words are words or phrases that are fashionable at a particular time or in a particular context. Synergize is one of these terms. I have never fully liked talking about it, but I have recently seen a video that changed my perspective on the topic. Watch this video to see what I mean.

The people in this video were in a unique, altogether undesirable situation. However, they were able to synergize to create a unique solution. When we synergize, we work along with people who have different points of view to create unique solutions. In the situation provided in the video, "resources" (or what we would consider to be resources) were limited. Through working together and sharing unique perspectives, they discovered ways to make instruments, allowing students to create the orchestra. Given the same set or circumstances, many of us would simply have given up and given in to our surroundings. Because the people of this town were willing to synergize, they were able to improve their situation far more than they could have done individually.

Now, imagine our current situation. We are in an incredibly uncertain situation. It would be easy in this situation to give up and give in to our circumstance. However, the beautiful thing is that we have each other, and we have each of our perspectives. We need to synergize now more than ever to help make this year a success. We need to value each others opinions and openly work together to make our season even more successful, which leads me to one final thought on this matter. The more that I think forward to our new year, the more I realize that we need to have a second option for our show. Typically, I design our marching band programs by myself and then ask for feedback and suggestions, but if I am really going to synergize with you all, I feel that we might need to take a different direction this year.

This is where you come in. I want your help choosing music and a theme so that if we need to change marching band shows, we can all buy in to our new theme and can make a real impact in our performances. Throughout our previous leadership sessions, we have expressed that we would like to create a deeper connection with other students at our school (particularly our student section at football games). I believe that we can do this while creating this "second show" by using popular music and a timely theme to engage our audience, but I don't know how to do this by myself. I don't know what music students your age would respond to hearing, and I feel too disconnected to know what type of theme our student body would respond to. I want your help to create this. Here is how we are going to do this. I have posted a two links below. One of the videos will take you to the site that I normally use to purchase music from (JW Pepper). The second video will take you to a video of how to access music on this site that is specific to marching band. I want you to find a minimum one piece of music that you would like to use in a popular music based marching band show next year. If you want to find more, that is awesome! When you find a piece, take the time to listen to the arrangement. If there is more than one arrangement of the song you are considering, listen to them all and determine which one sounds the best. You will submit the name and composer of the piece to me along with a link to where you found it and a potential theme that you would see working with this specific piece. On Tuesday, we will spend part of our time in our final leadership planning session discussing the pieces and themes that we are considering. Mrs. Lachenmayr and I will make the final choices as to what music ends up going in this show, but I want us all to contribute the show planning and music picking process.

JW Pepper

Video on how to Access Music

Form to Submit Responses

Performance/Project Guide Day #3

Drum Major Candidates

A reminder of what you will have to complete for your audition and a few videos for you to continue watching

Score

Recording

Video #7

Video #8

Section Leader/Captain Candidates Candidates

Remember to continue to work on your solo for your audition. You will need to submit a link to a recording of your playing your brief solo.

Logistics & Equipment Team Candidates

To be considered for a placement on the logistics and equipment team or to be the chief of either of these teams, you will be asked to create a project that you will take on for the upcoming marching band season. I have mentioned this briefly before, but I want to add on one additional layer this time. Start beginning to think of the specifics of your project. For example, what materials will you need? How much time will you need to complete the project? Will you need other people to help you complete your project? What supplies will you need for your project? Why is this project needed? There will be a space on your application for you to submit this information. I will consider your project more seriously if you provide me with a variety of details about the project, but I will not require you to provide any details at all. I want you to show me your ability to fully think through a project without assistance and have a plan to see your project through to completion.

Habit 7: Sharpen the Saw

As this training period has progressed, I have become more and more convinced that we have been a six habit band for the past two years. We have focused on planning, working, and doing whatever is necessary to be successful, but we haven't focused on habit 7. Our work habits have been incredible, but we have not been taking the time to make sure that we are renewed. We have made some small moves in this area, but we need to fully consider if there are areas including this habit that we can improve upon.

Habit 7 asks us to consider what we are doing to renew four key areas of our lives: physical, social/emotional, mental, and spiritual. Below are some actions that can be used to help improve these four areas:

Before I go any further, I want to make sure that you will mistake my intention for something that it is not. I do not think it is appropriate to try and establish myself as your "advisor" in any of these areas. Rather, I would like to find ways that we can corporately make gains by improving our physical, social/emotional, mental, and spiritual selves. I do not seek to be an advisor but a guide and a participant along with you.

We have slightly begun to address the physical and mental states of our band members over the past two years through the institution of required Study Hall and PT. I want to continue to pursue these areas with our band members. I want to also consider what can we do to improve our social/emotional self and our spiritual self. We have made suggestions this week about including regular band meetings to help address issues within the ensemble. I think this would help with the social aspects of band some, but I think that we need to continue to look further to consider how we might help make an impact on the social health of our band (I'm not saying we should be the metaphorical "life of the party", but rather how do we help every band member feel like they have a social home in our organization).

Additional, I feel that we should consider adding a service aspect to our marching band program. Other parts of spiritual development can/should take place outside of the band hall, but I feel that we could begin to look into a service component to help improve our spirit and increase our dedication to our school.

There won't be a "reflection assignment" for this training, but I want you to think about this along with me. During our meeting next Tuesday, I want to take time to see if we can talk about this habit and get your thoughts about how to improve our band program as a whole by "sharpening our saw".

Application Form

Now for the moment of truth. The form below will ask you to consider our entire training to show us how you will be a highly effective leader in our band program. I believe that you all are ready to step up into leadership of our band. Use this application as a way to showcase your thoughts, skills, and understanding of leadership. I will close this form on Wednesday, May 27 at 11:59 PM.

Good Luck! Remember, I believe in you!

Final 2020 Marching Band Leadership Application Form

Synchronous Planning Session #3