I jumped into Sunsick not knowing what to expect; I had very limited music theory training and zero experience writing music for a full band, so I knew I had a lot to learn before I could say I was done. On top of that was the challenge of pacing myself; while there were deadlines I had to meet throughout the months, I recognized early on that I had to keep up on this project, because I could be in over my head without realizing and no one would hold me accountable except for myself. I am quite proud of the maturity it’s taken to take on a project of this size and see it through largely on my own; those of us in the capstone program were warned initially that students often commit to the challenge and fail to follow through because of the lack of oversight. While I struggled, I made a plan and stuck to it, and I’m proud to see it done.
Additionally, I can say that I’m proud of creating a respectable piece of music! My writing skills couldn’t keep up with the ideas that I had laid out for myself, but with some peer-review I was able to present a finished score that outlined roughly what I had envisioned. There were plenty of times I found myself straying from the original plan, but I took it in stride and let myself have fun with the music. The band seemed to take to it really well, too, which warmed my heart. There is much room for improvement, yes, but it’s amateur. Amateur comes from the latin root amare, meaning to love -- I wrote it because I loved what I was doing. In this case, I’m proud of the process and the product.
As for things I would have done differently, there isn’t much. I would surely do more listening before I started writing to get a good handle on my stylistic influences -- one thing I wish I could say for Sunsick is who my models were and what exactly I intended to write. I also would have thought about specific musical goals for each section so that I could have a clearer idea of where to direct my band while working on it in class with them. Additionally, there is just never enough time in the day, and I wish I had more time to refine the piece, especially working with percussion. There is a depth to this tune that we were only able to scratch the surface of because of a short rehearsal time and other pressures like concert and festival.
In a more technical vein, I wish I had taken the time to write a complete piano reduction before exploding parts; it would have given me a better understanding of the development of the piece before I started to think about instrumentation, which I cobbled together along the way. If I were to do it again and start from a blank score -- something I had thought about doing when I hit a massive wall while writing -- I would probably have written a more cohesive composition that stuck to thematic elements and was more deliberate in its melodies. Having done it once, I would naturally be able to improve next time. I don’t regret how I wrote it, though, and I am ultimately very satisfied with the finished score and performance.
Sunsick, on the whole, is meant to be a tribute to the life I’ve lived here in Queen Creek. Conceptually, it’s about the explosion of life in the desert as the sun goes down; we hide away from the blistering heat of the afternoon and instead go about our business in the dark. After seventeen summers here, I can certainly speak to the heat-tolerant lifestyle you’re forced to adopt, and the relief offered by cool nights. The project lends musical elements to personify the creatures of the night; to give voice to the mourning dove, the coyote, the cricket, and illustrate their nighttime carousing. The piece has multiple sections depicting the progression of the night to take the audience on an engaging aural journey, and I hope to reach them with its central ideas of mischief and drunken jubilation.
Drawing inspiration from wildlife is a nod to my lifelong interest in the natural world. As a kid, I would catch lizards on the backyard fence and watch hummingbirds build nests outside of my window, among other things. Hiking and biking are two of my favorite activities; I actually brainstormed much of the piece while out on my bike, taking time to stop and listen to what I heard around me. Later, I’d go home and figure out how to translate it into usable musical vocabulary. I have always been fascinated by the outdoors and its residents, which is largely my reason for going into biology after high school. Sunsick’s themes are an acknowledgement of that, and an interpretive take on the ordinary.
On a deeper level, though, I found that Sunsick accomplished a lot of things for me. I don’t think I could have set myself up better to display everything I’ve learned as a musician in high school. Foremost is the musical aspect of the work; I’ve performed many, many pieces of literature, and regardless of formal music theory training have picked up on things I find interesting. Certain motifs, chord progressions, and turns of phrase from previous works I’ve played have influenced the way I wrote Sunsick. I’ve even gone so far as to directly incorporate quotes as little easter eggs throughout the six-and-a-half minute piece. For example, at the end of the ballad section, there is a haunting horn cadence that I ripped directly out of Hymn of Acxiom, my sophomore year marching ballad. I sought the counsel of educators I trusted while writing, but otherwise having total creative control to fulfill my wants as both a performer and a composer was incredibly liberating and just plain fun.
Another goal Sunsick has enabled me to reach is teaching. Through years of being a section leader and newly volunteering at a local middle school, I’ve discovered that I have a real passion for tutoring -- I love to work with people who care just as much as I do, or care enough to seek help. While getting in front of the class is daunting, it’s an exercise in trust, and gets to be incredibly rewarding. As I work with the band on preparing Sunsick for performance, I’m utilizing the people skills I’ve spent years honing. Finally, as secondary a skill as it is, I’m also able to incorporate what I’ve learned about conducting an ensemble onstage. I grappled with the option of whether to play Sunsick or conduct it, but I decided conducting it was a no-brainer. I play enough onstage, and I have other performance skills -- might as well use them.
Ultimately, Sunsick has lent itself both as a growth experience and an avenue to flex the skills I’ve picked up along the way. In spite of the burnout, I couldn’t be more proud of how it’s come along and how I’ve made it happen.
My extracurricular hours were all earned through activities I’ve done through marching band. I can confidently say that, in four years, the amount of time I have spent in band outside of normal school hours tallies well over one thousand hours. If anything, I’ve learned to manage my time extremely well between band, academics, and a personal life, because dates will run up on you in an instant if you’re just going through the motions. Having been involved in a lot of different groups competing for my time, I’ve learned that there are just never enough minutes in a day to get done all what you need to, and often time juggling those responsibilities means sacrifices. An analogy that I like to use when talking about triaging is to imagine you’re juggling glass and plastic balls; there will be times when you cannot juggle everything given to you at one time, and you might have to drop a plastic ball to catch a glass one. Which tasks are glass and which are plastic depend on how you prioritize them.
Ironically, what I learned through these extracurricular hours came from the time I had outside of them, which meant taking time for myself and for things that I found important, in order to allow myself to continue doing the things I love.
I’m something of a chimera; I’d consider myself equally both a student of music and of STEM. While science satisfies my curiosity and pursuit of learning, band has always been my balm. At the end of the day, when I need to unwind, I always find music to fall back on. The practice in itself is wondrous and creative; I cling to jazz like glue because it’s the ultimate creative outlet for me. Through improvisation I can speak my heart without saying anything -- there are nights, joyful nights and sad ones, where I just want to pick up my horn and play. Listening to great artists play (especially live, which is something COVID has taken from us) is an experience close to euphoria. It’s a beautiful language. There are rules, yes, but we learn them to break them, and the unspoken synergy between people playing music together is such a raw human experience that it will always be my escape.
In more concrete terms, though, I have always had band to rely on for structure. I can count on seeing people I love and doing something I enjoy at least twice a week after school. I’ve often heard the comment that band takes up so much time, and it’s true -- but those long hours are so gratifying when it’s something you love. I’ve picked up life skills like punctuality, discipline, cooperation, and dedication through my years in band, all in the pursuit of success. It has lent me a hunger that keeps me going through the greatest triumphs and hardest failures. I’ve not only been taught how to work for something, but how to work for the sake of work itself, both of which are equally universal skills that I am incredibly grateful for.
I often take it for granted, but the sense of community that this band has is incredibly touching. I’d be hard-pressed to find another 115 people that I can count on as I can the musicians I know now. We were always told, at the beginning of each marching season, that the friendships forged on this field last forever. At first, the freshmen don’t buy into it -- I didn’t either. But through hours-long bus rides, countless football games, 112° rehearsals, celebrations at Denny’s, endless speeches, perfect reps, terrible reps, and 6 AM call times, all while evading rainstorms, chasing runaway props, running laps, sweating, cheering, and crying together, there’s a tether strung between myself and every person I’ve ever marched with. In a year, in ten, I will still know all of these people as I know myself. That, in its purest form, is what band is about.
As an incoming college freshman whose major has nothing to do with music, this is a daunting idea. Biology is a rigorous course of study, and combined with honors college commitments, I will have to actively make time to indulge myself in the arts. I could in no way give up playing trombone on account of the joy it brings me, and I’m considering joining the ASU marching band to not only keep me up on my chops but also allow me to unwind in an environment that I’ve always loved. Many of my techs are ASU students or alumni with nothing but positive things to say about the program and the networking it allows you to do.
On networking, I’ve found that music people are my people -- nowhere else can you as reliably find people who care so much and are just on the other side of quirky as you can in a group of musicians. Being surrounded by music will give me opportunities to meet people to gig with casually, or find ways to make art together. Ultimately, my dream is to have a gig playing jazz trombone on the side.
Additionally, and somewhat bizarrely, I’ve come to find that I am very interested in ceramics. While this has nothing to do with my capstone project nor experiences throughout high school, I plan to join the ASU clay club. I’ve sustained interest in the visual and practical arts all my life through painting, embroidery, crocheting, drawing, and sculpting on my own time, and while I’ve never taken a class nor joined a club on any of these arts, I look forward to being able to develop a new skillset.
As a section leader, I’ve encountered this question a lot while working with freshmen and other rookies in band. Oftentimes, these kids have yet to develop the confidence to fail, which seems like a backwards concept, so I always try to lay it out to them like this:
You need to go out and get it. Everyone says it, but the four years you have here are not so long, and I promise you that there is no worse feeling than looking back and wishing so desperately you would have done something different. These “what if?”s will sneak up on you once it’s too late. We stay in our comfort zone because we are so afraid to try and still fall short of the mark. Failure is a practiced skill. Right now, you're 14, and you don't have it all figured out. You will absolutely fail at some point throughout high school, no matter how hard you try not to, and there is no better arena to practice what comes afterward than the arts.
Our go-to scenario is an audition; you can try really, really hard for a role or a chair and be denied it. After the disappointment and the tears and the ice cream, your knee-jerk reaction is to think all that work went for nothing. The beauty of the arts is that you’re wrong; those hours spent practicing and rehearsing do not just go away; nothing can strip you of the skills you honed in preparing for it. You’re better for even trying. Next time you try, it gets easier because you’ve already done it. It’s about the process, not the product, and nothing can teach you that except experience. So go get it! You have nothing to lose. You could not try at all and not get any better, you could try, fail, and be better for the work put in, or go out on a limb and consider that you try and you succeed.
I have an anecdote for that last one; I signed up for all-state jazz auditions my junior year because I just wanted to get better at jazz, with no expectation of making the group whatsoever. I put in the hours, auditioned, and thought that would be the end of it. After submitting the last component, I remember saying to my director that I was happy I did it and happy I was done. To find out days later that I actually made the group was completely astonishing -- I got to play with some of the best high school jazz musicians in the state and meet some really neat bigwigs in the jazz world. What I learned the most from? Not the festival, not the award, but the audition.
Everyone has the potential to succeed, but potential is such a dirty word. It’s skill that hasn’t been refined yet. Putting in the work now will undoubtedly make you better for the next challenge, and that is something that will stick with you for your whole life. To make the most of it, you have to try, fail, and ask yourself what comes next. That will make you the best version of yourself.
This is a hefty concept to put on somebody, especially those fresh out of failure. It’s no insta-cure for disappointment and hardly a gentle pick-up. I reiterate this advice often because it’s the running philosophy of all of my most influential mentors, as they reiterate it often to me. In the simple words of my director Newt Wilson, excellence is not an act, but a habit.