Good weekend.

Yeah, it was a pretty good weekend for the Bushwackers. The usual "trials and tribulations" aside, the corps is progressing nicely, and the show is really going to bring the house down.

Part 3 in our show, "Great Lover/Times Square" is some of the most challenging music we've probably ever done in a lot of ways. It's not so much the amount of notes, but the control and maturity needed to pull off the complex layering and voicing. It's pretty well written, although in very strange time signatures. For instance, instead of being in 2/4 or 4/4, it's in cut time (which right away makes most non-musician drum corps type's heads explode)...so everything is twice as fast. Then, for fun, bars of 2/4 and 3/4 are thrown in.

What this basically means is that the quarter notes in the 2/4 and 3/4 are REALLY fast, and basically equivalent to the 8th note in cut time. That means that the 2/4 bar is counted like a 1/4 bar and the 3/4 is counted like 3/8. FUN!

For the purposes of this example, C = cut time while + equals "and":

C, 2/4, C, 3/4 becomes, in effect a bar of 4/4 and a bar of 5/8.

or subdivided as 1+, 2+, 3+, 4+, 5+, 6+a (triplet feel)

Very strange...and the 3/4 bars keep moving around in the phrasing, so it's hard to paternize (not a real word, but it means take all of these time changes and turn them into conducting patterns that can be read easily by the members) the whole thing, which is what I have to do. During this part of the show, a trumpet quartet plays a fun phrase with the above C, 2/4, C, 3/4 pattern, answered by the snares in a differently counted phrase. Next, the low brass plays a similar lick to the trumpet quartet, followed by a completely different phrase by the basses, cymbals, and tenors...counted like two 7/8 bars. Then all hell breaks lose.

It's very difficult for everyone, especially when I'm still having some issues with the end and I'm not completely able to give the kind of cues and huge downbeats that everyone is used to getting from me for entrances. Everyone is on the hook for counting and being right. It's a little scary, but fun. It's like "extreme drum corps"...but like everything else, we'll beat the crap out of it and own it. There will be no questions...it will just happen, and it will never tear.

We did a parade this weekend as well, which was fine. Generally, I hate parades. It's not the marching in them that I hate, but the entire concept...but the crowd was very nice and very appreciative. It was also short, so Milburn gets an A+ in my book for parades!

The rest of the weekend was an internal battle within myself. In addition to being the drum major, I'm also on the brass and visual staffs for the drum corps. That's all well and good, and I like being useful all of the time...however I need to be everywhere at once, and I am constantly faced with the decision as to whether or not I should, for instance, go with the drum line during sectionals because that's what a good drum major SHOULD do, or do I go with the brass and teach. When Joe Exley (caption head) isn't there, it's a no brainer. I'm with the brass breaking things down and getting results. When he is there, I feel the pull to be a good drum major and do what I need to do to get myself and my fellow members ready to perform.

And here is another lesson that all drum majors should learn. You should spend FAR much more time with the drum line than with the horn line. Why? Who's the pulse on the field? Who is the engine driving the tempo? The battery...not the horns. As a drum major, you should know the percussion music better than you know the wind book. You need to develop a rapport with the drummers and become one of them, whether or not you can actually play their instruments.

A lot of this goes back to the issues of trust and how to keep an ensemble together that I've dealt with in previous posts. So, consequently, I'm always caught between being a good drum major and being a good staff member. Drum major always wins out, especially at this point in the season, because I need to be the ROCK for this corps...I need to be the man, the guy everyone trusts during the course of a show. When they turn from backfield to front field, they need to know that I'm right. When they can't hear the battery on the field and are having issues staying in time...they need to know that, even though it may SOUND wrong to them on the field, that if they follow me all of the sound will come together up front (where it counts!). That's what the job is all about, and with a show as hard as this one, I certainly cannot neglect my drum majorly duties.

That being said, I've been working really hard to take a bit of a different approach as the drum major of this corps. When I'm teaching I am a very patient, fun loving, happy individual who wants to pull the best of you out of you all of the time. When I'm drum major, I'm an intense, competitive machine who doesn't tolerate any BS. At this point in my life, and at this point in the development of my drum corps, I don't think the latter is the kind of man this corps needs on the podium. Do I think that I need to keep holding people accountable? Yes, absolutely...but do I need to scream and yell to make it happen? Probably not.

I don't know...it's a risk. I've been one way for a long time, and it can take new people a long time to get used to me. As much hell as I'll give you for blowing a rep because of a mental error or talking, I'll get just as much fired up when you nail a rep and give me some real drum corps and some real effort. In the early season, though...there isn't much good drum corps to go around. It's rough, it's raw, and I expect finals effort ALL THE TIME. I don't think that's unreasonable...however, I now think that I need to view my role as drum major the same as I view my role as an educator. I need to be patient. I need to have fun with it, while still expecting 100% effort from the members. I need to make them want to succeed, not fear failure.

...and it's not disingenuous. I really mean it, and I really feel that way. It's not some ploy to screw with the minds of the members and trick them into getting better. It's just that I'm older, I'm wiser, and I've been in the activity since 1991. I've seen every educational approach imaginable, and I have a real good sense as to what works, and what doesn't.

As drum major in high school, I rarely yelled...by design. When the officers were assigned, we all met and I assigned roles. Matt Pfieffer, the band captain, was the designated A-hole. It was his job to yell and keep people in line, while I remained positive and full of hype. It was REALLY effective when I did have to yell, because I never did it. People listened, and we had a lot of success, even if Matt Pfieffer wasn't real popular that year. :)

At Bush, it's a different dynamic. I came in as a 19 year old rookie assistant drum major. I was younger than 3/4ths of the drum corps! Yelling didn't fly. As I got older and the corps got MUCH younger (our average age has loomed in the low 20s for years now), I had to be more demonstrative. I had to grab them by the lips and try to will them into submission. Really, all that resulted in was some lonely moments for me, and a lot of confused members. They respected me as a conductor and they drew from my raw energy during the course of a show...but so few had any real desire to get very close to me.

So, now it's time to try a different road. I'm more mature now, and I want people to believe in this drum corps the way that I do. I want them to feel the passion and the adrenaline that I do. I want them to find their inner raging competitive selves and explore that darker side that some of us are afraid to let loose. I want them to have fun, and I want them to want to connect with me. I want to be more accessible, because while I'm the drum major and the leader of the corps...I am a member, just like them. A cog in the machine. A rock on a mountain.

So we'll see how it goes, and if you're a young kid getting ready to assume the podium at your high school...or aspiring to someday...take the sage advice of this aging major. Every member of the group has their role. Some play trumpet, some spin flag, some hit drums...some conduct. Know your role, and respect your fellow members. You don’t become a leader because your director gives you the title of drum major. You become a leader when people want to follow you.