Marching
   Many students fear marching itself and don’t believe it is something they can do successfully. The best approach with these students is to build their confidence and tell them that with practice and experience they will do just fine. They may not realize that many students coming into the marching band have that same fear. I tell them that I am not going to encourage them to do something they are not capable of and that if I have confidence in them, they should have confidence also. I ask them if it would make sense for me as a band director who wants a great band to ask them to do it if I didn’t think they would do a great job. If there is time at the end of the year, you may want to take the new students out during their band class time and teach some marching fundamentals, keeping everything positive and building their confidence.

Wearing a uniform
   There doesn’t seem to be too much that can be done about this one. I try to reason with students that it would be unwise to quit something they enjoy every day because they have to wear a uniform several times during the year. You can mitigate this problem somewhat if you have included students (by committee or otherwise) when new uniforms are being designed. If current students like the uniform maybe future students will as well.

Memorizing the music and drill
   I assure potential members that we will practice enough to aid them greatly in this. However, I do tell them that while for some, band practice will be enough, for others, it will take time outside of rehearsal. I assure students that they will get better at this each year.

Being in band without their friends
   For many teenagers, this will be the most important factor. Some who actually like band will hesitate to join just because a good friend is not. I tell students that they shouldn’t quit something they enjoy just because their friends do not join (and I certainly work to recruit the friends as well), and the other person is not much of a friend if he can’t accept people being part of an activity they enjoy. Besides, students don’t always realize the potential there is to make new friends in band. Make sure to pinpoint the leaders in the group and recruit them heavily. That will make it easier to recruit the others.
   
Not having time for other activities
   In many programs, the top band members are also the top students in other activities. It is certainly possible for students to overextend themselves and not be much good to any of the activities they participate in. However, sometimes students are overly worried about this before they have even tried it. I simply encourage them to try it before they make a decision about what to drop; they may be selling themselves short. If they ultimately decide to drop band after the first year at least it’s based on knowledge, not conjecture.

Losing their social life
   This excuse irks me and I sometimes wonder if it’s worth trying to recruit a student with this concern, especially since band was my social life in high school. On the other hand, I can understand how it might be nice to attend a football game where the only things to worry about are watching the game and how many condiments to put on a hot dog. I tell students that it seems unwise to give up band for a few Friday nights when there are more than 40 Friday nights when they can go out unencumbered by a band event.

The expenses
   Students may be particularly reluctant to share this problem. Clearly outline expenses for students and provide ways to offset the costs through fund raisers. Make private phone calls to parents of students who you know or suspect may have financial difficulties.

Veteran band members
   Young students sometimes feel intimidated by the older ones. Have experienced and friendly band students talk to the potential members about what it’s like to be in the high school band, and make sure they address some of the fears that the students might have. There’s a good chance the younger students will listen to older students more than they will you. Have a non-hazing atmosphere where new marchers are encouraged, not razzed. Many students are easily intimidated and are scared enough of marching band without fears of being hazed or ridiculed. Have veteran band members adopt new members to show them the ropes and help them with anything they might need.
   Involve younger students with the high school program as much and as early as possible. At that age they actually enjoy the responsibility of helping with equipment. And whereas bus rides might have lost some luster with the older kids, young students look at it as a real treat. Mass band events at halftime combining the high school band with potential members can ease the transition as well.

No transportation to practices and games
   This can be tricky depending on the demographics involved. Set a summer rehearsal schedule that makes it easy for the students to attend. At Riverview I’ve found that evening rehearsals work best with parent work schedules while at Paragould, my previous position, the mornings and afternoons worked best. Veterans can help with the transportation of the students they adopt. It may be necessary to talk directly with parents to work out a plan.

Halftime & contest performances
   The pride and sense of accomplishment after a fine performance overcomes any anxiety that precedes the event. I tell students that they will just have to trust me on this. Veterans who talk to the group can support this idea.

The high school director
   This may be the most elusive factor. Few students will flat-out say, “I’m not going to be in high school band because of you.” If you do not have daily contact with the students you are recruiting, you should make your presence felt as much as possible by visiting rehearsals and concerts (conducting when possible) and being extremely positive when you are with them.
   When students see you infrequently, small missteps that make bad impressions can be costly. I’ve seen directors come in, make a few snide comments, and, because of this, are perceived as mean. Frequently making your presence known and being enthusiastic and approachable will go a long way in securing more students for your program. Just a simple comment like “I can’t wait to have you in my band” can go a long way with an impressionable student.

The weather
   In Arkansas it can get extremely hot and humid. I’m frank with students about this and tell them that it can get uncomfortable, but it will make them tougher, and they’ll be better for it. I assure them that we get plenty of breaks on days where the heat is brutal.

That they won’t like the music
   The key here is to choose music that inspires the students. It is impossible to fulfill everyone’s preference, but if the marching band plays a variety of music rather than focusing on just three or four contest selections this becomes more of an advantage than a disadvantage.

    Recruiting takes a combination of reasoning, psychology, encouragement, student involvement, parent communication, vision-setting, and, most of all, patience. Refining tactics to suit your program will make it possible to consistently increase marching band numbers.             

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An Expressive Face
    Conductors may find it painful to watch a video of themselves performing because it can reveal many bad habits, including a lack facial expressions. A conductor’s face will often reflect any negative attitudes or emotions. While on the podium, some directors unintentionally show their disapproval or disinterest in the performance. This may influence the behavior of the ensemble members. Instead of making the music enjoyable, they place added stress on the group.
    Directors should create a repertoire of facial expressions to draw from while conducting. To practice, make a list of five emotions such as happy, sad, angry, jubilant, and melancholy. Look into the mirror and create a facial expression for each emotion while saying each of the five vowels in the alphabet. With a metronome (tempo 60-72), first practice changing these expressions every four beats, and then vary the amount of time between changes for different beat patterns, including mixed meters. Any vowel can work for any of the emotions, but vary them so each emotion looks a little different every time.
   Once comfortable with these expressions, incorporate them into rehearsals and make eye contact with students. Sometimes I make notes in the score to remind myself to look happy. Letter B of the first movement of Holst’s First Suite in E Flat sounds joyful to me, so I might write “happy E” in the score to remind myself to show the happy emotion. This is more to remind myself to vary my facial expressions than to make sure all the students see it. To supplement the faces, I will write three adjectives in my scores for each section of music to get an idea of how it should sound.

Happy A

 
Happy I

Happy O

Clear Prep Gestures
    I have noticed in my early experience and in many young conducting students that the flow of time tends to be uneven in the prep. All too often it consists of a quick motion upward, a short pause, and a fast drop to the downbeat. This jerky motion not only obfuscates the tempo but causes performers to take uneven breaths. The prep and pattern should demonstrate an even flow of time and should provide students with all the necessary information about tempo, style, breath, and dynamics.
    The prep gesture should be in the tempo of the piece and occur one beat prior to the attack, so if the sound begins on 1, the prep beat should be on 4. The character of the prep should clearly reflect the character of the music. Marches often require a short, light prep and chorales require a long smooth prep, but default gestures usually meld these two styles together. If the prep for an allegro, forte piece is too large, it will cause heavy playing and a dragging tempo, not to mention tired shoulders. While studying a score, conductors should experiment with different gestures to find what fits. It can even help to practice these in front of an ensemble and ask them what felt most comfortable. Simple gestures communicate the best.
    No matter the style or tempo, breathe in a way that matches the prep. It makes little sense to begin rehearsal with breathing exercises and later contradict yourself with a jerky prep and shallow breathing. Shallow breathing or inhaling through the nose makes the players tense. When conductors take shallow or tense breaths, students will mimic the tension and take shallow breaths. Breathing through the nose creates tension in the throat and shoulders and does not allow for adequate air support. To prevent this, encourage and demonstrate breathing through the mouth. For a fast tempo, I would recommend giving two prep beats and breathing over those two counts. At faster speeds, more prep counts make the musicians more comfortable and allow for a deeper breath.

Angry E

Angry I

Angry U

When to Beat Time
    Musicians do not need to see every beat, and sometimes a conductor should just stop beating time. If a conductor beats time while the entire ensemble plays a whole note, players will stop their air and decrescendo through the note. Show a crescendo gesture without each individual beat and the ensemble will sustain the air with greater intensity.
    I recently worked with a high school program before a festival. While rehearsing the group, I turned to their director and asked if they had written in phrasing for a particular section, to which he said “Yes, but they don’t do it consistently.” I decided to rehearse the section again, but this time I just gave the start and end of the piece. They played together quite well, and for the next run through I simply indicated phrases: a crescendo for two measures, a decrescendo for two measures. Everyone, including the director, was quite pleased. Students don’t need the beat so much as they need a tour guide. Certainly there are works that require more conducting than others, but there is no need to beat time just for the show of it. Focus on what is most important musically.
    If a whole note or half note is the only thing in a measure, I would show the sustain by moving the baton straight from left to right, instead of up or down for a crescendo or decrescendo. Directors often tell students not to breathe on the barline, but the fourth beat in the four pattern has a high ictus that encourages a break and a breath. If we show a sustaining motion the ensemble will be more apt to maintain the sound.

Style Matters
    Conducting gestures need not be overly dramatic, but they should clearly relate to the style of the music. This requires a diverse vocabulary. A lyrical work with broad phrases calls for a pattern with more horizontal motion and less vertical. Staccato and marcato are similar, but the gestures should have a visible difference. Marcato has a little more length and motion than staccato and is a little heavier. I remember watching a video by Allan McMurray with an exercise for staccato where you poke the baton through a small piece of paper and flick the wrist to get it off. That motion suggests a lighter sound, but if you add more arm and more weight to that motion, it shows an accent for a marcato style.
Make patterns smaller and clearer to help draw the eyes of the performers to adjust the tempo. Most directors use larger and heavier patterns to pull along dragging tempos, but this exacerbates the problem and makes for a tired conductor.

Closing Thoughts
    Directors can practice with their ensembles using exercises like this one: ask the ensemble to play constant eighth notes on a given pitch and follow what they see. Conduct a basic, medium-size four pattern. After they become comfortable, change one thing about the pattern – make it staccato, for example. Notice how slowly or quickly the ensemble changes to match what you show. Randomly change other elements, including size, style, tempo, and even meter, but change only one aspect of the pattern at a time. To conclude, slow the ensemble with a ritardando that leads to a fermata on a weak beat, such as beat two of a four pattern. After the exercise, ask the ensemble which gestures were easy to follow and which were unclear. Finally, directors should be willing to seek instruction and continue refining their craft. This can be through attending workships or inviting a guest clinician. All conductors struggle with expressiveness and can benefit from each other.                    

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How do you teach students to be comfortable in all keys?
   I like to do exercises around the circle of fourths. We start going around the circle of fourths with the younger ones coming into the program. Students learn to transpose with simple patterns such as arpeggios and five-note runs. We pick a pattern and play it around the circle of fourths. Eventually we open the range of notes up to a full octave. I want students to be accustomed to playing in E or B; this way nothing seems too exotic.
   I point out arpeggios and scale patterns in the music so students understand why we spend so much time on technical studies and scales. It’s similar to learning to read and having to sound out long words like asparagus. Children eventually get to the point at which they can just see the word and know it without having to sound it out. The same is true with music, and I want students to build that memory to the point that they can see an E major scale or arpeggio and not have to think about fingerings.

How do you teach intonation?
   We do quite a bit of sight singing and teach students solfège. We sing scale patterns and will also sing through chorales. I tell students that I want them to hear the music in their heads and compare what’s coming out of their horns to how the music is supposed to sound. That way they know if they’re playing it correctly. I tell students that I want them not to need me anymore. They should know if a rhythm or pitch is wrong or if they’re out of tune. Sometimes the younger students lack the physical ability to make the change, but at least they know when there is a problem and are trying to adjust.
   As a trumpet player, I always thought intonation was more important for brass players, but woodwinds need to learn to play in the center of the pitch, too. We spent extended time earlier in the year working on scales and intervallic relationships, which can be horribly out of tune. At first that’s a weird concept to students, and when I comment that someone is out of tune, the response is frequently, “But Miss Keller, I’m not playing with anybody.” I think the sight singing helps them learn that they need to play in tune when playing alone.
   One warm-up favorite is a chorale book called Bach and Before for Band; it has 19 chorales with soprano, alto, tenor, and bass parts for each instrument. I tell students to pick a voice, and after playing through a chorale, everybody moves down a voice, so the sopranos now play alto. Working through each part forces students to listen carefully. During the first part of the year I have students count off by fours as soprano, alto, tenor, and bass. Students know that they will eventually play every part, so there is almost never an abundance of one voice. The variety prevents students from losing focus as they might with the same warm-up every day.

How do you work around a block schedule?
   We have A and B days consisting of four 90-minute classes each. Although not all students can schedule it, we encourage students to take band on both days. In the fall we focus on the marching music on A days and rehearse all-region and concert music on B days. If we have an upcoming contest and something’s not working well, we practice the marching music on B days. During marching season most of our sightreading is pep tunes, and we go through a lot of them. We might spend a day or two a week reading new concert band pieces.
   In the fall semester the percussionists have percussion class on A day and percussion ensemble on B day. These work just like the wind classes: marching percussion practice on A days in the fall, and B days are for all-region or percussion ensemble music. In the spring semester percussionists are in the band classes but still have the percussion ensemble on B days.
   After marching season and before the winter concert, we usually squeeze in three weeks of sectionals. Weekly sectionals start in mid to late January, when the second semester officially starts. Every section has a sectional once a week before or after school.

How do you approach chamber music?
   Everyone in the first two bands, wind ensemble and symphonic band, is required to play a solo, and we encourage additional ensembles. The solos and etudes that students play are going to be more difficult than what they play in full band. It requires different skills. Band music is difficult for different reasons, and for students to develop completely as musicians they have to work on both elements. Students in the concert band are not required to go to the contest, but they are assigned etudes and solos as well.

How do you audition students for placement in a concert band?
   Auditions consist of an etude or solo of choice and an etude that is required for everyone, and all 12 major and minor scales. If a section is especially strong, we might pick a more difficult etude to make it easier to delineate students. Almost all students in the first and second bands study privately, with a smaller percentage in the third band. We get some University of North Texas students to teach, but the teachers who have been with us the longest are professionals who teach and play in the area. We have a formal indoor concert in December and another one in February. Then we start on our University Interscholastic League music for April, and give one more concert in May.

What is most difficult in teaching students to play well?
   The most difficult part is getting students to make musical decisions. We work on that when playing scales and chorales; I don’t always tell them “crescendo here and diminuendo here.” I ask students, “What do you think we should do with this fermata?” or “Should we make this release taper, or crescendo it to the end?” It makes it more interesting if they can have input over such things. There might be one way to play something that is preferable, but students don’t usually make poor musical decisions. There are so many talented band students in and around our region, and many of them will be able to play the notes and rhythms flawlessly. I get students to think about how to make their performance stand out.
   When students make musical choices, the first reason they give is that they like the way it sounds. Older students might say something like, “This is the end of this phrase, and we should use the pickup notes to crescendo into the new section.” This year the audition etudes had few dynamic or expressive markings, so in almost every session with a student I asked what they were going to do to make it sound interesting.

What was it like opening a new high school?
   I have been at Liberty High School since it opened in 2006. The first year we opened with just 9th and 10th graders – a total of 38 students in band. We were housed at Fowler Middle School, which now feeds us, until our high school building could be built. At first there was some controversy when Liberty opened, because parents were worried their children were not going to have a true high school experience between the small student population and meeting at a middle school, but it actually turned out to be a wonderful year. Because we were small everybody grew close together, and it was fun to be able to establish traditions, including gong shows twice a year, one after marching season and one on our spring trip. This laid a good foundation for our start.
   In the first year we felt that we needed some kind of spirit cheer. The drum majors will yell “R” and the students yell “respect,” “E” “excellence,” “D” “dedication,” “H” “honor,” “A” “achievement,” “W” “willpower,” “K” “knowledge,” “S” “success.” That little acronym is the way we dismiss from the marching field.
   We also started a march-a-thon, which is one of our biggest fundraisers. Usually we’ve been practicing a week or two, and then we march in neighborhoods that feed Liberty High School. Having a mini-parade in the neighborhoods gets some of the younger students excited about band. We usually march just under three miles. When we’re walking along the way people come out. I think the rule is we can’t go up to them and solicit, but people come out of their houses and give us donations to play in front of their house and might request “Happy Birthday” for a family member.
   I also instituted social networking rules for students, something that first became necessary when I was the assistant director at Frisco High School, right around when Facebook and MySpace were starting to become popular. Rumors and insults can spread quickly, so I encourage students to talk directly with anyone they have a problem with rather than air grievances for everyone to see. Trust is extremely important in the band program because there are so many students and only four of us. We cannot watch every person every second, and if we go on trips we have to trust that students can behave and represent the band program and school well.
   We also instituted a rule that only band students may be in the band hall. These students work so hard and there’s so much expensive equipment in here that the directors simply can’t protect the band students and equipment all the time. I also like students to feel that they have a place of their own. We spend so many hours here that it’s like a home, and I like to know who’s coming into my house. The students enforce it. If they see somebody who is not a band student they give him the evil eye. They just know that it’s the rule. No one is mean about it, but they’ll say, “Hey, I need you to wait for your friend outside.”
   In the first year I occasionally assigned research on a piece and the composer. Many students got into the habit of seeking out the music online and downloading recordings. We also started a tradition of mentioning area concerts, and having the University of North Texas, the Dallas Wind Symphony, and the Dallas Symphony Orchestra nearby provides many opportunities to go to events and discuss them the next day.
   In our first year we didn’t have any all-state students, then the next year we had one, then six, and this year ten. Between that and the Midwest trip, it’s an exciting time at Liberty High School.                             

All photos for this article were taken by Dave Shaver.

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