Middle School Concert Report

My Freshman year was the best year ever! I got to be in marching band, FFA, and I got a tremendous academic placing. I definitely did a great job this year compared to last year. I broke out of my comfort zone and worked my hardest to get a high GPA, and join some different clubs. I met new friends and even passed driver 's ed.

The band that I willingly devote every spare minute of my free time to has come so far, and I have had the honor of experiencing extreme milestones in the path of success for this school. In my first year, we traveled to Bands of America Grand Nationals in Indianapolis for the first time in Round Rock Dragon Band history, and placed fourth out of nearly ninety bands. The following year, we were invited to march in the 2015 Rose Parade in Pasadena, California, which stretched the end of our marching season from the typical October to the beginning of January. This past year we traveled to Indianapolis again and performed a show that, although it placed seventh in finals, emotionally moved every soul in our program deeply.

The two pieces I have observed are Sad Case by Lightfoot and Leon and D-Man in the Water by Bill T. Jones. These two pieces are quite different but in a way they feel as if they could play off each other. Which is why I will be discussing the difference in the costuming, movement, and musical scores. These three components were the first things that I saw as I was watching the videos.

The performers are Greg Billings: Lead vocals, Tom King: Bass guitar, George Harris: Guitar and vocals, Rob Stoney: Keyboards, vocals and harmonica, Mark Busto: Drums and vocals. Kyle Ashley: Guitar. The band today includes Greg and Tom from the original band Stranger. Greg is a friend of mine as well as a colleague. He has since left the company to pursue music full time. I have seen Greg and Tom perform as Stranger and The Greg Billings Band. Greg is a very down to earth typical guy that anyone could associate with. Stranger released several albums as had some hits that established them as a “Florida Rock Band”. Greg has been performing since the early 1980s when Stranger began in 1981. Stranger was together for 16 years. Greg then was in another band Damn the Torpedoes for a few years which then led him to start The Greg Billings Band.

High school band is often looked upon as an activity where a bunch of nerds get in big, bulky, sweaty uniforms and walk around the football field during halftime all the while playing music that they have memorized. Although this is 99.9% true, marching band is much more than that and if you think about what was just stated, that takes a lot of time, effort, and dedication. Marching band provides students with life lessons and skills that can never be forgotten. There are some major “plus factors” of being a part of a high school band such as: students get to be around other students that they normally would not associate with,

Even before I had my first day of school at McGavock high school I had already been going to practices for the marching band. I had just been a freshman when I joined, and I had not known about the long legacy that

The first piece, Swimming with the Sharks, was a lively piece. Listening to the piece made me feel as if i was in a superhero movie. This jazz performance the instrumentalist seemed to have fun with the pieces however the one before seemed more uptight. Also compared to the previous performance I attended there was a greater use of the guitar. The ending was heavy

Marching band; copious amounts of people scoff at the sound of those words. I often hear students commenting on how easy marching band is, how we don’t train like the football players do. At Anderson High School, that’s not the case, the marching band trains for just as long. As a band of over 125 individuals, it takes determination, pride, and confidence to achieve the goals we have set forth to accomplish. As a leader of the saxophone section, I know what it’s like to face failure, to overcome and turn it into success and to march on with confidence. I know exactly how to motivate my underclassmen when they tell me “I can’t do this anymore.” Over the last four years, I have succeeded in leading my group of 13 saxophone players to two State

Overall the marching band has taught me many lessons that I will carry with me throughout my life, and the three that stand out to me are having the ability to display positivity to help make it through anything, how to serve others as a leader and when it won’t be seen, and respecting things other than people, for example, the efforts of others and criticism. I consider these three lessons to all help build up my character, which was also greatly shaped by band, and will never be the

I attended to a concert performed by the San Francisco Symphony Youth Orchestra on November 13th this year. This concert took place in the Davies Symphony Hall in San Francisco. I chose to attend to this concert because I have never been to a performance by any youth orchestra, I was curious to see how their performance would compare to other orchestras.

I attended the Houston Symphony conducted by Andres Orozco-Estrada on Sunday, February 18th. It consisted of three pieces by the name of Three Dance Episodes from On the Town, Lago de Lagrimas Concert for Flutes, and Symphony no 7 in D minor, Opus 70. Overall, it was a great experience that I would definitely repeat because it was relaxing and peaceful watching the performance. The crowd was very respectful and the setting was professional and fancy. Everyone was nicely dressed and the workers were extremely helpful in directing the audience to the correct place. The doors were not allowed to be opened during performances which kept the distractions to a minimum.

Savannah Live was a musical preformance held in one of the oldest continuing theater halls in the nation. The theater, appropiately named the Historic Savannah Theater, origionally opened in 1818, yet do to years of wear and tear and several fires, the modern theater was retrofitted to look like its 1940s, art-deco self. Although the stage was in the traditional Proscienim style, the play was anything but traditional. The stage hall itself seemed like something right out of the hay day of Broadway, with lights surrounding the procienian arch, red velvet chairs and carpet, the hall was like a time caplse bringing me back into the 20th centry. Mimicing the transformations of the hall throughout the years, the musical took the audience on a journey through musical, and theatrical history.

The Appalachian Symphony Orchestra performed, Celebration and Remembrance. The orchestra opened with Fanfare for the Common Man. Which was conducted by Mr. Smith. It was a great way to start off a World War II and Civil War Memorial concert. It was the opening piece and the orchestra was full of energy, and came out loud and with the bang. It brought a sense of suspense, with the opening bass drum so loud and firm, the audience jumped a little in their seats. You could envision war while listening to this piece, the stage was the battle field, the left side of the orchestra was the Axis Power, the right side was the Allies and the bass drum were the drummer boy. Fanfare for the Common Man was well put together, the orchestra sounded good even

Attending my first jazz concert was an unforgettable experience of great live instrumental music. The concert was entertaining and a very educational experience of this course. As a student in this course with little musical education, I never appreciated instrumentals, until the SDSU Jazz Concert. This concert was a really enjoyable experience with the balance of all the instruments. I really enjoyed the experience and the knowledge of music I gained from the concert. The way the conductor opened the show was very nice. As I walked in some of the violins were playing sweet melodies until everyone arrived and took a seat. They asked us to shut off our phones so we would not interrupt the concert. They had an itinerary for us to follow along with all the songs but they did not play every song that was on he itinerary. Also,

There were many musical elements heard throughout these pieces and it was interesting to hear how they varied in each song and suite. In Intermezzo, it began with a quieter violin solo melody creating a monophonic texture. Soon after, it became accompanied by the other violins and cellos, then the full ensemble came in creating a moderate, flowing melody at about mezzo forte and switching to a polyphonic texture. Next, there was a harp solo at forte with many crescendos and decrescendos. The full ensemble enters again raising the dynamics to forte before decrescendoing and slowing down to end with a held note and final tone. The first movement of the Swan Lake Suite, Scene, which began with the violins playing with an oboe solo on top. The oboe was playing various crescendos and decrescendos at a mezzo piano dynamic and the tempo was moderate. This ends with the high woodwinds playing a string of the melody, passing it to the low brass with the strings very quietly in the background and then what seemed to be a diminuendo. The second movement of the Swan Lake