Dear 8th grade band parents,
Yesterday, your children performed at the Carowinds Festival of Music, along with bands and orchestras from all around North Carolina, South Carolina, and Virginia. Their performance was judged by two of the most highly-respected bandmasters in the country, as well as world-famous composer and our friend James Swearingen.
I am sure your kid told you already, but our performance received the Superior rating at the festival, which is the highest possible rating. In fact, we received a Superior from all three judges.
I wanted to take a moment to explain this in a little more detail, because if you have not been involved in the "band world" for very long, you may not know how significant this Superior rating is. I spoke with the judges yesterday and asked them a question I have never asked them before: how many bands earn this Superior rating at the festival? Not because I want to degenerate this into some kind of competition, but rather I wanted some frame of reference for how rare this achievement is. While it was hard to give an exact number, they said it is about 10%. So over an entire day of band and orchestra performances, they may give the Superior rating twice on average.
I was encouraged by the answer I received. It should be very, very difficult to earn this rating, or it would not mean much, right? And it was very, very difficult. Your children worked on this music for months. Every note, every detail, every volume change, and every style marking on the sheet music had to be played correctly. On top of all of that, everyone had to play with beautiful characteristic tone on their instrument, everyone had to play in tune with each other, everyone had to maintain rhythm and tempo together, everyone had to execute changes to these elements together and in unison.... on and on. And on top of all of that, everyone had to follow through and execute all of this while maintaining composure through stage fright.
It is incredibly difficult. Almost nobody does it. Your children did.
And it's not because of me. I don't think I am an unusually talented musician or director. This isn't false humility, it's what I really think. I think most directors could do what I do. It happened because your children made a choice: they decided they wanted it, and I showed them how. That's it. They did the work, all I did was tell them what to do. This is their achievement.
Now I have a request: tell your friends. Tell your friends about what your kids have done in the band at Hawley. Bad news tends to travel fast, and we tend to take good news for granted. Let's not take this for granted. Go brag about your children. I know I will. Justin
