CMS and SCHS Band Banquets 2006

The Creekside Middle School band banquet was quite fine. Bill Guthrie seems to have come into his own the second year with the band, I'm happy to say (I was very unhappy with the band the first year he was with it, and it seems the communication problems have been distinctly improved upon this year, and will hopefully continue to do so). The band and the band boosters seem to really love him, which is great. I certainly appreciate his technological side (though I'm sure many of "my ilk" would laugh at his Mac OS laptop; for his needs, it's perfect, though). Chris received his Superior ribbon for State Solo and Ensemble (for his solo on Baritone). I saw a lot of "talent" that will be hitting the high school next year (especially the third-trumpet; she exhibited the excitement and interest of "being in band" more than ANY other student last week at the year-end concert).

The Spruce Creek High School band banquet went fairly well. The sound system, once again was a joke. Now, before anyone who was there ASSUMES I'm talking about a later incident, I'm referring to the fact that in the back half of the room, you could not understand what most people were saying at the podium. It was ridiculous! Speakers everywhere, and because of a combination of echoing and the fact that no one anticipated that people in the back MIGHT ACTUALLY TALK during the ENTIRE ceremony made for horrible acoustic (stupid freshmen, sheesh). My daughters and I had to restrain ourselves from REALLY hauling off and verbally beating the "kids" around us. Next year, NO SITTING with the abandoned freshmen! Good lord...

Now, the "later incident". I produced the Year-End DVD as well as the Senior Farewell DVD (order them now). I spent about 60+ hours on both, as I did every single step of the process (except recording the audio "will and testaments" which Shawn McKaig did -- unfortunately the recordings were ONLY on the LEFT CHANNEL and mostly too long, so I ended up doing a ton of alterations on them anyway, but I chalk that up to being "part of the job").

About 45 minutes or less of the 2.5 hour year-end DVD was played during dinner (which was expected, though I had hoped it would play with sound-turned-off the rest of the night; oh well). If the DVD sells well, I'm sure everyone will get to see the "whole thing" eventually.

But the "incident" in question was this:   The staff at the Daytona 500 Club facility had the cables from the DVD player plugged incorrectly into their sound system!! Oh.. my.. word. I wanted to strangle someone when the Senior Farewell video started playing, while my 28 minute remix of "The Best Of Times" (yes, 28 minutes..) played LOUDLY with the speeches by Mr. McKaig! You could not understand him at all. I wanted to leave and never show my face again, but instead, marched into the control room, started poking around cables and controls (it was pretty simple - DVD player, DVD volume and master volume on the receiver; no equalizer, no nothing; really "advanced"). As I then stood at the door between control room and banquet hall and signalled for the 500 Club worker to do this-and-that, suddenly (several minutes later) the sound came out PERFECTLY. If I understood what he told me correctly (because at this point I was not going to go near the equipment for fear of uncontrollable destructive tendancies) the LEFT and RIGHT outputs from the DVD player were plugged into one INPUT (correct) and one OUTPUT (incorrect) on the sound system! WHAT THE HECK! Do they never USE the DVD player?? Do they REWIRE IT OCCASIONALLY?? (it was built into a standard networking rack mount, so I doubt this) ARE THEY REALLY THAT POORLY EDUCATED ON "output plugs into input"?!

So, the second half of the video actually had SPEECHES with light background music, instead of loud music and some words being muttered incoherently. I still wanted to just leave at that point, but RELIEF had taken over and made me semi-comfortable. Seeing a few teary eyes (which was the desired effect) in the audience at that point made it all worth while (hopefully everyone understood that it was NOT the video that was at fault, but the building were were in, and it's staff...).

So.. that is the recap of this year's band banquets at the Middle and High Schools.

Next up: I'm part of the band board now at the high school ("officially", as I've been the official photographer for a year know according to Andrew Kidd) as the Football Program person (which means I develop and prepare the literal "program", a large printed booklet of ads and pictures, which is sold at the SCHS football games). That means (oh yeah!) we can sit at reserved band board seating at the banquet next year! (how sad that this is what I'm now anticipating as a "perk"...). The noise from the FRESHMEN aside, it was still a good two evenings. I did not take anywhere near the number of pictures I would take at most events, but they are online as of today.

Extra note: THANK YOU Andrew Angelo and the rest of the officers for DEGUNKIFYING MY SON! Lord only knows he (and they all) needed it! Long live the Gunkies!!