January and February rehearsal schedule

Ok, here it is! As I mentioned some of the days float around a bit because that is when we can get gym time. There are a few times we have more than one rehearsal during a week and not on Sunday or along with a Sunday.

January
mini camp
Saturday 3rd- 9:00a-5:30p We will break at 12:30 for lunch and you can leave the school but must return by 2:00
Sunday 4th- 8:00a-6:00p Lunch will be provided for you and you may not leave for lunch

regular rehearsal
Friday 9th- 7:00-9:00
Sunday 11th- 1:00-3:00
Thursday 15th- 7:00-9:00
Monday 19th-6:00-9:00 (Happy Birthday Chuck)
Sunday 25th- 1:00-4:00
Friday 30th- 7:00-9:00

February
Sunday 1st- 1:00-4:00
Monday 2nd- 7:00-9:00
Thursday 5th- 7:00-9:00
Wednesday 11th-7:00-9:00
Sunday 15th- 1:00-4:00
Sunday 22nd- 1:00-4:00
There will also be a rehearsal the last week of February, but Shomper has not scheduled the gym times that far ahead yet. Towards the end of January or first of February Shomper will have the March schedule finished and I will post it as soon as I have it.

Changes

Ok, here is the list of changes we talked about on Thursday. Make sure to mark these changes.

This is the schedule for the month of December:

Dec. 9th -rehearsal 5-7
Dec. 10th- meet at HS to pick up tarp at 7:30- go to Avenue to paint tarp. We will be done quickly.
Dec. 11th- meet at Avenue to pick up tarp before school. Time TBD -- No rehearsal this day due to Choir concert
Dec. 16th- no rehearsal due to band concert
Dec. 17th- Rehearsal 5-7 -this is a Wednesday
Dec. 18th- no rehearsal

Mini camp has been changed.
Mini camp is now:
Saturday January 3rd from 2:00-5:30 and Sunday January 4th from 8:00am-6:00pm.
(I am going to try to arrange for a meal to be provided at the school on Sunday. Make sure to eat BEFORE you come to rehearsal on the 4th.)

Other rehearsals in January:
Sundays from 1:00-3:00 and once a week at whatever times we can get the gym.
I should have the completed January practice schedule from Mr. Shomper sometime this week. I will post it as soon as I have it.

Contest change:
The contest that we had scheduled for Feb. 14 and Feb15 at Northmont has been cancelled. Therefore we are going to contest on Feb. 28th and March 1st. Feb. 28 is at Lebanon and the March 1st contest is at Bellbrook. Please make that change to your schedules.

If you have any questions please contact me by phone or email.

Rehearsal Cancelled Tonight

Sorry for the short notice but practice will be cancelled tonight Dec. 2 due to family illness. We will have rehearsal on Thursday night Dec. 4 as scheduled 5-7.

Again I am sorry for the short notice.

Saturday 13th Times

Percussion needs to meet at the High School between 10:30am-10:45am to clean the instruments. A few people need to bring paper towels and Windex cleaner. All instruments need to be cleaned and ready for rehearsal by 11:15.

Rehearsal will begin at 11:15. We will spend some time doing warm-ups and then stand and play through the music. At about 12:30 we will be on the field marching and playing through the show. We will stop rehearsal at about 1:15 so that you can load all of your instruments on the truck. You will be free to go at 1:30. You need to eat at that time as all students need to be at the Tipp Park by 2:30 to prepare for the contest.

Make sure that you have your music and drill books for rehearsal. Also, battery you need to make sure you have your performance sticks/mallets taped and ready to go before Saturday evening.

Sectional rehearsals

This is just a reminder that starting this Tuesday, the percussion section will have rehearsal immediately following normal band practice. The normal band practice on Tuesdays is 3-5, the percussion section will stay until 6:30. It is probable that most days we will not stay all the way until 6:30, it all depends on what we need to get done and how the sectional goes.

This Tuesday- the 19th- we will be done by 6:00 because it is also open house at Tipp Schools.

On Tuesday the 26th we will NOT have sectionals at all because Troy has its open house and I need to be their with my son. Thus you will be done when the rest of the band is done at 5:00.

Please make sure you are practicing your music on your own. We are starting to fall behind a bit musically as a section because not everyone is keeping up with their music. We started out very strong at band camp, we do not want to fall behind. By this point you should have the first 2 songs memorized. If you do not then you are behind and you need to catch-up NOW!!! Really the whole show should be memorized by now, but I will give you some slack on Night Train for now.

Also, please be aware that there will be some minor changes to the drum feature in Blues in the Night. Nothing major but you need to be prepared.

Band Camp

Just a reminder to keep working on your music. Do not put it away and not look at it until Sunday night at camp.

When you are packing be sure to pack plenty of socks! The ground is often wet in the morning and you do not want to wear nasty stinky socks all day long. Be sure to bring 2 or 3 pairs of shoes for the same reason. You may NOT go barefoot!!!

Also please remember that the percussion section CANNOT drink pop during the day! You may see the rest of the band drinking pop at meals, but that is there problem. You will also see that many people in the band will end up sitting out part of rehearsals because they are sick.

Make sure that you do not forget your music!!

Band camp can be a lot of fun, but it is also a lot of hard work. Please show up to each rehearsal with a good positive attitude. Be willing to work hard and not complain. When we are setting drill I move very fast and I expect to have your full attention the entire time. I will not put up with people being lost and confused as to what we are doing because they failed to pay attention to what is going on. I am more than willing to help everyone as long as everyone is doing what they are supposed to be doing.

If you have any questions please contact me before Sunday at noon!!

Get some rest and be ready for a great week!

June 25 Rehearsal ending early

Just wanted to let you know that Wednesday's rehearsal on June 25th will end at 8:00 instead of 9:00. So rehearsal will be from 6:30-8:00. Please arrange to be picked up at that time.

Thanks
Chuck

Lets try again

Ok, so I see that my last several posts have not been showing up. So I hope this one does.

Anyway, our next practice is Wednesday the 18th from 6:30-9:00 as per the schedule.

I am sorry to those who showed up tonight for practice, however, I made the announcement 2 weeks ago that we would not have practice because of Laura's doctors appointment.

The purpose of this blog is to make things easier for communication. However, so far I have made an announcement at least one week, usually two weeks in advance of any change to the schedule at rehearsal. It is YOUR responsibility to remember the changes. Thus you may need to actually use the pencil that you are supposed to have at every rehearsal and write down changes and times.

Again this blog is just a tool to try to make things easier, not absolve you from responsibility to make sure you listen and keep track of what is going on, where you need to be and when you need to be there.

For future reference, if I say that I am going to post something on the blog and you do need see it within a day or so, someone send me an email to let me know it is not up. I do not know why the posts have not been showing up. They show up on my page when I sign in but do not always show up on the page that everyone can view. I do not know why, but I will try to make sure that they do post on there.

Thanks
Chuck

Rehearsal ending early

As I stated at the last rehearsal, rehearsal on June the 4th will end early. We will go from
5:00-6:30.

This rehearsal will be simply geared toward preparing for the Strawberry Festival Parade.

Please make sure that you memorize both Glass and BS as we will add them to the cadence rotation.

Thanks
Chuck

New Percussion Instructor

As many of you may know, Sean McGrath has decided not to return for this season as Pit Instructor. He made this decision based upon the basic economics as the situation. He lives in Centerville, drives a full sized van, gas is nearly $4.00 a gallon, and he doesn't get paid enough to pay for all of the gas he has to buy to get here.

SO....

Casey Layer will be joining the band staff this year as the Pit Instructor. Casey spent four years on the snare line here at Tipp City and three years as section leader. Casey is a very accomplished young percussionist who worked very hard and consistently passed expectations. Casey is not simply a drummer, he is a percussionist. Through years of lessons and personal study Casey developed his skills as a mallet player as well. Along with spending time with the Pit, Casey will also spend some time with the battery percussion. I am very excited about having Casey join us on staff. His skills as a musician and leader will be a great asset for the percussion section and the band as a whole.

JUNE REHEARSAL SCHEDULE

Sorry for the delay of this schedule, but I did not know what my personal work schedule was going to be until very recently. So here is the June Percussion practice schedule. All of these dates and times are for BOTH BATTERY AND PIT Percussion.

Wed. June 11th- 6:30p-9:00p
Mon. June 16th- 7:00p-9:00p
Wed. June 18th- 6:30p-9:00p
Mon. June 23rd- 7:00p-9:00p
Wed. June 25th- 6:30p-9:00p

These rehearsals are MANDATORY!!! If you are going to miss a rehearsal I need a note from a parent ASAP! Because this is a young section overall, it is even more important that everyone show up for rehearsal.

slight change

I mentioned this at practice last week, but just a reminder that practice this Wednesday, April 30th will be from 5:00-7:00 NOT 7:30. This is due to the budget meeting for the band boosters.

Also, for my students for Wed. lesson times will be normal even though school lets out early. If you are unable to make it please let me know.

Thanks

Rehearsal Schedule

Here is the Rehearsal schedule through the first week of June.

Wed. April 23- 5:00-7:00
Wed. April 30- 5:00-7:30
Wed. May 7- 5:00-7:30
Wed. May 14- 5:00-7:30
Wed. May 21- 5:00-7:30
MONDAY MAY 26- MEMORIAL DAY PARADE-times TBA
Wed. May 28-5:00-7:30
Wed. June 4- 5:00-7:30
SATURDAY JUNE 7-STRAWBERRY FESTIVAL PARADE-times TBA

All Rehearsals are MANDATORY!!!! If you need to miss or be late or leave early you MUST give me a note signed by a parent ahead of time. This applies for school sports related events as well. If you have a game on a rehearsal day, I need to know ahead of time, not the day of. Work is NEVER an excused absence!

There will be more information on the two parades at a later time. Listen for times and such from Mr. Parks and Mrs. Marsh.

The schedule for June will be out shortly. Once I make the schedule it will be posted here.

How to Practice

The biggest problem that young musicians have is knowing how to practice. Practicing is more than just trying to play through a piece of music over and over again. Some people think that every time they play their instrument that they are practicing. That is simply not true!

In order to be effective in your practicing you must know how to practice. A former teacher of mine said, "When you practice you should sound pretty bad." Of course when I heard that I was quite shocked. However, upon further explanation it made perfect sense. Whenever you are practicing the goal should be to improve. That means you must be trying to play the things that you struggle with. Playing things that you can already play may seem more fun but is not going to help you get much better.

When you are going to practice you should have a set a exercises that you go through before you begin to work on a piece of music. The warm-ups that we use are a good starting point. They work on all of the essential techniques that you are going to need to be able to play the parts. You do not need to spend a great deal of time on these, but at least play through them a couple of times. This sets your mind up for the work you are about to do and stretches the appropriate muscles that you need for playing percussion.

Once you have finished the warm-ups, have a plan of what you are going to work on. Pick out the areas of a piece that you struggle with and start there. Work on exactly what gives you trouble and then work out. Make sure that you can get into and out of the trouble spot. Once you have fixed the issue or at least done all you can for that practice session, move on to the next trouble spot and repeat the process. Continue this process until you have worked on all of the areas that you planned to address during that practice session. Once you have done that try to put those sections together and then finally try to play through the music. If after all of that you have time to just play for fun, by all means do it. Playing music is supposed to be fun, but it also takes a lot of work and dedication. Practicing is the only way to get better. As your skills imporve and you can play more complicated music, your confidence rises and playing becomes even more fun.

Practice VS Rehearsal

Often we refer to rehearsal as a practice. The term practice is really used far too often and is miss understood. So what is practice and what is rehearsal?

Practice is something that you do on your own time. You practice by yourself. This is the time that you figure out rhythms and work on the issues that you have with the music.

Rehearsal is something that we do as a group. It is not practice! During a rehearsal we are trying to put all of the individual pieces together to make a cohesive ensemble. We are working on making the music work as a group.

The problem is that far too often individuals show up to rehearsal and have not practiced. Then when we try to rehearse as a group, that individual is actually trying to practice during the rehearsal. This is detrimental to the success of the group. In order for a rehearsal to truly be effective, all of the members must be prepared.

This is in no way saying that you must be able to play everything perfectly before you arrive at rehearsal. However, you must be able to work through the piece and you should have spent a considerable amount of time working on the parts that you struggle with.

Things you need to have at Rehearsal

Always remember to bring everything you need to rehearsal. This includes, but is not limited to:
music(in binder with clear page protectors), pencil, shoes(that you can run and exercise in, no flip-flops), sticks or mallets, a positive attitude, willingness to learn.

Things you need to leave at home:
bad attitude, bad mood, personal problems.

Again this is a partial list. Failure to be prepared for rehearsal will result in your being very unhappy, and the entire line being upset with you.

Welcome

Welcome to the Tipp City Drumline blog. I have set up this blog so that you may view information regarding practice dates and times, performance dates, audition information, and any other information I feel you should be aware of.

Make sure to check the blog on a regular basis for changes to practice times and other valuable information.