As some of you know, I am raising my grandson Julian. He is a trumpet player with the Michigan Competing Bands Association's State Champions: Jenison Marching Band.
When I attended the band booster meeting last Tuesday, the directors Dave Zamborski and Mike York told us about our Jenison School's Superintendent's blog. He is spot lighting Jenison Marching Band this week in his blog. They want this article to be the most visited, page hits, of any article that has been posted.
Mr. Z, as we call Dave Zamborski, was the band director in Jenison's Thespian Group's production of Anything Goes this past spring. He wants this band article to get more hits than the article about Anything goes which was 350 hits. It's a friendly competition. So they want this article to go viral and get many, many more hits as it will help Jenison with its School of Choice enrollment. Many families choose to send their kids to Jenison for their outstanding music programs, including the marching band.
You can see Julian, playing his trumpet in the school band room in two of the pictures. He is the trumpet player third from the right with a brass trumpet. He has on a black t-shirt.
Spotlight on Jenison Bands through Superintendent TenBrink's Blog
http://tomtenbrink.com/2012/05/23/spotlight-jenison-bands-state-champs/
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If you'd like to see the show that won Jenison their first MCBA championship, scoring top score of 44 marching bands, since 2004 here is the link. Julian will be the marcher you see marching over and standing just to the left or behind the big round bass drum at the end of the show. The show is called Tempest's Fury. There are excerpts from the scores of Sleepy Hollow and Titanic. Edited to add: music also from the movies The Day After Tomorrow and samples from The Wizard of OzIt's very dynamic. The color guard plays the Tempest that is a supernatural force that can create all kinds of weather, mostly storms. The marching band will be either the weather or they will be blown about the weather through out the show. It's a goosbump giving ride, musically.
This is their pre-lim performance at the Grand Nationals of Bands of America competition in Indianapolis last November. This performance sent them on to the semi-finals. Watch it at full screen if you can. I wish you could see the color guard hairstyles and costume details. They do take off their overcoats during the ballad, from The Day After Tomorrow, when the eye of the storm passes over.