Winter Park Band Notes
September 11, 2016
From Mr. Blackmer
Dear Winter Park Band Families,
Thank you to all of our parent chaperone volunteers for helping out this weekend, both with the away football game last Friday, and the ASIS Convention appearance earlier today! Also, huge thanks to Lee McBurney for organizing the pizza lunch for today!
As always, just a reminder to check the Band Calendar and to make note of upcoming events. We have several rehearsals and performances coming up that fall outside of our typical week. Among these are the mini-camp coming up on Saturday, September 24, and the Space Coast Island Classic on Saturday, October 8. I'm hoping to soon have an itinerary for the competition on October 8 - probably sometime last this coming week or early the following week. I do know that we will most likely perform in the early evening, so our report time will probably be in the early afternoon.
All the Best!
Mr. Blackmer
United States Marine Band in Concert
The United States Marine Band, “The President’s Own,” is coming to Winter Park High School! On Wednesday, October 12, the Marine Band will be giving a free concert in the WPHS auditorium at 7:30 PM. The United States Marine Band is one of the premiere wind bands in the world, and the concert is not to be missed!
The program will include Derivations, by Morton Gould, Be Thou My Vision, by David Gillingham, March from 1941, by John Williams, and both Mars and Jupiter from Gustav Holst’s The Planets, among others.
Though it is a free concert, you must request a ticket and bring the ticket to the concert to ensure you get a seat in the hall. Beginning Monday, September 12, go to www.marineband.ticketleap.com/usmbtourwinterpark to request your ticket(s). There is a 4 ticket limit per request. Be sure to request your tickets right away, as they are sure to go fast!
Winter Park Band students are required to attend this performance, and it is recommended that they request their ticket(s) first thing on Monday, September 12 using their laptop device.
All-State Auditions This Saturday!
As students make final preparations for their audition, it's important to remember these things...
- Begin to work toward a performance mode. While there is certainly still time to tweak the various parts of the audition, it is very important to get in some full "run-throughs" of the two etudes and the 12 scales. Pushing through mistakes and concentrating on error recovery. You don't want your first time to be in the actual audition!
- Focus on tone. It's all about sound. Technique is great, but in many cases, it is your tone that will win the day.
- Don't forget the new order of scales! And don't forget about performing your scales with a good sound. Be "in tune with yourself." Does the first note of your scale sound like the octaves up and down?
- Use the resource of the Sight Reading Factory to drill various sight reading scenarios. Use the 30-second timer setting, and set the difficulty for at least Level 4 for Grades 9/10 and Level 5 for Grade 11/12.
- Dress should be "smart casual." Dress appropriate, however, it is important to also be comfortable! Remember that your "audience" for the audition is a microphone, not a live adjudicator like S&E MPA.
Marching Band Group Pictures
SAV-A-ROUND BOOKS
Our next fundraiser will be Sav-A-Round Coupon Books beginning Tuesday, September 13. The cost of each book is $25 and students will receive $12.50 credit to their Band account for each book sold. Please encourage your Band student to sign out a sample book on September 13 if you want them to take advantage of this sale. Sample books must be sold or returned in perfect condition.
CHARMS PROFILE UPDATE
At some point over the next week, please check your Charms profile online to make sure that all information is up-to-date and correct. Students should not use their OCPS e-mail address for Charms as it will block all messages from coming through. Use a personal e-mail address that you are used to checking!
Go to www.CharmsOffice.com > enter WinterParkHSBand as the school code > enter your password > click on "Update Info" > make all necessary edits to the student and parent pages > click "Update" in the upper right corner of the screen. That's it!
Sight Reading Factory
The Winter Park Band students have a new tool in their efforts to become better sight readers. Each student now has a 1-year subscription to Sight Reading Factory.
Sight Reading Factory provides an unlimited resource for students to practice sight reading. The program creates real music (that makes musical sense) with a multitude of difficulty levels and various difficulty settings. In addition to assignments created throughout the school year by the Band Directors, students are strongly encouraged to create their own sight reading exercises on a daily basis as part of their regular practice routine!
At this point, all Band students should have signed in and activated their accounts. If they haven't, they should go to their class' Google Classroom page and go to the posting entered on August 21. Once they follow the link, SRF will ask them to create an account. Note: the e-mail address here does not need to be the OCPS student e-mail.
Potential Chaperones, Operations Volunteers & Door-2-Door Drivers Updated!
A list of the volunteers selected for a band function will now be posted at the bottom of the itinerary for that event. Please check the itinerary to see if you are on duty. If you have not yet signed or renewed your OCPS ADDitions account, please go to our website and read any of the previous newsletters for instructions. Questions? Contact Carla Shuman, Band Chaperone Coordinator at shumanorl@aol.com.