This weekend was the MENC (Northwest Division) Biennial Conference. MENC is the National Association for Music Education, though don't ask me how that ends up standing for MENC because I have no clue dispite spending a small amount of time considering the matter. This year, it was in Bellevue, Washington, and among the vast multitude of events was included a combined concert by local Army bands. The Oregon National Guard (234th) headed it up, with augmentation by the Washington National Guard (133rd), and my band, the 204th Army Reserve Band, and we had a guest conductor from DePaul University.
Except for some lodging the night before for a couple people (me!) pretty far away, the 204th's experience started early Thursday morning when we gathered into a couple vans and personal vehicles and drove up to Camp Murray in Tacoma for a rehearsal. Once there, we decided on parts. In the horn section, we had five players, and we settled on one per part with first being shared between myself and a horn player from Oregon. In the 204th, we had been given our parts in advance, although we had no idea what parts we were playing nor did we rehearse as we were only augmenting (in our case, rehearsing would be pointless just as testing an engine that is missing half the pieces would not work either), though it was evident that the "core group" had not either when the director made a comment to the effect of "it sounds like you are sight-reading," which was actually the case. The day went on with several hours of rehearsal, and we did get the pieces quite presentable. I even got a fun, albeit short, solo in the closing piece, although while the end result was decent, there were a few moments which many of us were nervous about.
The next morning, we arrived early to the convention center where we were surprised to discover some miscommunication had given us the wrong time; our warm-up time was cut short as we did not arrive early enough to really take advantage of it, but we persevered and even had a "singing-only" rehearsal before the performance.
The performance itself was somewhat bittersweet. The first piece was very exposed of and some further rehearsal time might have saved it from some mistakes, though the overall performance got better as the concert went on. It was not the best of concerts, and although I wish the audience might have been aware of the circumstances, it was a pretty good job for only having one rehearsal.
After the concert, I was amazed at how many of my Army colleagues knew people that they passed by in the halls of the convention. Most them are music educators, so of course it is reasonable that they would see colleagues and former classmates at the biggest event of their profession, but I admit that I did feel left out and wished I would see someone I knew. At the very end of my day at the convention, while waiting for our van, I saw a member of the OSU Marching Band staff (who I also know from participating in community theater), so I got my wish and felt like one of "the guys," actually knowing someone at the convention.
Overall, the MENC Convention was a fun experience, and dispite a few hiccups, my experience and invovlement went well.
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