Welcome to…
BAND LAND
The West
High School Trojan Band has been through a lot over the past four years. I
joined the High School band as an eighth grader and learned to march. At that
time, we were not what you would call a winning program. We were a bunch of
kids who wanted to win, but didn't want to work for it. That year, Mr. Ray came
to our school and transformed a stagnant losing program into a first division
performing group. It didn't all happen in one year however. My Freshmen year,
we changed our marching style to military/corp and earned a fourth division in
marching. This made the band members angry at the judges. Mr. Ray simply
pointed out that we were not just given a fourth division, but we earned
one. The next year we started to work together as a full fledged corp marching
band. We still had some problems, but our program was steadily increasing in
quality. We earned a third division that year. Then came my Junior year. That
year, we got our act together. We decided to just skip over that second
division stuff and went straight to earning a 1st Division in
marching, concert, and sightreading. We were then a Sweepstakes band. We earned
a reputation for being a winning group, and tried to keep that reputation.
Unfortunately, this year was not as successful. Our show was up to 1st
division standards the day before contest, and then we got there and choked. We
received a 2nd division. These West High School Band years have
changed the actual personalities of the people involved. We have learned the
value of working with each other and not against each other. We have learned
that band is fun, but there are times to be serious. Thank you Mr. Ray for
everything you have done for us. You have not only improved our playing
abilities, but our attitudes as well. I
am gonna miss hanging around my West High School band nerds, but I am now going
to be a part of the Trinity Valley Community College Cardinal Band in Athens,
TX. Thank you everyone for the good
times that we have had together. I will
never forget the times like when the loading crew and I decided to make shadow
puppets on the wall of the trailer at contest.
(Jay, get that long shadow away from me!)
These are the muscles that power our
band program. Meet my loading crew! Oh, yeah, and Brandi too. Just kidding
Brandi! You know I love ya. Eric Patterson, Brandon Ortega (AKA MESCAN), and
Jay Martin have been awesome this year with helping get things done fast.
Together, Eric, myself, Jay, mescan, Brandi, and Georgia Jung (not pictured
future head of loading crew) hold the record of getting the entire trailer
loaded and locked up in less than two minutes. You can't tell me that that
isn't awesome. Thanks for everything you guys (and girls) have done for me this
year, and good luck to you Georgia in finding people to take our places.
This is a shot of my group of trainees during
summer band camp. In this shot, we were reviewing marching moves, and am not
pictured because I was on the marching staff this year, and I am on the stage
back there yelling at the top of my lungs…(you can see my sock)
Rebecca Podsednik and Lindsay
Kolar have always been close friends, and I couldn’t leave them out. Lindsay was our Drum Major the past two
years and has proven many times that excellent leadership can make the
difference in a program. She has always
held a good attitude towards her band kids, and she has earned my respect
whole-heartedly. Rebecca has been my
bud throughout the years, and she is sooooo sweet. She was in the PALS program with me this year, and together we
have learned more than I ever anticipated.
Rebecca doesn’t have a mean bone in her body, and I will always consider
her to be my friend.
April and
Sophia are just plain weird. The two of
them are always thinking up some way to cause trouble, but for some reason,
people still love them. I will miss you
guys next year, and good luck as Seniors!
