Reflections and observations on the twilight of my last journey into the realm of the Band Nerd

So as I was saying yesterday, our band director Brett is leaving after this year to pursue a career in songwriting in Nashville, making this his last band trip as well (unless we beat Texas tomorrow).

I don't know what it keeps happening, but whatever band I'm in seems to really go to crap after my class graduates. Same thing happened to me in High School. We would always get perfect scores at Concert Festival and stuff, but then after I graduated, they started sucking. That might have something to do with the fact that our band director was banging his secretary and both him and the assistant director bailed, but that's beside the point.

You always have these romantic notions about your organization having the prestige it did while you were in it, but it doesn't often work like that. And I'm afraid something similar is on the horizon for the Redcoats. With Brett's departure, most responsibilities will turn to Dr. Romines, the substantially more uptight, older, less personal director of bands. (Brett will have a 'replacement' and all, but whoever it is won't have the amount of responsibilities he does now.)

With this in mind, I can see Redcoats a. Being a lot less fun, and b. Having a substantial drop in membership. They've already taken away our trip to The Landing during the Florida trip because too many people are hungover to rehearse the next day. Now, from my own experience, this is a bit of a problem, but come on...we always got through it.

He also made us change certain vocal parts of our cadence (for those of you who haven't heard it, during the breakdown of 'G...E... is a hO...RRRR...G, I got your G...I, I got your I...A, we'll kick your ass...) which upset a lot of people. And he just isn't as cool and fun as Brett. I mean, I don't see him being thrilled to see the entire band show up in his hotel room at midnight, and I don't think he would've sang Strawberry Wine for us.

I also don't think Dr. Romines would be the kind to be cool with nicknames like 'Coach' and 'El Poos', or with explaining the differences between Viagra and Cialis on the bus.

A little discipline might do the band good, but it's just not going to be the same without Brett. It certainly won't be as much fun. Anyway...I know the vast majority of people reading this have no idea what I'm talking about, so I'm sorry. I'll post something more general interest later.