What was your favorite subject in school?
If I had to select any one-off class for any semester, it would be Speech class in 10th grade. I realized my potential in that one semester more than I did my entire high school career.
Now if you mean favorite subject as a whole, then it’s Music/Band, hands down.
My first experience playing an instrument came in 4th grade when I was one of 6 choir members to volunteer to accompany the band while playing the Recorder. From the start, I loved having the ability to make sounds with more than just my voice. Sure, I had done it before, playing around with a harmonica, my aunt’s piano and a toy guitar I was given when I was young, but this was different. Now, I was playing with other students as the choir sang, making the melody that much more beautiful.
The following year, we were allowed to sign up for band. I chose the tenor sax but was third to request a sax when only two were owned by the music department. So I went with the clarinet. Things became much more enjoyable, playing with a larger ensemble, albeit and out of tune ensemble.
In junior high, I signed up for Cadet Band, which was similar to a small orchestra, but with only wind instruments (what you play by blowing, as opposed to violins, violas, cellos and basses). However, still wanting to play sax, but having a loyalty to clarinet, I asked to try out the bass clarinet. This was shaped like an alto sax, larger than the clarinet, played in the same key, but possessing a deeper, more resonant tone, which I instantly fell in love with.
I participated in my first full orchestra when we joined the string instruments to play during the Christmas and spring concerts.
During the summer after my 8th grade, we got our first taste of a marching band, playing for the junior high school. Later that summer, we were permitted to join the high school band, even though we had not yet entered our freshman year.
That’s when the fun began. I learned to play more complicated pieces and march in formations in drills, as our Corps-style band competed in the Annual Mermaid Festival about 3 hours away.
I knew then, playing with all of those cool upper classmen (and gorgeous girls) that I would stay with music for the duration of my high school career and beyond.
Freshman year, my band director asked me if I would be willing to try out the French horn, which puzzled me. I had been playing woodwind instruments and had never touched any brass. We had one other player, who happened to be my neighbor Hector from across the street. I learned later that my junior high teacher had told the high school director that I was “very talented” and could probably play other instruments with little effort.
To this day, I never told anyone that I accepted because I had seen someone play a French horn while sitting on a toilet in the 1980 movie Fame with Irene Cara. Let’s just keep that between us and don’t ask me if I ever tried it.
Having abandoned the bass clarinet, I found myself missing those low frequencies. I had become addicted to being “the bottom”, cranking out those low tones. By this time, my younger brother had been playing the sax in junior high and was letting me practice on it when he brought it home. So when the director mentioned he was going to have someone convert to bari-sax for marching band, I asked if I could do it. He told me he needed someone quickly and I told him I could handle it.
That first football game of the season, there I was, marching down the field with an instrument that was heavier than I was!
From that year on, I was allowed to play alto sax and the great baritone sax in jazz and basketball pep band, alto sax and French horn in the orchestra, and a series of instruments in the marching band, whenever he needed me to fill in. I had learned to play trumpet, sousaphone, flute, baritone, and snare/bass drum, to fill in if we were ever short in the percussion section during a parade. I learned everything except trombone, oboe, and bassoon.
I loved everything about playing music. But mostly I loved being in front of an audience. Whenever a song allowed for a solo in jazz band, I jumped on it. I asked my church’s young adult choir director if I could play with the keyboard player in church on Sundays. I was later invited to play for other churches. Naturally, when my band director asked if I was willing to do a solo during the song, “When Doves Cry” at halftime at a basketball game, I was in Heaven!
The most fun of all of my band days came when I was asked to put a group together to be the opening act for the school talent show my senior year. We played an instrumental rendition of “Easy Lover” by Phillip Bailey and Phil Collins.
I called the group “Hit And Run” because if we bombed, being the first act, we would ‘hit and run’ and hopefully be long forgotten by the time the show was over.
Thankfully, it was the exact opposite. We brought the house down!
It was one of two groups that I played in that night. I was also invited to join another group called “Xadrian” to play “Tonight” by Ready For The World” and “Men All Pause” by Klymaxx.
I had opportunities to play in sports over the years, which would have been to my father’s delight. I never wanted to disappoint him, especially knowing he wanted me to follow in his footsteps as a 2-year state champion star football player from the same high school. But playing on the field during the games would not have allowed me to be out there at halftime. I know that sounds funny, but that’s all I wanted.
Band took me much further than sports ever would have because although I was a decent athlete, as skinny as I was, I was far from the collegiate level. This is why I never truly did anything beyond playing for the basketball intramural league in high school, just for fun (and an excuse to get my girlfriend out of her house, late nights – but that’s another story).
Most important, it got me my scholarship to Florida A&M University, where I performed as a member of its world-renowned Marching 100 band. This made my father prouder than I dreamed possible.
But I’m sure you know my inspiration.
But yeah, it was music for me. It was and will always be the music…
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