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WF Marching Band

Great seats for basketball used to be a perk and now it's a detractor
 
DeaconJoe said:
They get class credit.
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1.5 hrs of you participate in both athletic bands.

The band has dropped in size by nearly 50% since I was a member 20 years ago. I far and away spent more time and effort being in the band than I did for any other class, but I wouldn't trade my time and experiences while in the band.

Hopefully Currie will put a refreshed emphasis on growing the band. I'd be content with a 125-150 piece band out there each week. We'll never have an App/directional school sized band, and that's ok.
 
Less light woodwinds, more heavy brass and saxophones = more sound. That’s been what I’ve wanted since I was in the band.
 
DeaconJoe said:
Why does it surprise people that a small school has a small band? FTR, I'd love a bigger band. Wake's a small school with a very image conscious student body. Students don't like to do things that other students don't perceive as "cool." Add in the perception that band takes too much time away from academics and you have a band of 80-100 students (including Salem and FTCC students).
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Good point. Prep school fuck ups and kids of Chinese oligarchs don’t usually want to play in the marching bands.
 
deacdixieboy said:
Unfortunately to non-WF people they definitely are.
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I’m sure you have access to a whole treasure trove of non-WF opinions of our marching band to base that on.

I can agree that the band should be bigger. But to call the students who are out there making the effort “jokes” is wrong.
 
DeacDaddy said:
I’m sure you have access to a whole treasure trove of non-WF opinions of our marching band to base that on.

I can agree that the band should be bigger. But to call the students who are out there making the effort “jokes” is wrong.
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1) there was a discussion about it on Reddit several weeks ago with many non-WF folks chiming in so yeah I do.

2) I didn’t call the students a joke. The band is a joke and that is on the AD and the people getting paid to run it, not students who are basically doing it for no perks.
 
DeacDaddy said:
I’m sure you have access to a whole treasure trove of non-WF opinions of our marching band to base that on.

I can agree that the band should be bigger. But to call the students who are out there making the effort “jokes” is wrong.
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I will also add that several former WF band members posted and agreed and had tons of terrible stories about their experience.
 
P4nthers11 said:
My fiancée was in band at a pac 12 school and she usually has a lot of thoughts after seeing wakes band along the lines of why on earth do they do it that way. I’d never thought about this, but she pointed out that for a band wakes size they really need to push students into instruments that get more bang for their buck. So if we have a 50 person band we can’t have 10 people playing clarinet.
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A couple of thoughts:

Pushing kids to a horn with “more bang for the buck” is a good idea, but you have to have a horn. For example, most clarinet players either can already or could very easily learn to play sax. But you have to have a sax for each clarinet player you convert. Also, the more brass the better, but very few woodwind players have ever learned a brass instrument let alone mastering one to the level needed.

The music itself is an issue as well. Currently there are too many voices, which other than size, is one reason the group sounds weak. If you only have six trumpet players, you can’t have two kids on first part, two on second part, and two on third part. Just bag the third part and have three kids playing first and three playing second. The group will sound fuller.
 
deacdixieboy said:
I will also add that several former WF band members posted and agreed and had tons of terrible stories about their experience.
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Link? Or what sub was it discussed on?Curious about their experiences that you mention.
 
To former band members: How much has the implosion of our basketball program hurt our overall band participation? Wasn't the opportunity to also be in our pep band and the ability to play in a sold-out Joel and travel to ACC and NCAA tourneys a big draw in the day?

I'm sure there are many other factors. But I have to believe our basketball program hasn't helped matters.
 
TheAbster said:
To former band members: How much has the implosion of our basketball program hurt our overall band participation? Wasn't the opportunity to also be in our pep band and the ability to play in a sold-out Joel and travel to ACC and NCAA tourneys a big draw in the day?

I'm sure there are many other factors. But I have to believe our basketball program hasn't helped matters.
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For me personally, basketball was a major reason I did marching band. I loved marching and performing for sure, but the incentive of going to the NCAA tournament to watch the Deacs was a big factor. That we ended up better at football in my 4 years (class of 2008) was surprising but not expected to be the norm a decade later.
 
deacdixieboy said:
1) there was a discussion about it on Reddit several weeks ago with many non-WF folks chiming in so yeah I do.

2) I didn’t call the students a joke. The band is a joke and that is on the AD and the people getting paid to run it, not students who are basically doing it for no perks.
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There was a discussion on Reddit with “many” non-wake forest people discussing the Wake Forest band, and not just discussing it but calling it a laughingstock? Uh, okay.
 
MBDeac08 said:
Link? Or what sub was it discussed on?Curious about their experiences that you mention.
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Can’t find it after a quick search. It was on r/CFB and a general thread about perceptions of your school’s band.
 
DeacDaddy said:
There was a discussion on Reddit with “many” non-wake forest people discussing the Wake Forest band, and not just discussing it but calling it a laughingstock? Uh, okay.
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Are you the band leader or something? Not sure why you are so upset about it. If you don’t like that as proof, how about the fact that I attend numerous WF sporting events a year and, unlike you I guess, have many friends who are not Wake fans including family, that I take with me, and without fail they mention how disappointing our band is.
 
P4nthers11 said:
My fiancée was in band at a pac 12 school and she usually has a lot of thoughts after seeing wakes band along the lines of why on earth do they do it that way. I’d never thought about this, but she pointed out that for a band wakes size they really need to push students into instruments that get more bang for their buck. So if we have a 50 person band we can’t have 10 people playing clarinet.
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Out of curiosity, what Pac 12 school? If you don't mind sharing. I recently was living in the Bay Area and both Cal and Stanford have extremely nice bands in comparison to us. Granted, their enrollments are much larger than ours, but they definitely do get better bang for the buck.
 
MBDeac08 said:
For me personally, basketball was a major reason I did marching band. I loved marching and performing for sure, but the incentive of going to the NCAA tournament to watch the Deacs was a big factor. That we ended up better at football in my 4 years (class of 2008) was surprising but not expected to be the norm a decade later.
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Basketball guaranteed lower level seating plus the NCAA and ACC Tournaments were a huge draw. Also being able to visit every away venue was immense. I was able to go to every ACC school and some pretty awesome non-conference opponents. We also got a per diem that if you spent wisely, would pay for your booze for the trip as well.
 
deacdixieboy said:
Can’t find it after a quick search. It was on r/CFB and a general thread about perceptions of your school’s band.
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Found it. Thanks! Sounds as though the goals and leadership structure have changed a lot in the last decade.
 
deacdixieboy said:
Are you the band leader or something? Not sure why you are so upset about it. If you don’t like that as proof, how about the fact that I attend numerous WF sporting events a year and, unlike you I guess, have many friends who are not Wake fans including family, that I take with me, and without fail they mention how disappointing our band is.
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I just think it’s silly that you try to claim that “many non WF people” regard our band as a joke, when no one thinks about our band but WF people. And among WF people, only a very small subset.

I do agree that it could be bigger and surely it could be improved with more resources. Like anything. But I just think a thread about how lame the band is, when it’s a group of students doing their best to entertain people like you with the resources at their disposal, is itself lame.
 
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