Fortunately I woke up without needing the alarm clock. Unfortunately the clock said 7:32, and we were meeting at 7:45. Glad I got that too-short haircut after all, so I was able to jump into my uniform and get to the bus with a few minutes still to spare.
This being the first day at Fort Sam Houston, we were certainly anticipating a few “hiccups” in the schedule. The first was for our command staff, who left the hotel early to make sure everything was ready for the rest of the band’s arrival. Too bad the resident band doesn’t typically show up until 9:00, well after our arrival time. We decided to go ahead with our safety and other general briefings outside, but were “saved” when someone showed up earlier than normal (for them) and let us in. The briefings took place inside the building which had been running the AC all weekend long … VERY nice. Quote of the briefing: “Blue flowers are people too.” We got some good reminders about heat injuries and how to avoid, identify, and treat them. Hopefully we’ll all drink way too much water and be smart in our activities so that won’t be an issue.
Be broke into two groups and a few of the resident band members took us on a tour of the facility. Theirs is perhaps THE largest band facility in the Army system, set up on two floors of a historic building. They have a large rehearsal room (might have been a ballroom in the building’s past), large admin area, library, separate room adequate for the Jazz band, day room (plenty big enough for our entire band for any future briefings), and that’s just the upstairs. Downstairs they have their instrument lockers, repair shop, changing rooms, and 5 or 6 small group rehearsal rooms. There’s probably more that I’m just not remembering right now. The leaders of all the groups were pretty happy to hear they have designatred rooms for Woodwind Quintet, vocals, combo, Brass Quintet, and others.
Since our large instruments were shipped on the back of a flatbed truck had wasn’t due to arrive until later in the afternoon, we had scheduled an instrument-less drill band (marching) just to help train our people on things such as turns, starts & stops, etc. Just before going out, we got the call that the truck with our instruments was in fact on post. So we loaded into the bus, expecting to drive over to the warehouse to transfer our gear into an equipment truck. Another call was made, and the truck instead was able to drive right up to the band hall. So we had “fun” unloading and carrying stuff into the building … remember that the main rehearsal rooms were all on the second floor? Historic buildings don’t have things like loading ramps or elevators. I think we only had a few pulled muscles, scrapes and bruises from that PT session.
Some of us had left our instruments back at the hotel since nobody really knew what the security or rehearsal situation would be, so that group rode back to the hotel in a van. We managed to get lost on the way back, so we stopped for lunch on the way. The selected establishment was Schilo’s Deli, a german delicatessen with “Since 1917” on their sign. I just got a grilled ham & cheese on rye, which was OK, and then we made our quick stop at the hotel.
When we got back after lunch we were informed that many of those rehearsal spaces pointed out during the tour were in fact going to be off-limits. Part of that was due to a bad situation they had when two National Guard bands came through for a recent backfill and basically trashed / lost / took some of their percussion equipment. So the room with the drumsets and almost all of their equipment was off-limits to us. In addition, some of the band members going on leave had put their personal gear into the lower-level rehearsal rooms, which were then locked. There was no interest in consolidating all that gear into a single room so we could use the others. The library is also off-limits. But hey, it IS the biggest band facility in the system … too bad we can’t use it. We did the best we could, which at times meant groups spread out in the halls or three separate rehearsals going on concurrently in the main rehearsal room. Not sure how long that can last.
One of the main goals of this AT is to get people playing on their instruments A LOT. The MPTs (separate musical groups) are given dedicated rehearsal time, and everyone else is supposed to round up whoever else is available and make MORE groups. For one of the rehearsal sessions I took part in a group comprised of 2 flutes, oboe, tuba, 2 bassoons and 2 horns. We acquired a set of ceremonial music written in 6 parts with various transpositions to allow quite a number of possible combinations. Certainly something that could be used “in a pinch.”
The final rehearsal hour I did Brass Quintet, and we were informed that the group had been assigned a new request for a redeployment ceremony (troops returning from an overseas deployment) on Saturday morning at 6:00am. Due to other rehearsal conflicts we didn’t quite have the “regular” group together, but were fortunate to have a bassoon player covering the tuba part. We probably would have needed one or two more to make up the same balance we typically get from the regular player; that’s due to the nature of the instruments, not any lack of effort on the part of the bassoonist! :+)
A quick stop was made at the commissary (grocery store) so people could stock their fridges back at the hotel. A bit later an MPT leader meeting was called to discuss how things were going so far, and what things could be improved as go forward over the next few days. That was followed by a quick senior staff meeting. I was fine with cooking some of my frozen dinners and trying to get to bed early. Would have worked except I also tried to catch up on email, blogging, voicemails, and some work details.
No comments:
Post a Comment