Middle School Band Music

makes me cry.  Well, not really.  Tonight was the annual band concert and I wasn't expecting too much in the way of musical greatness.  But watching my middle school student play in the middle school band concert did bring tears to my eyes.  It's because I'm a softie like my dad.

Madison plays percussion in both the advanced band and the jazz band.  When we got to the auditorium I asked her where we should sit so we could see her.  She told me we could sit anywhere, so I tried to be more specific with my question.  "Madison, what percussion instrument will you be playing tonight?  If you tell me that we can sit where we can see you playing."  She replied, "Mom, I'm playing all of them."  There was definitely a tone to her response that communicated "duh" to me; apparently a good mom would know that her daughter plays all the percussion instruments.  We ended up sitting in the middle and hoped we would be able to see her at least part of the time.  If you've been to a band concert before you might remember that the percussion instruments are usually in the back and this concert was no exception.  The percussion equipment took up the entire width of the gym behind the rest of the band.

I think Madison is amazing and I don't want this to sound as if I don't think she is , but I was taken by surprise by how well she did during the concert.  It was sort of funny to see her in the back playing.  She was wearing the white shirt and black skirt required by her band teacher, but had decided to wear one of Jared's ties as well - a green one because "that's Christmas-y".  She also had a big Christmas hair bow (thanks for the cute bows Megan!) clipping her hair back on one side.  The rest of the percussion section are boys and, of course, they hadn't accessorized nearly as well as Madison.  Because she played so many instruments, as many as six in one song, she was constantly moving back and forth behind the rest of the band going from one instrument to the next.  If only her hair wasn't so brilliantly red she wouldn't have been so noticeable back there as she moved around.  Well, that and every time she put the triangle down it made a little *ding* sound.

As the band was getting ready to play the first song I looked at Madison and could tell something was up.  She looked kind of lost or as if she had lost something.  I could see her mumbling something to the boy next to her, but it didn't look as if he had given her any help.  Jared and I both thought at the same time that it might be her music that was lost.  Jared was certain that she was just going to stand there and not play anything, but I thought she might try to play her part from memory.  She has started to memorize longer piano pieces so I hoped she had done the same with her band music.  Well, as the band director started conducting Madison started counting.  Not out loud, although I guess it could have been and I wouldn't have heard her, but just mouthing 1-2-3-4, 1-2-3-4 as she played her part from memory.  That would be hard enough if she was playing only one instrument, but she somehow remembered exactly when to play each of the instruments in each song without missing a beat.  She even had time to correct the percussionist next to her when he was playing the sleigh bells at the wrong time ;)  Seeing Madison do so very well when she might have just given up without her music was really gratifying to me.

It was wonderful to see what a good fit percussion is for Madison.  It's like an outlet for all her OCD tendencies!  Now the fact that, like me, she counts each step as she goes up and down the stairs can help her as she plays music.  Her crazy organizational skills have helped her to be able to move quickly and smoothly from instrument to instrument.  The rhythm of percussion is reliable, it's constant, and it's perfect, just like Madison.

Just for fun, here's a list of instruments Madison played during the concert:

Timpani 

Marimba

Crash cymbals

Suspended cymbals

Wood block

Triangle

Chimes