2019 Life Logs, Day 72: All Bands Night at Falmouth High School
Date: Wednesday, March 13, 2019
Weather: Sunny, Turning Cloudy Late Afternoon; High 43, Low 25 degrees
Location: At Home in the Cottage, East Falmouth, MA
After a day of more of the same—exercise, rest and elevate knee, read (more on that a little later)—I went with Heather and boys to Falmouth High School this evening for All Bands Night. This is an evening when all of the school bands in the district come together on the floor the high school gymnasium
to showcase their musical talents. And WOW—very impressive. All 5th and 6th graders in Falmouth go to Morse Pond School and there is a 5th grade band, a 6th grade band, and a jazz band. Sam plays percussion in the 6th grade band
and the jazz band. All 7th and 8th graders go to Lawrence Junior High School and they have a band with strings and a jazz band. And then there is the high school marching band, the high school band with strings, and the high school jazz band. The high school marching band opened the evening with the Star Spangled Banner and the Falmouth High School Song. Then the band presentations began, with each band playing one song, and then going back and each playing a second song. It is so interesting to listen to the progression from 5th grade to high school, but I was really impressed with the musical expertise of each. The band directors do a fabulous job. Unlike the earlier elementary grade performances which are sometimes a little difficult to listen to, all of the bands tonight were enjoyable. After each band played two songs, the jazz band players came forward. The first was the Morse Pond Jazz Band playing ‘My Girl’ with Sam on drums.
It was almost enough to burst my heart open with joy to sit and watch him. He was the only one on drums, keeping the beat throughout the song, and he did a fabulous job. Playing in front of so many people must be overwhelming for a 12 year-old. He handled it just fine, but I was a little teary-eyed. I just can’t believe my oldest grandchild is almost a teenager, and a talented one at that . . . so proud of him.
This evening was a wonderful opportunity for the younger students to be exposed to the progression they will experience through high school and at the end of the evening, all of the bands played ‘America the Beautiful’ together, leaving Oma with glistening eyes once again.
I finished another great book today, ‘Unsheltered’ by Barbara Kingsolver. She is one of my favorite authors and I really enjoyed this book. But it ended way too soon. Surely there will be a sequel as there is so much more to the story that I want to read. I have now finished both books I got from Heather for my birthday, so I’ll go back to reading my Inspector Gamache mystery series by Louise Penny.
