Hello again!

Yes I know it’s been a WHILE since I posted last. One of my friends said the other day that college is nothing but a never-ending to-do list. Since the last time I posted a blog I’ve done a lot of different things!

1) I moved into a new dorm with a fantastic view!

(Yes that's Beaver Stadium)

2) I played 2 concerts in Eisenhower Auditorium at Penn State

3) I performed in my first Tuba/Euphonium Studio Recital

4) I recorded some new Barbershop Multitracks

www.youtube.com/drewjbonner

This weekend the Blue Band is heading to Columbus, Ohio to accompany the football team to the Horseshoe! I’m really excited about the trip. Here is the Itinerary:

Friday Nov. 12^th

11:30 Load Buses

Noon Depart for Columbus

6:30 Arrive in Columbus

7:30 Dinner at the Hotel

Saturday Nov. 13^th

7:00 am Breakfast

Get Instruments to take on bus

8:45 Load buses in uniform

9:00 Depart for OSU practice field

10:00 Arrive and unload equipment

10:15 Practice

11:15 Practice Over

11:30 Boxed lunch at bus

1:00 March to Skull Session (St. John Arena)

1:30 Skull Session with OSU Band

3:00 Pregame

3:30 Kick-off

7:00 Game over/Post Game concert

8:00 Load truck/buses. Change into travel clothes

9:00 Dinner at hotel

10:00 Board Buses

Sunday Nov. 14

4:00 am Arrive at University Park

Blue Band is the thing that keeps me sane during the week. I like to play a game with myself in order for me to keep my grades up. I’ll make sure that the weekend has something fun planned for it. Usually it’s a football game or going home etc.

Apart from Blue Band, School is going well for the most part. I’m starting to get the hang of the whole college thing. Adjusting my schedule to fit in all the things that I have to do is becoming easier to do. I’m even getting time to things for myself! Me having free time is the key for me to stay on top of things. It’s also nice to have sunsets like this almost every night. Nothing relaxes you like nature.

GAME WEEKEND and Beyond!

Friday September 3, 2010

Easy day today. I went to theory this morning and then came home and napped. I had Blue Band at 4 and then we got ready to go to the stadium for football eve. We lined up and the cadence started. Then everybody started basically dancing around. This was the phenomenon known as Parade Order. I’ve seen it before, but I never learned anything for it. They basically throw all of the rookies under the bus and make them learn it on their own. Here is basically what happens.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KvcLxjh3284&feature=related

Craziness. And I loved every minute of it. So once we got there we walked through the tunnel and sat in our seats. I couldn’t help but smile. We got into our seats and played some stands tunes throughout the show. We did cheers and other stuff. And then JoePa and the Nittany Lions came and he game a speech. He was like Mark Twain but he got the crowd riled up. After that, we lined up for Parade Order again. I love it. After we got back to the Blue Band Building, I packed up my stuff and headed over to my friend Ryan’s room to watch last year’s Blue Band DVD. It was cool to see some of the halftime shows that they did. After that I walked home and fell asleep quickly because I knew tomorrow was D-day.

Saturday September 4, 2010 (Day 18 if you’re still keeping track)

GAME DAY!

Woke up at 6. Ugh. But I knew that it would all be worth it in the end. I went and got a shower and when I got back in my room I heard a familiar sound. A bunch of trumpets thought that it would be cool to wake up East halls at 6:30 before they went to rehearsal. I walked into my room with Victory blasting from the ground near my dorm. And it was loud. I thought to myself, God I love this place! After I got dressed I walked over to the Blue Band field. There were already cars parked and people were getting ready to eat breakfast. We rehearsed for a while and then we went into the building and ate hoagies and some other treats. (Breakfast of Champions!) We saved our cookies to eat during the game. Then it was time to get dressed and inspected. The Blue Band takes their uniform very seriously. The section guides inspect you and make sure that you have everything put on correctly etc. We then lined up for Parade Order to march over to the Bryce Jordan Center for TailGreat. About halfway over I saw my parents. They basically freaked out when they saw me. Very cool. We got into the BJC and marched in to the Pre-game Cadence. People went crazy. It was so cool. Youngstown State’s band also came. They were good. Smaller band but they had a good overall sound. After TailGreat we lined up outside and marched over to the stadium. I saw my parents again, this time with my brother. They were smiling and Aaron was taking pictures and videos on his iPhone 4 (so jealous, by the way). We got to the stadium and marched into the tunnel entrance. We hung out back there until the football team walked through and then a whistle sounded, and mass chaos occurred. Everyone ran to the front of the tunnel and got into position. We waited there for about 3 or 4 minutes and then we heard the drum taps. DRUMS ARE OUT!! Everyone was yelling. I grabbed onto the shoulder of the person in front of me so we didn’t get trampled on the way out. ONE FOR THE MONEY, TWO FOR THE SHOW, THREE TO GET REEADDYYYYYYYYYY!!!!! LEFT LEFT LEFT LEFT. I marched onto the grassy field of Beaver Stadium (The most beautiful grass EVER, I’m convinced). SWITCH! My horn was down at the normal position now. I felt numb. My eyes were everywhere. I looked at the student section and noticed that it was only about half full, but I didn’t care. I was marching pre-game with the Penn State Blue Band. DROP TURN! OUT UP! The notes of the fanfare broke up the sounds of cheering and clapping throughout the stadium. I watched the big screen as the drum major ran up to do the flip. He didn’t make it, unfortunately. It didn’t matter though. He made the second one. We continued through pregame. I didn’t screw up on the Floating Lions, Thank the LORD! And we got into the Team Aisle so the team could run out. We started to Rock and Roll! Halfway through the team ran out and the stadium exploded. We ran off the field. All together it went by so fast I couldn’t explain what was good or bad. It was just a blur. I’m hoping to catch more of it when we play Kent State. Then the game started. It was cookie time. It was good J The Lions looked a little sketchy in the beginning. They went down after Youngstown scored. 7-3. Not good. Penn State came back though and we were up by the time halftime rolled around. We went down unto the field with about 2 minutes left in the game. It was probably the closest anyone could get to the players and coaches without actually touching them. Joe Paterno was pacing up and down the sideline about 15 yards away from me. The players were GIANT. I’m talking like two heads taller than me. The half ended and we watched the Youngstown State band perform. We did a good job with our Halftime show. The theme was Space and we did the theme from Star Trek, the Jetson’s, and Jupiter from the Planets. After halftime we headed back up to the stands. When I was about halfway to my seat, I heard the crowd go crazy. Penn State returned a kickoff for a touchdown. I was happy. We watched the rest of the game and Penn State dominated them for the most part. We walked down for Post Game. We played some fight songs and some song from our halftime show. I heard the familiar whistle of my Mom. I spotted her and the rest of my family. My Uncle Brian and his son Greg had also come up for the game. After we were done playing we marched off the field playing Victory. I ran over to my dad and gave him a high five. We talked while the drum line did their thing. Then we lined up to march back to the Blue Band Building. After I got changed into my civilian clothes I found my parents and my brother and Madeline, a friend of ours. I sat and chatted with them for about an hour until I decided that I was too tired to function, so I went home and passed out. But it was an awesome day!

Sunday September 5, 2010

I woke up at around 11 o’clock and my dad came a picked me up. I took my laundry down to my brother’s place, which seems to be our normal Sunday routine now. Before we got to the laundry, we all went out to eat at the Allen Street Grill. It was so good. I guess when you eat at the commons most of the time, you tend to appreciate a ‘real’ meal. So then we went back to Aaron’s apartment and we loaded up their car. They drove us up to Aaron’s parking spot near the BJC and they said bye and left. Then Aaron and I went to my dorm to get some stuff. We got back to his place and started the laundry. While we waited, I decided that I was going to record a tag and possibly put it up on YouTube. So I warned my brother not to make any sound while I did this one. I belted a high A flat for about 25 seconds, and then I hit the stop button. My brother said that I couldn’t do that again because I was too loud. So that killed that idea. So the wash finally got done and we sorted it and then my brother brought me back home. I was excited because the Blue Band was going to the Spikes Game. The Spikes are the minor league baseball team that plays in State College. It was so much fun. They sit us in the middle of left field. So naturally we talk to the left fielder the whole time. And we politely harass the opposing teams left fielder the ENTIRE game. So funny. It was a good time. Then I headed home after the fireworks display and passed out, still tired from Saturday.

Monday September 6, 2010 (Labor Day)

While I was mad that I couldn’t be home to play with my band Story of Another at Zoostock, I made the best of this day. But they were in the back of my mind the whole day. We started the day with a 9 am rehearsal followed by a wonderful picnic. Burgers and Hotdogs and all of the other Labor Day essentials. Following the picnic I was recruited to play football against the trumpets. Well apparently it is a contest every year. And the trumpets always win. And everyone is against them. We looked good. Some would say that it was the best team we had in a while. What I didn’t know was that this was legit football. There was a line with 5 guys on it and 4 wide outs a running back and a QB. And the line protected the QB. I’m talking like all out blocking. I’m talking 45-minute halves. I’m talking PAIN. At then end of the game we lost 1-2. But we were in it the whole game. The game ended as we were driving down the field to score, but time ran out. I was drained. I went back to my dorm and immediately laid down. My body hated me. I then cleaned my room because I had friends coming over. My friends got here and they brought pizza sticks that were amazing. Then we decided to go for a walk. We walked down to the football practice field because that is where Blue Band practice is held on Tuesday nights. Mollie showed us the quickest way to get there. After walking around for a while we decided to go home. My arms hurt so much, I couldn’t lift them up above my head. It was hard falling asleep that night.

The rest of the week was kind of rough. I am sick today (Thursday). I feel like my head is going to explode. And I found out yesterday that I have to organize rehearsals for Tuba/Euph Quartet. So much work. I was planning on going home this weekend but I doubt that that will happen. :(

I know this is a short post, but I wanted my next post to be all about this weekend and my first Penn State Football Game as a member of the Blue Band! Look for it at the end of this weekend!

Wednesday September 1, 2010

Happy September! I am absolutely swamped with work. It’s an immense amount of things that I have to do. Classes are starting to actually be classes. Blue Band is getting more intense. And practice time is getting more and more valuable. Tomorrow is Thursday. Hard day with a hard schedule. 8 - Sight singing 10 - Science of Sound 11:15 – World Literature Symphonic Band – 1:25 then I can breathe for a few hours before going to Freshman Tuba-Euph Studio Class. Tonight I’m probably going to get myself organized for tomorrow. I hope I survived this whole college thing.

Thursday September 2, 2010

After an extremely busy day I came home at around 7 to chill out and maybe do some theory homework. I was really excited to find an email from my YouTube account. I do multi-track recordings of barbershop tags and some other musical stuff. I recently got a new microphone and recorded a tag called I Love to Sing ‘Em. It’s a standard barbershop tag and it’s pretty boring. So I added a new and improved ending to it. I got a message asking for the music to my new tag. I never even thought about writing it down. So I wrote it out in Sibelius quickly and sent it to him. He wanted his quartet to try it out. I asked him, if it was at all possible, to make a recording of it so I could have it. Who knows, maybe my tag will become famous!! Unlikely. If you want to see some of my videos, click the link!

http://www.youtube.com/user/drewjbonner

I’m looking forward to Friday and Saturday this weekend!

Friday I have Football Eve in Beaver Stadium!!!! WHOOOOO!!!!! And Saturday is GAME DAY IN HAPPY VALLEY!!! I will be ON THE FIELD in Beaver Stadium! So Surreal!!

The First Week at Penn State!

Day 6

August 23, 2010

Today I woke up and got a shower and got dressed and went on my way to my to my first college class, Music Theory I. I walked over to the Music building for class. I found my friend Audrey, and we met the professor Tom Cody. He seemed like a pretty chill guy. We talked about some basic things about theory and music and the like. Then I went over to Audrey’s suite. Who happened to be suite-mates with Ali. We hung around there until it was time for my Freshman Music Education Seminar (or FMES!). I think I’m going to really enjoy that class. It’s basically going to be the transition from student to teacher. J. At the end of this class, I called my parents, who had just picked up my brother from the airport after his 3-month stay in Germany! It was so good to know that he was safe and sound back in America! Then I went to get lunch with an old Tamaqua Crew. Myself, Corey, Bheff, and Geoff. Geoff brought along his roommate too, who is also named Geoff. What are the chances? On the way to lunch it poured rain on Bheff and me. We got there and found Corey, Geoff, and Geoff. We talked about classes and such. I then went home and hung out until it was time for me to leave for blue band. Since it was raining we were inside in the band room. We worked on stand music and chasers. After Blue Band I went to rescom so that I could finally get on the Internet and I went back to my dorm to surf the web since I hadn’t gotten to do that in a long time. I went to bed early because I had to get up early for my 8 o’clock class on Wednesday. Ugh.

Day 7

August 24, 2010

ONE WEEK! It went by to quickly! I had Sight Singing this morning. The professor is a Teacher’s Assistant. He is hardly fluent in piano skills. I don’t know if he was nervous or what, but he could hardly play simple triads. It was kind of frustrating to be taught by someone who didn’t seem like he knew what he was doing. Hopefully it will get better. After that, we went back to the girl’s suite in North Halls. We all had about an hour off until our next class. We hung there for a while and then set out to find our next class The Science of Music. We got there after taking the long way and getting a little off track and we walked in 5 minutes early and we saw 100 people looking at us. We had to sit apart from each other because of how packed the class was. The class itself seems to be very interesting. We would cover topics from every sense of scientific music. From acoustics, to the anatomy of the ear, to using electronic music. By the end of the class I was feeling it. I was tired. Tuesdays are going to be a long day. Audrey and I had World Literature right after Science of Music. We got into class and sat down. The professor was very very nice. She expects a lot from her students. But it you take it seriously, you will be fine. It was so hard to stay awake. It wasn’t even fair. She gave us 50 pages to read for the next class. UGGHHH. That’s a lot to do. After that class I went and met with the Tuba Euphonium Studio Freshman and some upperclassmen for lunch. I met Corey Durham, a Euphonium/Tuba performance major. He would be teaching us in a master class about playing our instruments and everyone would give feedback. Then I went back to my dorm to organize and rest myself before Blue Band at 7. We were out on the field. It was a fairly cool night but I managed to start sweating. We rehearsed our first half time show for most of practice. At the end we lined up in pregame fanfare block and ran through pregame. Blue Band seems to be all about digging in deep when you are most tired. After practice I went home and passed out for the night.

Day 8

August 25, 2010

I’ve been away at college for one week, and my parents already have to come up to check on me! I’m just kidding! They were on their way bringing my brother Aaron up. I went to 9 am Music Theory and then went back to my dorm to start on my homework. I read most of my World Lit reading and passed out on my bed around 12:30. My mom called me around 2 and told me that she could see Beaver Stadium. I got dressed and went to meet my family at the Bursar’s office. When I got there my mom and gram gave me a big hug. My dad and brother went in to take care of some business. I waited anxiously to see my brother. When he finally came out, I gave him a big hug and swung him around a little bit. I was glad he was up here with me. We then went to his apartment above the Starbucks above College Ave. (This will be my headquarters after this year J) We started to unload all of my brother’s new IKEA furniture up into the apartment. After about 45 minutes of loading I had to leave for Blue Band. My dad drove me to my dorm to change and then took me to the field. About halfway through practice, my family showed up to watch me march around and play. We were practicing the half time show so it wasn’t as exciting as pregame was, but it was still cool to have them watching me. After rehearsal we all went to Five Guys! YES!! So good! It is also within spitting distance of Aaron’s apartment. After we were all full of greasy burgers and fries, we said goodbye to my parents and gram, and then Aaron and I went up to his apartment to chill out. I helped him build his desk and some tables. I really like IKEA’s furniture. It’s so simple, yet so cool. After we were done, some of his friend’s stopped over to say hi and welcome him back to the USA. Soon after they left, I left to walk home. It only took about 25 minutes to get to my place. I finished my World Lit readings, did some theory homework, and played around on Sibelius. I passed out around 1:30. Crap. I have an 8 AM class tomorrow.

Day 9

August 26, 2010

I woke up this morning tired. Not good considering that I have a ton a classes today. I went and got some breakfast and went to my sight singing class. It wasn’t much better than what Tuesday was. The prof was a bore and I felt like we as a class could be doing so much more if he would be more fluent with his piano skills. Whatever. We went back to the girl’s suite for a little then left for Science of Music. We got there early and got decent seats together. The class started out fun. We talked about the history of acoustics. It was really interesting. He even had videos and pictures of people playing the first forms of instruments. We saw the evolution from primitive flute type instruments, to drums, and other instruments. I was starting to feel tired an I knew that I would have to get through World Lit before I would be able to rest. World Lit was like a mental work out in order to get through. After that class we went back to North Halls and just chilled out. A bunch of people ended up coming over and we watched the first season of Hey Arnold! Great times. We ended up watching 5 or 6 different episodes of Hey Arnold before we kind of gravitating away. My brother called me and we decided to go for dinner. We met at the hub and walked to my dorm commons. We ate and then Aaron had to go to a meeting. I went back to my dorm and hung around until I left to go to Champs with the Tuba/Euphonium Studio. It was a great time and I met some new people. I got to meet our professor while Professor Brown is out on medical leave. He is a 2006 graduate of Penn State and he is a really nice guy. After we had a great meal we came home and I tried to fall asleep while the rest of my floor was blasting music. I’m a little upset.

Day 10

August 27, 2010

I went to my morning theory class and then waited for my parents to show up. They were bringing my brother’s mattress and my computer chair up for me to use. After that, we all went out to eat and I went to Blue Band. I came back home and got ready to go out with the baritones. We went over to our friend’s house and chilled out there until we decided to go home around 2 am.

The First Weekend

Saturday I slept in until noon. Wow did it feel good. I woke up and Aaron called me. We took a road trip to Wal-Mart and then went out to eat at Applebee’s! Then Aaron went to the AT&T Store to buy a new iPhone. After that I went to the laundry mat behind Aaron’s apartment to do my first load of laundry! It took forever. The dryers were crap. It took about 2 hours all together. Then I went home and got ready to go out with some blue band friends. We went out on the town for the night and I got home around 12:30.

Sunday I woke up around 11 and decided to do some homework. I finished some music education seminar and then decided to go practice for a little bit. I walked over to the music building and went into a practice room. An hour and a half later I walked out feeling pretty good about my practice time. I went to check the symphonic band auditions. Still not up. Then I went to meet my friends Ali and Jess near the hub lawn. We walked around and went to the bookstore and I got a few things. Then we walked up to the music building to see if the symphonic band results were up. We got there and checked them. I am 4^th chair in the symphonic band. There are only 4 euphoniums but that’s still good! Then I walked home and hung and around and did my homework for theory and inart. I got done my stuff and decided to just hang out in my dorm for the night. I fooled around on Sibelius and wrote a pretty cool arrangement of You Are So Beautiful for baritones. I talked with some old friends on Skype to see how they were doing. It was good to talk to some people that I knew.

Penn State Blue Band!

This is about my time at Penn State University. At then end of most days I write about what happened that day. I don't have time to to write every day but I'm going to try and write as much as possible. I'll give you some back story.

I have always wanted to go to Penn State since before I can remember. I can remember going to football games when I was a kid and going to see the Penn State Blue Band. I always went to games with my Mom, Dad, brother Aaron, Gram, Pap, and Uncle Brian. I loved to watch the band come out of the tunnel during pre-game. And I knew that I wanted to do that one day. Then years passed and I was done my junior year in High School. I was an accomplished musician and was planning to go into the music education field. I knew I wanted to go to Penn State. I said that I wanted to go to other schools too, but I knew that Penn State was IT. I wanted it so bad. I auditioned for the Tuba/Euphonium studio on the Euphonium, and I was accepted. I knew that my dreams had come true. But there was one small catch. A Marching Blue Band Audition. I had done everything that I had to do. And this is what happened...

Penn State University

Day 1

August 17, 2010

Wow, It’s finally here. My mom, dad and I got on campus around 11 o’clock on Tuesday morning. We checked in at the blue band building and I saw a familiar face. Elly Graham, whom I had met a few years prior at Penn State’s summer music program, was one of the officers that was working as I walked into the building. She made me feel very welcome and quickly thrust a bunch of papers into my hands. I then proceeded into the hallway past the reception area and registered myself into the Blue Band Database. It was almost surreal, thinking that this was the beginning of my lifelong dream to come to Penn State and march out of the tunnel. I felt confident that I would do it. Before I left for Penn State people would constantly ask me if I had made the Blue Band. I was almost getting tired of explaining the audition process. Like a robot I would rattle off the schedule. “Tuesday August 17 I leave and go do a music audition and then Wednesday I have 3 three hour sessions on the marching and fundamentals that the Blue Band uses. At the end of that day is when most of the cuts are made. Then Thursday is the final day of rookie training/first day of Blue Band Camp.” I knew what I had to do. Clearly. I intended to treat it like any other audition but my brain thought otherwise. I was feeling nervous in the morning and as the audition time grew closer, I could feel my stomach turning over itself. But I didn’t let it bother me, yet. We got to my dorm, Pinchot, and started to unload everything out of the car. We even had these nifty handcarts to help out with the big stuff. Well about 10 feet out of the car disaster. My dad had spilled his box of hangers for my dorm room and as I went to help him, my cart went started to roll and hit a curb. Of course all of my stuff went flying. My desk lamp, broken. Damn. So after embarrassing myself in front of possible friends we finally made in to my room. 403 Pinchot Hall (the T is silent by the way). I walked in and I said to myself, I could dig this. I have suffered through worse conditions, such as my own attic J. After everything was in the room we decided that we hungry so we went to a sports bar that we had eaten at before. I remember what I got there before and I wanted to get it again. Then my stomach gave me a sign that it probably wasn’t a good idea. I wasn’t really hungry so I just ordered a appetizer of chicken fingers with a side a ranch dressing. The food came and there were 5 chicken fingers. I ate the smallest 2 and told my mom I was full. She looked at me with the most quizzical look that she had ever given me. She said really? Are you feeling ok? I quickly replied no. I felt sick. ME. SICK. At an audition. I couldn’t be my usual cool calm collected self today. My brain knew what was going on. This was something I wanted since I was a fetus inside of my mom. After I got a box for my leftover chicken fingers, we went to best buy to get a cable wire for my TV and an Internet wire for my computer. Well, my Internet still doesn’t work but that’s a different story. I went back to my dorm and set it up, then my parents said bye and I met up with some friends at the Blue Band Building. I practiced for a while and soon it was 3:55. Time to go. I went in. I did well. After I played my Etude out of my book, the auditioner said ‘ok, breath’, I was so nervous. The sight-reading was ok. So overall I felt good about it. I then waited for all of my friends to get done their auditions then it was time to find some food. Now that I was done auditioning I realized that I was STARVING. So my friend Eric and I set off to find some food. We went to my dorm in East Halls, to his dorm in South Halls, up to a different commons building, back to the East commons building, back down to the HUB, and finally ended up at the Creamery. All of these places had one thing in common. There was no food to be found anywhere. We finally had a dinner of Jimmy Dean breakfast sandwiches warmed up in the Creamery microwave and some lemonade for dinner. Ugh. So by this time it’s 7:15 and we have a meeting at the Blue Band Building at 8. We didn’t feel like waking farther than we had to, so we figured that we would just go straight to the meeting and show up early. The meeting was really informative and interesting. Dr. Bundy explained the ‘cuts’ process and why he couldn’t take everyone. After his speech, he turned in over to the officers of the Blue Band. The first thing the officer said was to get our phones out. Once out he said shut them off. Then they shut the lights off and told us to close our eyes. We did. He said “imagine that you just got done playing in the Bryce Jordan Center on game day, no game NIGHT. You are marching over to Beaver Stadium. People on both sides of you are all in WHITE. Screaming and cheering. I mean screaming. It’s Ohio State. People are going crazy As you enter the stadium you see people all around you. Now you are in the stadium, in the tunnel. The student section is so loud you can’t even hear yourself think. And then you hear this”… and then started a video of the Penn State Blue Band coming out of the tunnel for pregame during a whiteout game against Ohio State from 2007. Now during this whole thing, every hair on my body was at straight up at attention. My friend Nancy and I laughed the whole time. I couldn’t stop smiling. On my way back to my dorm I found another friend of mine Curtis whom I know from Region Band this past year. We had a good conversation and then I went up to my dorm and ate the rest of my chicken fingers because jimmy dean didn’t satisfy my hunger needs. AND THAT’S JUST THE FIRST DAY!

Day 2

Wednesday August 18, 2010

Last night they told us to be at the Blue Band field about 30 minutes early to make name tags and stretch and warm up. The initial report time was 8:30 so that pushed in back to 8. So naturally, my alarm didn’t go off and I woke up and looked at the clock. 7:49. After saying some expletives I found all my stuff and ran to the shower and got dressed and showed up at the field at 8:13. Good thing it seems like a lot of other people seemed to do the same. So then marching came. WOW. It was so hard. The first session was very intense. Just marking time in place. High step marking time. We learned facing commands and other stationary commands. It was so hard because you weren’t moving forward or backward and you were using the same muscles constantly. After the first session I ate at Pollock Commons Dining Hall. It was the only dining hall open on campus. I then went to my friend Ali’s dorm. North Halls. Where I WANTED to live. Let me tell you. It’s beautiful. Air conditioning, private bathroom, tons of storage, new desks. Beautiful. Then came Marching session 2. This was still very intense but the marching part was starting to become easier. Probably because we were moving forward and using different muscles. After some intense marching we broke for dinner. I went with my 2 music major friends and my other friend Eric and went and got my books at the bookstore. And after dropping some serious cash I left there with 60 extra pounds to lug around Penn State. After that we went back to Pollock to eat. After dinner I went back to my dorm to try and figure out my Internet. I went to my commons and sat down and picked up wireless. NICE. Opened the Internet up. Still wouldn’t connect. AHHHHH. It’s so frustrating. I went back to my dorm and put my computer away and then went up for the final marching rehearsal before cuts took place. I had the mindset down. And my stomach was settled unlike my first audition. So we get to the field and immediately go into sectionals. We worked for a while and then we just sat down because there was nothing that we could have done. We then started talking. Just about random things. Then we noticed that they were getting near. And it had been a while since we played. So we all got up and started warming up again. Then Dr. Bundy came over and said ok. Here we go. Got on my line. Tap tap tap tap Up 2 3 lift play. We were playing the music that normally comes right after the flip when the drum major does it during pregame. High stepping and playing is not a good combination but I feel like I did well with it. Then we sat and waited some more. Waiting and waiting. Clarinets and Piccolos went and then they called us into out block and told us to sit down. I imagine that Dr. Bundy hates this part of his job. I can’t imagine being the person that tells someone no to something that they want so badly. He started with the woodwinds. Piccolos, clarinets, and saxes. I was happy to hear my friends last names being called for clarinets. The sax section was sitting right next to me and I could obviously tell who had made it and who hadn’t. The girl next to me didn’t. I almost cried just by looking at her. Then trumpets, mellophones, and trombones. Then Baritones. This was it. The moment that I had been working toward for the past 2 days. The following baritones are being asked to report to band camp tomorrow in no particular order…. Bonner… BOOM mini explosion in my head. I didn’t even hear the other 3 or 4 names he called. He repeated them… BONNER. It was even better the second time. I could hardly move. I was numb with joy. He then read off the Sousa list. My friend Eric made it as well. He then reminded us that there could still possibly be cuts tomorrow and that we should come prepared to march and hit the ground running. Then he dismissed us. I walked home and talked to my mom on the way. I told her that I made the big cut and have Penn State Blue Band camp tomorrow morning. Then I came back to my dorm to rest my shock absorbers, I mean toes and feet.

Day 3

Thursday August 19, 2010

I woke up this morning and got a shower and sat in my room until it was time to leave. I met Ali and we walked over together. We talked about or chances about making. I walked into the blue band building and saw a friend from Schuylkill County, Mike Fries. He went to Pottsville and his father was the band director. I then went out on the practice field where we did some warm-ups and then we started fundamental marching. Ugh. High step marching is definitely one of the harder things to do. We were marching with returnees who knew their stuff. After a few different drills we stopped and Dr. B started talking to us. Then he said ‘this will be the 2010 Penn State Blue Band’. He said to come back at 2. Giving us an extra long lunch break. Thank the Lord. Then the baritones had a little meeting and decided to go to lunch together. We went to a great chain restaurant called Chipotle. It was so good. I had a chicken burrito with rice and beans. So good. Then we went back to the Blue Band building and waited for rehearsal to begin. We then started to learn pregame. This is what I’ve been waiting for! It was very cool. We didn’t start in the beginning but we started in the middle of pregame, going into the PSU. I’m the second person on the left line of the U! Then we started the Floating Lions Drill. It was so cool to be a part of the floating lions and the rest of pregame. Then I went and ate dinner and then came back for more rehearsal! YAY!

The Next 2 days basically fell out the same way as Thursday did. Sunday we had off. Kinda. I slept in (which was AMAZING). Then went to some meetings for the School of Music. Ali and I had to leave early to go for uniform fittings. It took me a long time to get fitted. Afterword, we had a performance at Be A Part From The Start or BAPFTS. I wore my Penn State Blue Band Shirt and Blue Band Wind Pants. Verrrryy Classy. It was basically a way for freshmen to get involved in different campus activities. It was fun playing the different fight songs and other stand music that the blue band plays. Like Hey Baby and Living on a Prayer. After BAPFTS, myself and other baritone players went out for ICE CREAM at the Creamery. Great stuff. Then I went home and got myself prepared for my first day of classes at PSU.