Weekly Update
October 17, 2009

The Castle Marching Knights qualified for Semi-State this weekend as a result of their performance at the ISSMA Regional last Saturday. The Knights earned a “Gold” rating, and finished among the top 10 bands to secure a spot at the Semi-State competition. (Regional results)

While the cold, damp weather had an impact on the band’s performance last weekend, the Marching Knights gave it their maximum effort, and ran the entire show for only the first time in performance at the Regional competition. That’s correct -- first run at Regional! As you may recall, the Knights finished staging the show earlier in October, but have missed the past two performance opportunities due to torrential rain and muddy, hazardous football fields. (South Spencer – Oct 10 was a standstill performance, and a football performance Friday Oct 16 was also rained out)

“The weather issues have been daunting, to put it mildly” said Asst. Band Director Faril Bunner. “Not having a turf field has greatly diminished our rehearsal and performance opportunities in the past two weeks, especially when compared with many of our direct competitors in the Indianapolis area and further north.” As the marching arts activity becomes more complex each year and shows utilize increased movement demand and velocity, performing on a mud-covered, cratered football field can present a significant safety risk for the students. “Our field was a complete mud pile Friday night, to the point where we had no illusions about going out on that field, ruining our uniforms the night before Regional, and most importantly, putting the kids in an adverse performance situation that would not end positively,” Mr. Bunner said.

“But the biggest challenge of the week was rehearsing in the late-November-ish weather,” added Mr. Bunner. Temperatures throughout last week hovered in the mid to upper 40’s, nearly 10-15 degrees below normal for this time of year. And while the band prepares for and expects colder temperatures later in the season, it has been tough to adjust to this seemingly early onset of winter this year. “The temperature when we got off the bus at Terre Haute was in the upper 40’s,” said Mr. Bunner, “and at that temperature muscles react differently, instruments react differently...the keyboards (marimbas and xylophones) go way sharp, whereas the pitch sags in the wind instruments as hot warm air is forced into a cold instrument.” Fortunately, temperatures are rebounding back to normal this week, but may plunge again this weekend in Indianapolis.

SEMI-STATE: In 2009, Semi-State is still a relatively new contest, as ISSMA (Indiana State School Music Association) premiered the competition in 2008 in an effort to level the playing field for bands aiming to make State Finals.

For years, the state was divided into North and South Regionals, with the top five scoring bands at each contest advancing to state finals. Unfortunately, the geographic balance in this system was often puzzling, as the dividing line between “north and south” stretched all the way up to Lafayette and Kokomo in recent years. This system all but guaranteed that Indianapolis area “Class A” bands would always compete in the South Regional, and never against northern Indiana bands in the state qualifying contest.

With the arrival of Semi-State, bands continue to compete at the District and Regional level, but now the top TEN bands at each Regional (North and South) advance to the Semi-State contest. These “top 20” Semi-State bands now compete at the same contest, on the same field, with the same judging panel, with the top ten advancing to State Finals the following week. Bands will perform at Semi-State in three groups based loosely on proximity to the contest site in Indianapolis; Castle performs in the last group along with bands from the far northern part of the state. Performance times within these geographic groups are randomly drawn by ISSMA.

Castle continues to compete in ISSMA Class A, as it has since the 1980’s. Unlike our local invitational contests, where units often compete based on band size, ISSMA classifies bands based on school enrollment: 1701 students and higher lands one in ISSMA Class A. With an official enrollment of 1831, Castle is obliged to match resources and talent each year with bands from much larger high schools, some with nearly twice the enrollment (or more) of Castle. Despite this seeming disadvantage of resources, Castle continues to compete at the highest level, fielding a 191-member band this season. As in many years past, the Marching Knights are one of the largest bands in the state, and make up over 10% of the Castle H.S. student body.

According to Mr. Bunner, the rehearsal plan for this crucial Semi-State week is to focus mostly on refining the “back half” of the show. Endurance, energy, and communication in performance will be the keys to success in this and the coming weeks. (And as always, perfect intonation, articulation and visuals are important as well!) As for the weather, “now that we’ve experienced extreme heat and cold, we’ll be better able to roll with the punches whatever the temperature does this weekend,” joked Mr. Bunner.

The Castle Marching Knights will perform in Semi-State competition at 5:20pm EST this Saturday, October 24 at Ben Davis H.S. in Indianapolis. (full lineup) The stands at Ben Davis will be full, but there will be an intermission between 4:30-4:50 pm, which will be a great time to grab a seat. It will be a terrific and highly competitive show. See you in Indy!

GO KNIGHTS!