Four Tubas, a Guitar, and a Gallery of Cheerleaders

The older men from the community, who spent a lot of time at the Shop, often watched and talked to me about education and how important it was to learn and achieve with the opportunities before me. I didn’t feel tremendous pressure, but I did feel a sense of responsibility to live up to a standard that had been set by my grandfather, who graduated from college with a B.S. degree, and my father who earned an M.S. degree. One day near the end of the summer, I was working at the Shop trying to find something to do to busy myself with before quitting time, when Mr. Fred Lowe, a community activist, got my attention as I swept the floor. He said very bluntly and surprisingly, “You know your grandfather got his B.S. degree, and your father got his M.S. degree, and you are the third generation of Rice men, so you must get your Ph.D.” Mr. Jimmy Singleton, another good friend of my grandfather’s, agreed with what Mr. Lowe was saying and in a strange and funny way gave me the same charge for my life. This proclamation came out of the blue. Being young and idealistic, I couldn’t even imagine why they saw into my future that way. I wanted to become a medical doctor and felt pressure to succeed, before I finished my first semester of higher education. My goal became to finish where my grandfather and father left off, and I quickly learned that success in education and life equals 95% heart and 5 % talent. My summer job at the Shop was almost complete, and I was excited because this would be the first summer I had something else to do. I was also happy to be joining the UAPB marching band. All of my paperwork was complete with the admissions office, and the entrance letter to band camp stated that new members had to report one week before upperclassmen arrived. The organizers of band camp wanted new players to learn the fundamentals of marching, playing, and command structure quickly. I read the letter without much anticipation, since I had always spent the summers in high school playing music. I arrived at the UAPB band room at 6:00 p.m., on a Sunday evening in late July, for our first meeting. The upperclassmen section leaders and drum majors addressed the band, as well as the head band director, Dr. Joseph “Doc” Miller, a former assistant band director from Grambling State University. Doc Miller laid out his plan for the band year. His vision was clear but somewhat controversial because he had taken over from a musical legacy, Mr. Odie Burrus, who held the title of Director of Bands at UAPB from 1980-1989. Freshmen students got instructions about what was next in band camp. I remember when the meeting was over and people finished their speeches. All of the new people got up and headed toward the door. Then, we heard three loud shrills from a whistle and immediately were yelled at and forcibly directly to sit back down in our seats. The head drum major stood on a chair and loudly said, “We don’t leave this room like that!” with a cold stare and contempt for all of the new musicians. I looked around to understand what was going on and was puzzled like the rest of my “crab” mates. I was confident everything would be okay, since I had been through Mr. Lott’s music program, saw his name embroidered on the wall, and thought I had seen and done it all musically. Then, someone prematurely asked, “What time do we report tomorrow?” The staff hastily and loudly responded, “five-o-clock,” so I immediately thought they meant 5:00 p.m. In actuality, they meant 5:00 a.m., which was made very clear before we left the band room. The drum major asked if there were any more questions. No one said a word, and then he instructed us on how to leave the band room after each practice. He said, “You only leave this room, when I blow this whistle in this fashion. Tweeeeeeet-Tweet-Tweet. Stand to your feet, and say ‘U------A-------P------B’ beginning from a parade rest position and ending at the attention position!” “Are there any more questions?” “Ok! Let’s try it” “Tweeeeeeet-Tweet-Tweet. U-------A-------P------B!” He immediately stopped us and told us to do it again, because that try wasn’t loud or good enough. The inflection in his voice changed. He was angrier with his commands and instructions. Tweeeeeeet-Tweet—Tweet. U----A-----P----------B now rang forcefully in unison from everyone in the room, but this time we were so focused on making the statements loud that we forgot to come from parade rest to attention. We had to do it one more time. Our group didn’t take this exercise seriously and some people were laughing near the back of the room. This wasn’t a good idea. The drum major made us all very aware that this exercise was no laughing matter. He told us “You think it’s funny now, but it won’t be funny tomorrow!” Most of us were first year college students, who were once were kings and queens of music in our respective high schools, but here we were often referred to in military terms as plebes, cadets, or crabs and could only speak or have something to say when addressed by our superiors. We tried our exit from the band room one last time and we all nailed it, even though some of us were a little shaken by the fact that report time was 5:00 a.m. the next day. I thought that because I lived only five blocks from the school, it would be a piece of cake, but I didn’t realize that band camp in the Marching Musical Machine of the Mid-South (M4) would forever change the way I approached music and life.