District 49 Middle School Honor Concert, with videos!

Bryce was invited to participate in our district’s honor band this year. Their concert was Saturday evening. After snapping a couple of pictures when the band started playing the first song I remembered that I had thrown my new iPod Nano in my bag of sewing stuff I was working on; Bryce had to be there an hour early, and with the concert all the way out in Falcon the rest of the family got to be there early too so I figured it would be good to have to entertain someone while we waited ;) One of the things that I thought would be cool when I was picking out my Christmas present (yes, I bought my own present in 2009! LOL) was that it came with the option of a built-in video camera. So, I dug it out of my bag and started recording so that I could share the band pieces with distant family members who don’t get to attend these sorts of things. I was very impressed with the kids’ playing- they were pretty darn good for 2nd and 3rd year band students! We talked with Mr. Lawrence after the concert for a few minutes and he said they did very well- the best he had heard from our honor bands in several years.

I’ll start with a picture or two, and then I’ll put in the videos I made. Please pardon any shaking, tilting and such- the nano is tiny and I was hand-holding it for about 15 minutes (thank goodness the chairs had arms! LOL). I have to say that I’m quite impressed with the audio on the recordings for such a tiny little microphone.  The director of the honor band this year was Linda Shea.

The band coming on stage; Bryce is in the middle looking towards the left. He plays the Cornet (or trumpet, as he has one of each LOL). The kids standing in this picture below are the ones from Horizon. I pointed Bryce out way in the back with the red arrow for you.

In case anyone has problems with the embedded videos, here are the direct links:
Dorian Rhapsody: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CpjWdyj4MiA (I only recorded the second half of the song)
Bell Tower: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BF2aJF5bOUQ
Medieval Legend: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wUYgpii8MTo
Fire Dance: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_GcnNx_E04w

and just to be fair, I took a couple of pictures of the honor choir too even though we didn’t have anyone from our family in it (6th graders weren’t eligible). Our choir teacher, Ms. Depew is doing the introductions over there on the far left in this photo. Beth and Carissa have really enjoyed going to the choir practices with her, even if it does mean having to go to school an hour early two days a week.

Let me know how you like the videos, and enjoy the music!