It was a Sunday afternoon and she had nothing to do. Sitting around waiting for the weekend to be over Cadence was terribly bored. She was in band and proudly considered herself a band geek. She played percussion and enjoyed it to its fullest extent.

The next day was the first summer band practice. She was nervous and excited. Cadence was a junior and had experience on the field. She longed to get out on the track and play her heart out. Everyday brought something new, and yet there was always routine.

Later on that weekend Cadence looked back at the past week of summer band. Just compared from the first practice on Monday, to the last practice of the week on Friday, the band covered 14 drill charts. Great progress was being made. The music was coming along nicely as well. The show was an exciting piece. It had lots of attention catching high hat and ride cymbal, being played by the snare drummers. It was a very fast beat fun show to march and play. The directors were hoping to really catch the judge’s attention by having an up beat show. Cadence loved the high hat and ride in the show. She played snare, and very much enjoyed getting to play on the cymbals. She loved going from high hat to ride.

Cadence was sitting at home practicing on her practice pad when her section leader called her and said they were going to meet early for practice on Monday. The next day Cadence was there an hour early to have a sectional. Carol, the band director and head director of percussion, had the drum line and pit run through the show multiple times. Carol would let Brian, the section leader, run it over and over and she would just listen. Whenever she heard something wrong or they got off, she would make them stop and start from the beginning again. Even though the students didn’t like this greatly, it helped their playing skills. Because of this, it wasn’t common to make the same mistake more than a couple times.
After running the show a million and one times, Carol let them take the last ten minutes off before the actual practice would start with the rest of the band. People were all ready starting to show up. Once it was five o clock the band met out on the practice field. They started by doing calisthenics lead by Jeremy. The three drum majors, Lee, Keith, and Jessica, ran the warm ups. They did J A Y windmills and toe touches. They did jumping jacks to the school song. They stretched, and did push ups. After stretching they went for a nice run. This was all Carol’s idea.
After running on the track they went to get their instruments. The drum line hooked up and went off to the trees as pit went to the barn. The rest of the band lined up for basics block. The pit went with Michael and the band stayed with Carol and Stephen. Drum line went with Leonard.
Cadence hooked on her snare and they walked off to the trees. First Leonard had the drum line get in lines and warm up. They started with eighths. They played the cadence a few times and then did a few other warm ups. (Cadence felt special whenever they played the cadence because she was named after it.) After warming up their sticking they practiced the summer music. They ran through one song at a time first playing all the way through it and then working on sections that needed improvement. After playing forty five minutes Leonard let them take a five minute water break and un hook their drums. After the five minutes was up, they played for another fifteen and then were called to join the band.

On their way up to the practice field, the pit was pulling their carts up. All of percussion was now with the band and they were working on drill. While the band worked on drill, pit had to play for them. Cadence loved drill. Since it was so early in the summer they weren’t marching with their instruments or drums, just drill books. Chart after chart, page after page, and finally it was lemonade break. “Seniors first then the rest can go!” Yelled Stephens.
Cadence and the rest of drum line un hooked and laid their drums by the pit carts and went to join the rest of the band. Once over there, it was hard for Cadence to decide what flavor of drink she wanted. She decided to go with purple. After getting her drink she walked over to her group of friends. They stood in a circle talking and drinking their cool refreshments throwing ice at each other. After what seemed like just a few minutes later, they heard Jeremy on the speaker system telling them to come back. From here until the end of practice the band worked on playing the music to line up with the drill they had just learned.
At the end of practice Stephens had the band come to the ladder for announcements. He told what time to be at practice the next day and told the band they were making great progress. As Cadence stood there listening, she knew deep inside, with all her heart this was where she belonged. She knew then and there she wanted to make music her career. So after being dismissed as she marched off the field with her peers, she couldn’t keep a smile off her face.