I love the bands at college games, but I honestly find our band to be more annoying than anything. The musical selection pretty much sucks. The only thing they are really good for is down the drive.

Having said that, I don't blame the students. They play what they are told and do their best.

When are you dossbigs around here going to flex your muscles to get a change?

Read a few years ago that alumni at Michigan were trying to endow the marching band after Branden tried to leave them out of the Alabama game at Jerry's World because of the the travel cost. They estimated that they would need to raise $40 million to accomplish this. Good luck getting anywhere close to that here.

(09-10-2015 12:51 PM)UCBEast Wrote:  

(09-09-2015 08:44 AM)TubaCat Wrote:  Former band member here (duh). If we want a more "big time" band, some changes need to happen:

1. More rehearsal time. Our friends in Athens have about 15 hours per week, and those in Columbus have 30 hours. UC class schedules here only allow for 5. This issue must be solved high up in the university.
2. New director. Dr. Frenz is very talented and is one of the best directors in the band's 95 year history, but this is a different type of football program with different needs than what he has worked with for the past 50 years.
3. Better facilities. OU and OSU's facilities include much larger rehearsal halls, multiple practice rooms, and more offices. Our band has one small rehearsal hall, no practice rooms, and only a couple small offices, and is packed into a converted parking garage.
4. Music education majors. OU and OSU's bands are made up of about 20% music education majors, while ours hovers around 1%. CCM highly discourages music ed majors from joining our marching band, which is stupid since most of them will end up as high school or college band directors and instructing marching bands. This needs to change, as UC prides itself on co-op and real world experience.
5. More funding. CUSA and MAC schools have higher budgets than our band. The sousaphones in particular require electrical tape nearby at all times to hold parts together. Embarrassing. Our band is already extremely cost effective, as it was one of 2 schools nominated for the Sudler Trophy (the only prestigious award in college marching bands) last year after our performance at Ohio Stadium. Only past recipients can nominate schools, which is why we were nominated.

And for those misguided few, blaming our students is way off base.

If all or most of these changes are made, this band can be as good as any in the country. Until then, nothing will change... and that's just how it is. A big time band requires big time material and human resources.

Agree on all points.

As a musician though I found A&M's band just a lot of loud with strut. Loud doesn't equal good music necessarily. I've been in a bar at Gallaudet University for the deaf whose music wasn't that loud.

I agree. As a music instructor once told me, if you want people to listen play softer. With that said I also noticed that A&M played at only one level: loud. Even so, they were entertaining. At least we could hear them.

If anyone has listened to UC's band prior to the game when they play outside the stadium near the grid they should know that UC has very good musicians.

I think the selection of music that they play at halftime just needs improvement.

As a former Band president at UC years ago, I also have a very similar experience as Tuba does...

I CANNOT STRESS the is a massive difference in budgets in bands... some schools like USC, OSU, and Texas literally have 7 figure budgets... UC after paying it's 3 full time employees (not making a ton) has a budget of BARELY 6 figures.. and having band camp on campus now that may be a reflection of yet another cut in funding..

Many schools buy arrangements or have students write them.. fixing the funding, or the CCM discouragement would immediately help update the music library... this band will have more brass with greater exposure, and greater funding.. I can promise that.. simply put, comparing the UC band to any other P5 band is not helpful.. frankly I know I will be in the minority here but while I disagree with the music a lot of the time, hell almost all of the time(they dont even play down the drive at the right time it seems bc the AD would rather pipe in halloween themes) with the constraints many in the university have given him, I am often surprised at the positive attitude of the man. I think change is needed in many ways, but blaming students and even Terren Frenz, I think is placing the blame in people's hands who have less say than you all think. Yes I know Frenz picks halftime music, but I think as much of this goes to the AD and university, it's very obvious when they repeat shows every couple years that the musical selection is not the first thing budgeted.. and having seen/experienced falling apart instruments.. very much of the issue is overall funding, not allotment of funds...

Sorry if it's long winded.. but I think only some of the blame here is being placed correctly. Just my 2 cents....

Also if you think our band lacks actual quality, I could point you to many a OSU band members who say our fight song alone is incredibly hard to play.. many fight songs are very vertical with whole band hits on 1 or 3.. while UC'S has runs many students have a hard time playing...

(09-11-2015 02:59 PM)Ahhhorsepoo Wrote:  Also if you think our band lacks actual quality, I could point you to many a OSU band members who say our fight song alone is incredibly hard to play.. many fight songs are very vertical with whole band hits on 1 or 3.. while UC'S has runs many students have a hard time playing...

My daughter was in district honor band three years, but when she started practicing the fight song this summer she was worried that she would never be able to play it right. She got there eventually :)

(09-10-2015 04:34 PM)BearcatsUC Wrote:  

(09-10-2015 12:51 PM)UCBEast Wrote:  

(09-09-2015 08:44 AM)TubaCat Wrote:  Former band member here (duh). If we want a more "big time" band, some changes need to happen:

1. More rehearsal time. Our friends in Athens have about 15 hours per week, and those in Columbus have 30 hours. UC class schedules here only allow for 5. This issue must be solved high up in the university.
2. New director. Dr. Frenz is very talented and is one of the best directors in the band's 95 year history, but this is a different type of football program with different needs than what he has worked with for the past 50 years.
3. Better facilities. OU and OSU's facilities include much larger rehearsal halls, multiple practice rooms, and more offices. Our band has one small rehearsal hall, no practice rooms, and only a couple small offices, and is packed into a converted parking garage.
4. Music education majors. OU and OSU's bands are made up of about 20% music education majors, while ours hovers around 1%. CCM highly discourages music ed majors from joining our marching band, which is stupid since most of them will end up as high school or college band directors and instructing marching bands. This needs to change, as UC prides itself on co-op and real world experience.
5. More funding. CUSA and MAC schools have higher budgets than our band. The sousaphones in particular require electrical tape nearby at all times to hold parts together. Embarrassing. Our band is already extremely cost effective, as it was one of 2 schools nominated for the Sudler Trophy (the only prestigious award in college marching bands) last year after our performance at Ohio Stadium. Only past recipients can nominate schools, which is why we were nominated.

And for those misguided few, blaming our students is way off base.

If all or most of these changes are made, this band can be as good as any in the country. Until then, nothing will change... and that's just how it is. A big time band requires big time material and human resources.

Agree on all points.

As a musician though I found A&M's band just a lot of loud with strut. Loud doesn't equal good music necessarily. I've been in a bar at Gallaudet University for the deaf whose music wasn't that loud.

I agree. As a music instructor once told me, if you want people to listen play softer. With that said I also noticed that A&M played at only one level: loud. Even so, they were entertaining. At least we could hear them.

Hear them? Heck, we felt them on the west side. They blew it out. Was refreshing to have a band that did not drop my resting heart rate to sub 40 bpm.

Band doing Blue Moon and Under The Boardwalk to fire up fans tonight at halftime.

was also told at the game tonight that Brad, the gameday coordinator who left recently had made a deal with Frenz to buy a few dozen new stand tunes for the band to play... but once he left the athletic department deal went with it..

(09-11-2015 02:59 PM)Ahhhorsepoo Wrote:  As a former Band president at UC years ago, I also have a very similar experience as Tuba does...

I CANNOT STRESS the is a massive difference in budgets in bands... some schools like USC, OSU, and Texas literally have 7 figure budgets... UC after paying it's 3 full time employees (not making a ton) has a budget of BARELY 6 figures.. and having band camp on campus now that may be a reflection of yet another cut in funding..

Many schools buy arrangements or have students write them.. fixing the funding, or the CCM discouragement would immediately help update the music library... this band will have more brass with greater exposure, and greater funding.. I can promise that.. simply put, comparing the UC band to any other P5 band is not helpful.. frankly I know I will be in the minority here but while I disagree with the music a lot of the time, hell almost all of the time(they dont even play down the drive at the right time it seems bc the AD would rather pipe in halloween themes) with the constraints many in the university have given him, I am often surprised at the positive attitude of the man. I think change is needed in many ways, but blaming students and even Terren Frenz, I think is placing the blame in people's hands who have less say than you all think. Yes I know Frenz picks halftime music, but I think as much of this goes to the AD and university, it's very obvious when they repeat shows every couple years that the musical selection is not the first thing budgeted.. and having seen/experienced falling apart instruments.. very much of the issue is overall funding, not allotment of funds...

Sorry if it's long winded.. but I think only some of the blame here is being placed correctly. Just my 2 cents....

Also if you think our band lacks actual quality, I could point you to many a OSU band members who say our fight song alone is incredibly hard to play.. many fight songs are very vertical with whole band hits on 1 or 3.. while UC'S has runs many students have a hard time playing...

I agree with everything you said with the exception of the difficulty of playing the fight song.

I took 12 years of private, legit trumpet lessons. I also played piano, guitar, bass and French horn. I worked my way through school as a musician and played night clubs (as a bass player) for 13 years.

The fight song is very easy. Go look at the horn charts for "Tower of Power" or "Earth, Wind, & Fire" (the real charts -- not the Hal Leonard charts for bands) and then you come to the conclusion that playing the fight song is not difficult. It actually ranks in the very easy to play range.

(09-12-2015 09:00 PM)rath v2.0 Wrote:  Band doing Blue Moon and Under The Boardwalk to fire up fans tonight at halftime.

Am I the only one who wondered how these two songs were a tribute to 9-11?

(09-14-2015 01:54 PM)BearcatsUC Wrote:  

(09-12-2015 09:00 PM)rath v2.0 Wrote:  Band doing Blue Moon and Under The Boardwalk to fire up fans tonight at halftime.

Am I the only one who wondered how these two songs were a tribute to 9-11?

If there are 7,125,000,000 people in this world, 7,124,999,999 did not understand how those songs were a tribute to 9-11.

(09-14-2015 11:46 AM)QSECOFR Wrote:  

(09-11-2015 02:59 PM)Ahhhorsepoo Wrote:  As a former Band president at UC years ago, I also have a very similar experience as Tuba does...

I CANNOT STRESS the is a massive difference in budgets in bands... some schools like USC, OSU, and Texas literally have 7 figure budgets... UC after paying it's 3 full time employees (not making a ton) has a budget of BARELY 6 figures.. and having band camp on campus now that may be a reflection of yet another cut in funding..

Many schools buy arrangements or have students write them.. fixing the funding, or the CCM discouragement would immediately help update the music library... this band will have more brass with greater exposure, and greater funding.. I can promise that.. simply put, comparing the UC band to any other P5 band is not helpful.. frankly I know I will be in the minority here but while I disagree with the music a lot of the time, hell almost all of the time(they dont even play down the drive at the right time it seems bc the AD would rather pipe in halloween themes) with the constraints many in the university have given him, I am often surprised at the positive attitude of the man. I think change is needed in many ways, but blaming students and even Terren Frenz, I think is placing the blame in people's hands who have less say than you all think. Yes I know Frenz picks halftime music, but I think as much of this goes to the AD and university, it's very obvious when they repeat shows every couple years that the musical selection is not the first thing budgeted.. and having seen/experienced falling apart instruments.. very much of the issue is overall funding, not allotment of funds...

Sorry if it's long winded.. but I think only some of the blame here is being placed correctly. Just my 2 cents....

Also if you think our band lacks actual quality, I could point you to many a OSU band members who say our fight song alone is incredibly hard to play.. many fight songs are very vertical with whole band hits on 1 or 3.. while UC'S has runs many students have a hard time playing...

I agree with everything you said with the exception of the difficulty of playing the fight song.

I took 12 years of private, legit trumpet lessons. I also played piano, guitar, bass and French horn. I worked my way through school as a musician and played night clubs (as a bass player) for 13 years.

The fight song is very easy. Go look at the horn charts for "Tower of Power" or "Earth, Wind, & Fire" (the real charts -- not the Hal Leonard charts for bands) and then you come to the conclusion that playing the fight song is not difficult. It actually ranks in the very easy to play range.

I was comparing fight songs to fight songs.. not cheer cincinnati to carnival of venice..