On the Road

And we're off! Wartburg Wind Ensemble has left campus for the journey of a lifetime. On Saturday, April 27, 2007, 51 bright-eyed students, 1 band director, and 1 bus left campus to start our tour. So far, we've had five home stays, four concerts and lots of bus time. This tour has brought everyone a lot closer together, and as a first year, even with it being unfortunate that this is the end of the year, it's amazing just how connected we all are thanks to this unbelievable adventure and our passion for music. I've hung out with so many people, walking to Kwik Star, doing jumping jacks on the bus, learning tons of card games, and even just sitting around talking. It's really easy to feel welcome.

One of the best things about this tour is that we get to share our music with so many amazing people, especially younger music students that really look up to and want to be" just like us" some day. While concerts are a good way to share our music and talents with an audience, the most rewarding aspect of our music sharing is doing clinics. We get to sit right in amongst the students, watching, listening and playing right along with them. Today was especially fun, because we worked with a 6th grade band in Milton, WI. This band is at the end of it's first year of playing on these instruments, so it's basically the first step in their musical career. Getting up there with them gave them the opportunity to learn about their instruments, music and what "hard" music sounds like, music they could be playing as they grow up. Sometimes we forget what it was really like way back when most of us didn't even hold our instruments the right way or had never seen a bassoon or piccolo up close. I know we definitely left those students with some good memories and skills to take them through their musical journeys.

Tomorrow we head to DeForest, WI for another round of a clinic, concert and home stay. This tour thing is really starting to click. We can load this bus in probably less than ten minutes, live from a suitcase, sleep in strange beds and tolerate being in small spaces with 50 other people. I'm pretty sure this tour is going to be so amazing, that we'll never forget it or any of the people we spent a month with.

Well, that's all for now. Catcha later!