Mountain Brook High students place in All-State Band
Congratulations to the
following MBHS band students who won a position in the All-State Band by virtue
of their auditions last Saturday, January 26th at Homewood Middle School.
Reese Williams (French
Horn) 1st place in the district
Rhys Reynolds (String
bass) 1st place in the district
Daniel Bolus (Alto Sax)
2nd place in the district
Ben Webster (French
Horn) 4th place in the district
Julia Lott (Trumpet) 4th
place in the district
Laura Semmes
(Contra-Alto Clarinet) 2nd in the district and alternate place
Also congratulations to
Adam Thomas, 8th grade MBJH, (trombone), who placed 1st in the district for the
middle school All-State band.
The following MBHS band
students also scored high enough in the auditions to be placed in the District
All-State Honor Band:
Reese Williams (French
Horn) 1st chair
Rhys Reynolds (String
bass) 1st chair
Daniel Bolus (Alto
Saxophone) 2nd chair
Ben Webster (French
Horn) 4th chair
Julia Lott (Trumpet) 4th
chair
Nichole Edge (Flute) 9th
chair
Tianyi Liu (Trombone)
11th chair
Rafi Goldsmith
(Percussion) 7th chair
The following MBJH band
students scored high enough in the auditions to be placed in the District
All-State Middle School Honor Band:
Adam Thomas (Trombone)
1st chair
Laine Alby (Flute) 3rd
chair
Christina Xing
(clarinet) 13th chair
Robert Dillard (Tuba and
a 7th grader) 8th chair
Bradley Jenkins
(Trumpet) 15th chair
These students had to
prepare and audition on the most rigorous individual musical assessment
administered by the Alabama Bandmasters Association. The students who
made the cut for the All-State Bands will move on in April to audition again in
Huntsville for placement in one of the three high school All-State
bands and one middle school band that combines students from all 8
districts of Alabama. We are in district IV which is Jefferson and Shelby
counties and is the most difficult district in the state in which to make All-State
Band. We actually tied for 4th place in the district with the Alabama
School of Fine Arts for most students to make the High School All-State cut.
Pelham HS was 2nd with 9
students and Oak Mtn. was 1st with 12 students. Both of these programs as
well as other OTM schools that had fewer students than us to make All-State
have considerably more band students in their programs than we do and have true
feeder programs starting with 6th beginner band in their middle schools. This
means that while the number of students we have may be much less than other
programs, the individual quality is very high and is partly the result of the
team teaching structure that provides the hours per day of one-of-one
instruction that our students receive from the band directors and adjunct
faculty.
