The Quantico Marine Band supports more functions than there are days in the year.
While every Marine has seen or heard a Marine band perform, many Marines probably don’t realize the amount of training and coordinating that is done behind the scenes.
Marine musicians must work constantly to keep their proficiency and keep up with the workload. After losing four days of practice to record snowfall recently, the band is working even harder to stay on track.
“You wouldn’t see a bodybuilder who is getting ready for a competition take off four days prior to an event,” said Master Sgt. Sean Helms, the band master with Quantico Marine Band. “These are professional musicians and, if they’re off of their horns, they just don’t have the endurance and it makes it really difficult.”
Maintaining endurance and memorizing notes are not the only tasks involved with training ensembles for performances.
“With music, it’s not just, ‘I’m making noise. It’s the right noise,” said Sgt. Hector Hernandez, a tuba player with Quantico Marine Band. “We can look at any piece of music and in a day we can get it right. It’s just a matter of rehearsing with each other, knowing our tendencies, knowing what we’re prone to do as musicians. A lot of times, when you’re so used to the music, you forget the small things.”
Just as a body builder manages his time with each workout, the musicians must do the same to keep from becoming exhausted before a performance.
“I would say they get five hours [of practice] a day,” Helms said. “An hour and a half of section leader time, an hour of individual practice, and the remainder for concert practice. By then the muscles in the face are so tired that we have to find something else for them to do. You don’t want to burn them out.”
The musicians have more than just band practice to catch up on. Many of the musicians hold collateral duties to keep up with the dozens of requests the band receives daily. The band has their own supply section, their own instrument repair section and their own administrative section to handle performance requests from civilian organizations and military units.
“We get more than 700 performance requests a year. We can only accommodate, on average, about 400,” Helms said. “I receive about 30 e-mails a day inquiring what our schedule looks like. So when we lose four days of valuable rehearsal time, we have to start cramming.”
Not only are the musicians working harder to prepare musically for the next performance, responses need to be sent to the ‘gig’ inquiries they receive daily.
“It’s been pretty hectic,” said Lance Cpl. Kayla Hagglund, who helps handle requests and is the Quantico Marine Band’s only bassoonist. “There have been a lot of gigs that people are just now sending in, so we’re working to catch up with that. It’s manageable, just a little hectic.”
Currently, the band is practicing for the Virginia International Tattoo in Norfolk, Va., April 26 through May 2. The festival is scheduled to host performers from Canada, the Netherlands, Republic of Korea, Russia, the United Kingdom and other Armed Forces units.