34 Auburn Magazine a u a l u m . o r g

35a u a l u m . o r g Auburn Magazine

Marching Orders

A trumpet player steps high, counts

to the beat and tries not to trip as

the Auburn University Marching

Band forges onto the field at Jordan-

Hare, providing the loud-and-proud

soundtrack for another football

season. b y r e b e c c a l a k i n

Standing, waiting, just beneath the stands of Jordan-Hare Stadium, I feel a single bead of perspiration creep down my skull. It’s itchy and uncomfortable and, well, a little gross, but I don’t swipe it because my attention is primarily drawn to two things: a kid about my age from Prattville, dressed entirely in white and clutching a worn black whistle between his teeth, and a regal golden eagle just completing its familiar, artful flight marking the beginning of another Auburn football game. A crowd of 87,000 spectators bellows a thundering “War Eagle” battle cry. That Nova—he makes it look so easy. It’s almost my turn to perform, and all I can think is: Do not fall down. “BAND. TEN-hut.” “One!” The kid in white—a drum major—presses his lips onto the whistle: Tweet-tweet. Tweeeeeeeeeeeeet! It’s time to march. To the rumbling of percussion, the Auburn University March-ing Band takes the field and, for the moment, I’m part of some-thing bigger than myself: a group of musicians whose job it is to keep the fans entertained. I clasp the trumpet balanced on my right arm and jog, following the queue ahead to the 20-yard line, breathing out on every count to ensure I halt at the proper spot

Making music can be a sweaty business dur-ing the Auburn Tigers’ early-season football games. Katie Morgan waits to take the field with her fellow play-ers. Auburn Univer-sity’s band program began in 1897 with a single tenor horn and a bass drum.

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at exactly the right time. My fellow performers and I hit our marks, swelling with heat exhaustion and pride. With rifle-line precision, we bring our instruments up to play the first notes of the fanfare announcing the entrance of the Auburn football team.

have a lot of company, because this year’s marching band is the largest in university his-tory. Its 380 members form nine brass and woodwind sections, a drum line, a front per-cussion ensemble, and three visual ensembles. Our director, Corey Spurlin, is in his third year on the job, and it’s my fourth year as a member of the band’s trumpet line.

As with each and every season, our music unites the Auburn family on game day. If my fellow bandmates and I have done our jobs, fans will never realize how much hard work and serious sweat has gone into perfecting the show or how that work has united us. Within the AU family, we have a family of our own. Our band year starts in August, a week before classes be-gin. Preseason “band camp” is hot and grueling and—did I mention hot? We broil. This is where the hard work gets done. “It’s intense, and it’s a lot of preparation,” says drum major James Earl Corley, who is working toward a bachelor’s degree in cell and molecular biology. “It’s not something I don’t enjoy, but it’s the most intense because of the weather, which is out of our control.” During the week of band camp, I begin my morning ritual at 7 a.m., filling a one-gallon blue jug with water and slath-ering sweat-resistant sunscreen on my face, arms and legs in anticipation of our “three-a-day” practices, during which we rehearse our drill—the formations we make on the field—first in the morning, then during the afternoon and again around early evening. As the temperature inches past 90 degrees, we remind our-selves of the eventual payoff: the privilege of running out of

the stadium tunnel on game day. We al-ternate drill practices with music rehears-als, perfecting Auburn’s fight song, “War Eagle,” and dozens of other melodies on the director’s playlist.

Shade is a valuable commodity, so we cram ourselves under whatever cover we can find during our breaks, rendering its cooling power useless. But there’s one group that has it even rougher: the tuba section, also known as “the herd.” Tubas weigh about 25 pounds each, and members of the herd must build up their stamina during band camp. “For most of us, we haven’t had that instrument on much at all during the summer,” says herd leader Shane Haws, a secondary science education, general science and biology major. “The roughest part of band camp is getting used to the weight again and hav-ing it on eight-plus hours a day for several days in a row.” I can’t imagine. By the end of band-camp week, even my two-pound trumpet gets heavy as I hold my arms in playing posi-tion, blood rushing from my fingertips and shoulders throbbing. The sweat and sunscreen bonds us, though. Like the ath-letes, we know we have to work as a unit, respecting the rituals and traditions unique to our team. Each night during camp, for example, the “RATs”—Rook-ie Auburn Tigers, an ancient term used to describe freshmen and other new students—attend an evening social planned by “RAT royalty,” four upperclassmen who serve as freshman ad-visers. It’s designed to help the RATs and returning veterans get to know each other and relieve stress from a day crammed with drills and practices. First up is a scavenger hunt. We divide into groups that meet each morning throughout camp. Veterans help groups of RATs learn fun facts about Auburn. They also visit key cam-pus landmarks and—most important—learn the alma mater. We sing the familiar lyrics “On the rolling Plains of Dixie …” every day during band camp, again during each game-day re-hearsal and at every football game. It’s a way to remind each of us why we’re here. Then there’s “RAT Adoption Night,” during which each RAT is paired with a vet who becomes the newbie’s “mom” or “dad.” Male RATs get moms; female RATs get dads. Each substitute parent is charged with looking out for his or her baby RAT during the first week of classes. My RAT dad was an alto sax player, so on adoption night I was able to branch out of the trumpet section and get to know other musicians. I’m now helping my twin RAT sons—an alto player and a member of the herd—assimilate. At the RAT banquet on the last night of camp, we finally get to see our bandmates cleaned up. Some of us don’t even recognize each other minus a slick layer of skin-on steam. We finish camp with an impressive farmer’s tan and two shows ready to go, one each for pregame and halftime.

The RAT tradition is just one link to the band’s history, which extends to 1897. Auburn musicians have made music on game day for more than a century, minus fancy nicknames or high-flown monikers. “Some other institutions need to give descriptive names to their bands in order to praise them,” the late former AU president Harry Philpott once said. “The qual-ity of the music, the precision of its drills and the fine image

Left: Senior communi-cation major Rebecca Lakin is in her fourth year on the marching band’s trumpet line. Opposite: The major-ettes, dance line and flag line, collectively known as the Tiger Eyes, practice routines repeatedly during the weeks leading up to the Tigers’ first football game of the season.I

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it portrays have made it unnecessary for us to say more than, ‘This is the Auburn University Band.’”

The band traces its roots to a 12-member drum corps and a single tenor horn named the “Jenny Lind.” Community mem-bers, faculty and students pitched in for instruments to broaden the fledgling band’s repertoire. By 1917, the Auburn band, re-dubbed the 16th Infantry Regimental Band, marched in Europe during World War I. As they crossed the Rhine from France into Germany, musicians played “Glory to Ole Auburn” to celebrate the Allied victory.

By 1945, Auburn University had formed a music depart-ment, officially incorporating the band and musical instruction into its academic curriculum. The following year, the first ma-jorette corps formed, although female musicians didn’t join the band until 1950. In 1949, the band traveled to Washington, D.C., to march in the inaugural parade for U.S. President Harry S. Truman; by 1952, its members had made their first recording under the direction of David A. Herbert.

As Elvis Presley began dominating the airwaves and hula hoops came into vogue in the late ’50s, two seminal events un-folded that had a lasting effect on the AU band: Its members premiered the brand new “War Eagle” fight song in 1955 and, two years later, dropped their gray cadet uniforms for orange- and-blue suits. The modern AU Marching Band was born.

nce classes begin, the full march-ing band meets four days a week for an hour and a half; each section also practices at night once a week. The band’s “visual ensemble,” known as the Tiger Eyes, includes majorettes, flags and a dance line, and has an even busier practice schedule. “We not only have the full band practices, but two

days a week we come a half-hour early to start practicing,” says accounting major Melissa Hennessy, a majorette. “On Mondays, we have a two-hour practice. We also meet on Tuesday nights from 8 to 9 p.m. in the coliseum, just to (refine) and work on things as a whole line.” As the first game day of the season approaches, the marching band divides into four groups known as spirit bands. The smaller ensembles conduct pregame performances around campus on

game days, including at the Alumni Hos-pitality Tent, and play for the athletes as they file into the stadium, a ritual known as Tiger Walk. On any given game day, home or away, we encounter lots of fans for both teams. We pose for pictures, return many “War Eagles” and answer random ques-tions, from “Where are the restrooms?” to “How hot is your uniform?” We an-swer as best we can. During one game in 2008, a third-quarter thunderstorm soaked the stands

for five minutes and, by the fourth quarter, we were miserable. Our polyester uniforms acted like a lid on a steaming pot of broccoli, trapping the heat against our skin. It was one of the most uncomfortable games I’ve ever been through, although

The 25 members of the marching band’s tuba section, also known as “the herd,” pump brass, not iron. The largest and lowest-pitched brass instrument, tubas ap-peared first in Berlin during the 1820s, displacing other wind instruments of poorer quality and intonation. Auburn’s marching band is one of the largest in the country.

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I’m probably typical. As a public relations major, I am not in the band for any kind of class credit. But being in the band has become part of who I am in the Auburn family, and it gives me a chance to give back to the school that has given me life-long friends and a great education. I know my memories from marching band will be the ones I treasure most.

“Our sense of family (makes us different from other bands),” says Haws. “A lot of bands play well and march well, but one thing we do is bring more energy and spirit. We have a lot of fun, because some of the best friends I have are in the band. It’s a lot of hard work, but I do it because it’s so fun.” Adds Corley: “I don’t even know who I’d be without the marching band. I really believe some of the people I’ve met I will talk to for the rest of my life.” Standing in the stadium’s bowels just before kickoff, we wait with our friends—our family—to run out of the tunnel and begin the day’s performance. As I hear the drumbeat, I count my push to take to the field as a personal display of the Auburn spirit. Corley says it best. “Running out of that tunnel with 80,000 people screaming just for you—you feel almost like a rock star.”

Rebecca Lakin is an editorial assistant with Auburn Magazine. To read more about AU bands, including administra-tors’ plans for a new $15 million band hall and adjoining practice field, see www.auburn.edu/auband.

we did get a laugh out of it: Band director Spurlin had assured us it wouldn’t rain that day. Every band member has a favorite story. Majorette Hennessey remembers a game during which four different LSU fans asked why Auburn girls were prettier than their counterparts on the LSU dance line, known as the “Golden Girls.” Drum major Corley recalls a particular fan encounter as the different sections tried to get to their assigned positions for Tiger Walk. “This mom came running up. We didn’t know who she was, and she grabbed us and turned us around. She almost got on her hands and knees and begged us for a pic-ture with her daughter.” The daughter apparently was a band groupie; the mom was trying to photograph her with all the trumpet players. “It’s amazing that people get that excited about the band,” Corley says. Haws’ most memorable moment wasn’t quite as happy. In fact, the tuba player lived every band member’s worst night-mare. “At the Ole Miss game in 2007, I fell in the pregame tunnel,” he says. “I’m not sure exactly how it happened. I was on the ground with a hundred people jumping over me,” he adds, wincing. “By the time I got to my feet, the band had already started playing, so I missed the entire pregame show. I look back at it and laugh; it was one of those freak accidents.”

ame days are long, even sans sud-den showers. We begin the day with a morning practice timed to the start of the game. The later the kickoff, the later we can sleep. During game-day practices, we do warm-ups for our individual sections and then as a full band. We rehearse portions of both our halftime and

pregame shows, then finish with a run-through of both sets. Game-day practices always end with a pep talk and a list of reminders from Spurlin, plus the singing of the alma mater and a single, roaring “War Eagle!” It’s a good way to start the day, and also gives diehard fans a chance to get up close and listen in. Since my parents live in Auburn, they never miss an opportunity to see and hear the band, and bring me an extra bottle of water.

After practice, we head to the band hall, uniforms and instruments in tow, to change for the game. Our goal is to be one of the classiest bands in the country: The men must be clean-shaven on game day, and all of us are taught to remain cheerful no matter what’s hap-pening on the playing field. “It’s tough sometimes, but I always try to stay positive for Auburn and not be negative toward Auburn, or the of-ficials, or the other team,” Haws says.

All of us are fans as well as musi-cians. Of nearly 400 band members, only 48 are actual music majors. Some of us, as the NCAA ads say, “are going pro in something else.” We’re in the band because we want to be and because we love Auburn.

GOpposite: An iconic figure in most march-ing bands, the drum major serves as field conductor on game days. Auburn’s drum majors this year are James Earl Corley of Prattville; Stuart Daubenmire of Milford, Ohio; and Daniel Toner of Marietta, Ga. Right: Flag corps member Nayeon Kim puts on her game face.

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