Once a band nerd, always a band nerd

Drumline is on TV, and I haven't seen it in forever, so I started watching it. It's really making me miss college and band. For those of you who weren't cool enough to do marching band in college, ;) Drumline isn't as far off from my experience as you'd think.

Our band was fun and awesome. The OU marching band -- The Pride of Oklahoma -- has a great reputation, and I was surprised my freshman year to see how excited people were about us and how much respect they had for our band. People thought it was really cool that I was in the band. And I did, too. :)

Things that are true about the movie -- to my experience, anyway -- is that college drumline is a very serious thing. Our drumline had everything matching -- headbands, wristbands, sunglasses and probably more else than I realize. Our drumline was awesome.

But we were all more one single band than that. The drumline was definitely the most isolated of any section, and they were especially isolated my freshman year, but the longer I was there, the harder they worked to try to not segregate themselves so much.

There's a fraternity called Kappa Kappa Psi in the movie. That's real. A lot of the chants they do are authentic, too. There little initiation they have outside, though, is not real. Everyone knows who's rushing KKY, and the rituals are very secret. They would not be held outside like that. Also, only the officers wear robes, and the robes don't have hoods. I was actually cool enough to be in the fraternity's sister sorority, Tau Beta Sigma. It was alright. Pretty much all my friends were in it. We did some cool stuff.

Pregame, though, is the big thing with OU's band. It's the favorite for everyone in the band, and it's a favorite for a lot of the fans. It's what I miss most.

Pregame starts with only the drums, colorguard, drum major and twirler on the field. The drumline begins its opening cadence, and the fans scream so loud that we have a chant in the tunnels we run out of so we know where we run out.















And when our chant ("M-I-C... K-E-Y... M-O-U-S-E" TAP TAP TAP) is over, that's when we run out of the tunnels and straight onto the field. It's so awesome.





























As soon as we turn and begin playing "Oklahoma," which is our opening song, the crowd goes crazy. We would play a small part and turn 90 degrees each time. It sounded like this: DUNT, DUNT, DUNT, DUNT, DUNT, and then the crowd would yell, "O-U." After we went all the way around to the front again, our drum major would step off and do his signature strut. And then, the crowd would really go wild!















It's the most awesome experience ever. I used to always wish that I had a mini-video camera in my hat so I could record what it's like from the field.

In the middle of pregame, we would play the "OU Chant," which is our school song. That's what this picture is. Everyone raises his or her right pointer finger in the air and sings along. And everyone knows the song.















Do you see how full the stands are in this picture? It was awesome to have fans who supported us like that.

We closed our pregame show with drill that begins in straight lines and transforms into an interlocking OU, the university's signature symbol. Then, we marched it all the way down the field, keeping the form. It's awesome. :) I miss it like crazy!















See the bottom left corner of the O? I'm there!! There are four people who make up the angle connecting the bottom and the left side of the O. That's my squad! I am the third from the front, so I'm the third farthest from the camera in my squad. We rocked, and we had the toughest drill to get there. Even the band director said so. :)

We played some cool songs, too. This is one of my favorite sets from a movie show my junior year: (In case you're wondering, I'm near the left 35 yard line, so I'm in the dip on the bat's right wing, which is to the left from this view. I'm one of the two that are closest to the center of the field, so I'm at the deepest part of the indention.)














Oh, how I miss it!!!