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Do your bands have any special rituals, for instance, before a competition/game/concert for good luck? Post them here! Along with any other superstitions, chants or whatever.

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We have a lot in our band, so I'll just post one for now.

We have buckles on the front of our marching uniforms, and before every football game we click them together for good luck. The "click" is initiated by two fourth-year 2nd clarinets, who stand at opposite ends of the tunnel leading into the stadium, then run toward each other as fast as possible and chest bump, thus clicking the buckles.
I got to do Click last week and it was awesome razz

on bus rides, if we cross a railroad track, someone yells "Grab a nut!" and the bus (sometimes including the driver) picks their feet off the ground and grabs a "nut" bolt, screw etc. on the bus for good luck.

We also pray, and lock pinkies before a show.

holy crap do we have traditions!! well, we ride in silence too before a comp. for the guard, our coach brings some sort of candy (or last year it was cookies because we had a part called "cookies" in our show...i forget why though lol) and some cheesy saying. i remember my first one, 4 years ago, was that exact same lemon heads one, 290pika haha smile (for winter we do the same thing, except it matches the theme of the show. like we did "ordinary people" my freshman year and we had swedish fish and it was like theres fish in the sea...something like that so it was do it for your "sweetest" fish lol) then we do a cheer "benicia colorguard huh!" and then we sing a song that goes with the march (like last year it was one called thundercloud so we kept with the weather and sang pocketful of sunshine) and THEN the guard coach gathers the whole band and we do "breathing exercises" that are kinda cheesy but everyone takes them seriously and THEN one of the captains tells a joke to keep us smiling in the performance, and THEN, finally, our bd and the trombone rank comes around and shakes everyones hands (and i always squeeze the underclassmen's hands hella hard because they give wimpy handshakes hahahaha)
and these all work. at our last band review last year, we had some weird schedule and we never told the joke, we didn't breathe, and the trombones didn't come around. (now, we used to be the top band in our circuit. i don't wanna be cocky or whatever, but we were. now its more even with some other schools at the top with us, but, again, i'm not gonna lie, guard usually kinda wins sweeps or 1st at least) so, at this band review, we didn't do all that...and awards came around, and...we didn't place. we did in other categories, but we didn't get one sweepstakes, and we didn't get ANY guard trophy at all. cry it kinda sucked. but i BELIEVE in these rituals or whatever u wanna call them

and i'm sorry my post is so long xd

That sounds cool! Our bus tradition is to be as loud and annoying as possible rolleyes but it'd be nice to have some quiet time...

More specifically, we have a special chant we do when we go on the onramp, another for when we pass a tollbooth, and when we're about to get back home, we sing all of our pregame show.
We can't stop singing until the bus comes to a stop, so we're usually holding the second to last note of "Star Spangled Banner" for a couple minutes, if we've misjudged the ETA. "And the hoooooome...of theeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee.." Haha.



Oh hey, Benicia! I remember you guys were really good when I was in high school. Those rituals really work, huh? Some people may laugh at us, but we know better. 3nodding

Well,in our band:
1) the juniors always bring a marie callender's pie to eat in the way there.
2)never hear any song before the competition,but our show or parade,and sing it all the way there.

we always watch past field shows on the way to contest. we also have secret ritual (director doesn't know) called "who's making out in the drum closet" because without, fail before a game, there's always some couple caught making out in the drum closet.

There's a few superstitions from the percussion section, I don't know about the rest of the band.


Justin Case: We found a baby doll backstage before the first concert my freshman year, adopted him as a percussion mascot, and he lived in our drumline captain's quint case. He came with us to Disney and we performed well, along with getting his face painted. We've since lost him and we haven't won any percussion awards since.

The Pit Curse: Every time anyone is away from my section during practice, something breaks of its own accord. Let me show you.
Band camp: Pit Guy 1 was not here for two days since he was sick, on day one the cart's axle snapped and on day two a tire popped, rendering it useless. He's the one who normally pulls the cart.
Rehearsal: I missed a day due to a doctors appt., the vehicle that brings our stuff down (due to the broken cart) broke down. I often get rides down due to being the last one loading the stuff onto the Gator.
Guy 2 was out due to a doctor's appt. and a suspended cymbal fell over and the hook snapped right off its base. He plays that cymbal.
Break: I left for five minutes to go to the vending machine, I come back and Guy 1 had been smacked into a wall head-first by Guy 2. He was okay, but apparently short-term leaving means breaking other members of the section? They're always doing this so there's nothing too out-of-norm about it, but still...

Needless to say, I am no longer tolerating anyone being absent from practice...we can't afford to have anything else break.

Traditions

Mario Kart: We play MarioKart DS the entire way to competitions. It brings excitement and competitiveness, plus gets all our frustrations out before the show. Or it causes frustrations, depending on the person and your DS's charge level.

Pink Hair: If we get a superior at VBODA State Compeition, my band director dyes his hair pink. It's a great incentive, since he looks absolutely ridiculous and our principal even points it out on the announcements and EVERYONE goes down to see it at some point in the day.

Champions: We always sing "We Are The Champions" when we win a competition, or play it when we win a football game. Morale boost and it feels awesome.

Titans...: My freshman year, a senior stood on top of a hill and yelled out "TITANS. WHAT IS YOUR PROFESSION?" and the band responded "AWOO, AWOO, AWOO!" like the line from Sparta. We've done it every year since, and I do believe we do it at the same competition every time.

Traditions! Our school isn't that intense with them XD.

UHM. Our bus rides are normal on the way down, but for the last five minutes before we get to whatever school we're going we have "Quiet Time" to focus. We also have "Shoulders", which is our group huddle/pep talk, and we all have a hand on each other's shoulders.

And each section has their own little thing they do. The saxophones usually get together in a circle, and each person says some word of advice to everyone else. Like "Don't suck" and "Stay in step" and "Have fun." And then we have a handshake that I'm really bad at but we're supposed to do fast and...fast. XD.

And the entire band, last year, was made to learn the Hilshire Farm chant (you know, "Go Meat"?), but that's not so much tradition as an constant, on-running joke.

Every year on the big band trips the Pit and Drumline kids are given a really, reeeeeaally long scavenger hunt list, and it's fun helping them.

I think that's it XD.