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My band deals with bad conditions all the time. At band camp this year, as opposed to being scorchingly hot the whole week, it was only hot the second half of the week, and the first half it was rainy. The field was a swamp. We've also dealt with swamplike conditions at competitions in past years; because we're a good band, we perform near the end, and the field is all churned up by other bands by then.

Yesterday we had a 9 to 4 practice out in the cold. It threatened to rain the whole time, drizzled a bit, and we even had tiny hail for a few seconds. The MSBA Championships at the end of the year are always really cold, as well.

Are you over on the east too? We had USSBA PA State championships last night, and there was rain, wind, hail. All that fun stuff. We didn't get to warm up much because we had to get on the bus to wait for officials to come and say it was okay to go line up for our entrance. It stayed clear for our performance, but not having efficient warm up time effected our score. We dropped 2 points, and we were at least 7 points behind everyone else.

One of the bands in a group above us performed with the hail+wind. We sat up in the stands, all bundled up, and praised them. They got first place. They deserved it.

Our BD recalls a time in college that they finished their show in golf-ball sized hail. :O The hail didn't last long, maybe a little over a minute. F***ing crazy.

The worst conditions I've marched in weren't that bad. It was kinda funny 'though. We were marching at the Veteran's Day parade, and we were using flip folders 'cause the piece we had to play was really long and almost no one memorized it. Those who didn't have flip folders taped their music to the back of the person in front of them. Anyway, it was November, so it was cold, and the wind was blowing really hard. Several people wound up getting their music blown away. And we were really bad 'cause we hadn't marched since September.

Yesterday we had a band festival that had so much wind and it was cold, the wind chill was like 10, w/ on and off rain.

And this picture from Ivan will show you ..




We had a football game that day...rain ALL day...*sigh*

I live west of Pittsburgh

The worst conditions I had to march in was during the 'Dog Bowl' (Back ground information on the Dog Bowl. We have two high-schools in my town... well, three actually, but Earl. F. Johnson doesn't count since it's the 'bad kid' school.... Anyway, both high schools have a dog for a mascot (Huskey for West, Bullpup for East). Since it's a home game for both schools, both bands are required to come.) For some reason, the school board decided it would be cool for the Jr. High band-os to march with the high schoolers at the beginning of the Varsity game. We do something extreamly simple. We march out in lines and play the national anthom.

The reason it was the worst ever was because the Jr. Students out numbered the High Students 10-1, at the least. I suck at marching, I freely admit to that, but it was scary... I was the best marcher in my line!!! gonk I had to say 'Left... left... left right left...' whenever we moved! People kept on going to fast, getting in the wrong line... it was horrible!! Stepping off on the right foot, waddling, wearing white shoes where black ones are needed, jogging sometimes even, taking to big of steps were just a few of things they did. Not to mention that every person was wearing their school marching outfit... ~goes into a corner and whimpers~

My worst band expierence was 20 degrees marching in the snow while its snowing and hands frozen to baritone
*shivers*

Marched in a christmas parade in about 30 degree weather. We were first to go, but we also had to wait a long time before the parade started. My feet had blisters and my hands were totally numb.