Garden City's Marching Band Poised for Big Year

At 82 members strong, the marching band represents the largest extracurricular activity group at Garden City High School. It is comprised of individuals who play trumpets and horns, saxophones and trombones, flutes and clarinets, baritones and tubas. They form the pit crew, color guard and drum line. Together these individuals combine talent, precision, corps-style marching and choreography to produce intricate visual and musical productions.

Unlike athletic teams, no one sits the bench as a member of marching band. If you come out for marching band, instructor Brandon Psenicka will find a spot for you – either in the band or color guard. Because of the unique performance setting, all students are starters and soloists – even one person missing can hinder the group effort, which is why attendance is essential.

While some people only see a marching band at football games or town parades, Garden City's marching band is a competitive and accomplished group that takes part in numerous local, regional and national competitions during the fall season.

In 2010, the Garden City High School marching band will embark on one of its most rigorous schedules in years, entering six competitions on Long Island before competing in the United States Scholastic Band Association (USSBA) championships Nov. 5-7 at the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, MD.

"It's an exciting season," Psenicka said. "They are a hard-working group of students who never say no to trying new things. It seems like things are really clicking this year."

Last Wednesday, as part of the annual parents' night performance, the 2010 marching band played three songs from "Dancing With The Gods" (composer Karl Jenkins), its theme for the fall competition.

Psenicka said the marching band show is selected every year by listening to hours of marching band recordings. The list is narrowed down after finding music that will fit the projected band for the following season. The staff gets together and discusses the music based on the following criteria: playability, achievable challenge for the students, possibility for visual elements, good number of "high and low" points in the music, student appeal and showcasing all sections in the band.

"Dancing With The Gods" has several different challenges. "They are playing in five different keys and six different time signatures. That alone makes it a challenge to keep the band together and in tune before we even try and keep the band's feet together on the field," Psenicka said. "They are being exposed to playing dense, dark chords. The music also ranges to slow and lush to fast and aggressive."

The marching band members devoted 72 hours this summer – two days of summer practice and eight days of band camp – to prepare for the fall show. During the school year, members practice once or twice a week in addition to playing at the home football games and competitions.

After two consecutive years of competing in the New York State Field Band championships at Syracuse University, Garden City is privileged to be competing this November in the USSBA championships, which will feature more than 100 bands over two days of competition.

For the USSBA championships, Psenicka submitted a video of the final "West Side Story" show that it performed in 2009. After a review of the video, USSBA accepted Garden City into the show.

Psenicka said the parents' involvement is both very appreciated and essential to the success of the marching band. "We couldn't do it without them," he said.

This year's drum majors are Christine Pando and Lauren Reale. Student directors are Marissa Burdi and Meaghan Leahy. Section leaders are Amanda Ferraro (flutes), Will Chow (clarinets), Kimberly Ryan (horns and saxophones), Robert Pietrzak (trumpets), Matt O'Conor (drum line), Sam McHugh (pit) and Justin Sarfin (low brass). Color guard captions are Michaela Dougherty, Kaitlyn Zwicke and Hayley Giumenta.