Mr. Graber's Graberhood

Mr. Graber's Graberhood

(To the tune of 'Mr. Rogers Neighborhood)

It's a beautiful day in the Graberhood

A beautiful day for the Graber,

Would you be mine?

Could you be mine?

It's a Graberly day in the beautywood

A Graberly day for a beauty

Would you be mine?

Could you be mine?

I have always wanted to have a Graber just like you!

I've always wanted to live in a Graberhood with you; so

Let's make the most of this beautiful day

Get out your instruments, it's time to play

Would you be mine?

Could you be mine?

Won't you be my Graber?

Won't you please? Won't you please?

Please won't you be, my Graber.

Thank you to Michael for this addition to the blog!

Marching Band Ended...

Really Old Marching Uniform

A while ago and I am just now getting to writing the year-end summary. The 2015 show was 'Dead Men Tell No Tales' a swashbuckling, pirate adventure.

Firsts for 2015 year:
1. The first annual district parade band. (Everyone hated Bingham because we beat them at... everything.) Who doesn't like play Uptown Funk over and over and over and over and over and over again?
2. First year with very elaborate props.
3. Dropped back down to 4A, but got trophies and awards!
4. Changed the horn flash in Coach from and M to a V.
5. Changed the shako decorations, from chains to solid bands.

Old band on the left, new on the right.

6. This came into existence.
7. First year with Bryce Riley as instructor.
8. Assigned jobs for unloading the trailer.

Interesting events:
1.  Halloween in Saint George. Some went reverse trick-or-treating. Others went swimming.

Making Halloween costumes with what we've got. From left to right: Candolf the Colorful, Tree, Friendiless the Elf.

2. Watching the instructors teach the color guard to fight. (Stabbing people is hard, you have to go through all sorts of muscle and sinew and stuff.)
3. Learning how to Whip and Neigh Neigh during band camp. (The color guard put it in their show.)
4. Mellophones were nearly extinct during band camp. (One mello made pirate pictures out of turf turds when he couldn't march)

5. Pirate Jokes. Why is it so hard to play card games with a pirate? Because he's always standing on the deck!
6. Learning how to show emotion in our performance. Pain. Yearning. Hope. (Or three different kinds of sternness. We are pirates after all.)
7. Someone split their supersuit while marching. (He was really into the emotion of the show or something.)

8. The Inigo Montoya visual. Channeling our inner 18th-century Englishmen. My name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my mello, prepare to die.
9. Graber Shirts. (People in California wondered if he was a character from Star Wars.)

On Top of Old Smokey

(To the tune of 'On top of Old Smokey')

On top of old smokey
All covered in sweat,
There sit our poor majors
All filled with regret.

They fell off the ladder
And onto the field
And then our poor majors,
By tubas were killed.

(Parody written in 2014 while waiting for a Monday practice to begin.)

Stab and Close

In the year 2014, Noelle, a Mellophonist, went around asking the members of Bingham, Davis and American Forks' Marching bands how they would kill someone with their own instruments.  She then wrote a short story embodying many of those answers and gave it to the band for Halloween as they went on tour to St. George.

For all those who had known Noelle, save for a few of her closest friends who had read other things she had written, this sudden, rather disturbing dark streak was a huge shock.  According to his roommate, when Mr. Graber procured a copy and read the first page, he shook his head for a moment repeating, "Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear..." over and over again. The story also succeeded in terrifying the color guard and managed to turn the phrase 'Don't forget to stab and close' into a murder threat.

Read the story here.

So this is a thing...

Mr. Graber always says that we are standing on the shoulders of giants.  Every year, Bingham High School's marching band is different. This blog is an effort to capture the changes of culture throughout the years.

To do this, we will need your help.  We want your anecdotes, marching band stories, song adaptations and section chants so that all those that come after us will never forget.  Please email these or anything else with the year they were created to binghambands.comu@gmail.com or talk to the communications VP for bands at Bingham High School.  Thanks!