The Wadsworth High School, WHS, marching band recently added a new edition of instruments to one of their four set songs; two synthesizers and one bass guitar. Dana Hire, the band director, had three students play each of these three instruments: Reagan Bradley, Matthew Reed, and Aiden McAnalley.
Synthesizers are electronic instruments, which have the layout of piano keys. However, each has a sound modifier called a patch. This changes the kind of sound they create.
Bradley, a junior at WHS, is a part of the marching band. He plays a sousaphone in the marching band. However, during song four, Rihanna’s “We Found Love,” he plays a synthesizer.
“I’ve been playing piano since I was eight,” Bradley said. “I’ve done it for band before.”
These synthesizers were originally in the music. Hire was able to make this song come true with the new instruments.
Matthew Reed, a WHS senior, plays an alto saxophone in the marching band for songs one, two, and three. In song four, he plays a differently modified synthesizer than Bradley’s.
“My mom kind of, not made me but pushed me to take piano lessons because everybody else in my family had,” Reed said.
Like Bradley, Reed has been playing the piano since he was little. He was influenced by his mother and took piano lessons.
For the past five or six years, he has been messing around with synthesizers as a new challenge. He found that he likes the sound and how it works. So, when it was offered for song four, he accepted the challenge.
The bass guitar is the lowest-pitched member of the guitar family. Like some other guitars, it also gets hooked up to an amp, such as the synthesizer.
McAnalley, a Junior at WHS, has been playing bass guitar since he was in fifth grade.
He has always taken up the instruments his relatives have dropped. When his cousin stopped playing the bass guitar, he picked it up and got into it. He says he is very comfortable with the guitar.
“I do it so often that it doesn’t even bother me,” McAnalley said.
McAnalley is the least nervous out of the group, however, one of the stars. His instrument is the only one playing of this kind during this show.
The guitar is not school-owned. He owns it himself and brings it in. It was his idea for him to be a part of the show, so he volunteered.
McAnalley has never performed like this at a football game because, in the set of songs three out of four, he plays clarinet.
These electronics may take a while to set up; nevertheless, they add a great addition to the band.
“When we’re marching out on the field because it’s facing away from the field, it really doesn’t affect the music,” said Aaron Casey, a WHS drum major. “But when we practice in the PAC, everyone can hear it.”
The electronics are not too disruptive to the band, according to Casey. Instead, Casey suggests that the band and crowd might be distracting to the people playing electronics since it may be hard to listen for their cues.
This is one of the factors Hire had to consider when she decided to add them to the song.
These students volunteered to learn more work on their own time. They still have to learn their song four work and marching drill with their original instruments, on top of their electronic music. These three have gone out of their way to make the show enjoyable to their listeners.
