MCHS Marching Band set for another season
Debut set for football game Friday night
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LEWISTOWN -- Art Belfiore has been around marching bands long enough to hear many of the "This One Time at Band Camp" jokes, made famous by the 1999 film "American Pie."
The Mifflin County High School band director takes his iterations of band camp very seriously as they set the tone for the upcoming season. He treats it much like a football team approaches training camp.
"It really sets them up for success with our summer rehearsals," said Belfiore, who has guided the program since he came to Mifflin County in 1991. "What goes on at band camp, is we teach them almost all the show.
"We've had some pretty successful ones in the past, but this year's band camp was off the charts," he added.
The 80-member marching band received music for this season on the first Monday in May. They've been rehearsing since the second week of June, the week after school let out.
Band camp was held the first two full weeks of August, with eight-hour rehearsals daily. Typically, the marching band doesn't perform during the summer months, but this year it marched in the Central District Volunteer Firemen's Association Convention parade since it was being held in Lewistown for the first time since 1975.
This year's camp also welcomed 19 first-time bandies, which Belfiore said was "an incredible amount of new members."
Ahead of time, Belfiore makes sure band members understand the rigors of band camp. "We're going to be here eight hours a day, so they have to be eating right and hydrating."
Band camp is taken so seriously that two members of his staff even put together a presentation about nutrition. "They talked about the kind of food to get them through and survive band camp," he explained. "We added that this year."
For younger members, including the handful of seventh graders, the information can prove invaluable. Almost as pivotal as band camp itself where this year's band members learned 60 of 68-page drill charts for the upcoming season.
"We had one of the most successful band camps we've ever had in Mifflin County," Belfiore said, "and we've had some pretty successful ones."
That came off last year's performances where the Husky band finished as Tournament of Bands state champions and runners-up at the Atlantic Coast Championships and scored the highest point total in school history. This year's show theme is based off of the Russian Orthodox church hymn, "Salvation is Created." This year's show titled, "Human Nature: Angels and Demons - Divided Within" focuses on the two sides to human nature, comparing joy to anger, light to dark and angels to demons.
Belfiore ranks this year's show among the most challenging in program history, considering their recent performance history. "There will be lots of visual aid and contrasts," Belfiore said of this year's show, which debuts at halftime of Mifflin County's home opener at Mitchell Field Friday night. "The band will be divided on the field just like human nature ... there will be two sides."
Last summer, the band learned 45 charts. "We learned more charts at band camp this year than were in the show last year. It rained a couple days, but we have a spectacular group of young adults. Every time we fell behind we caught up."
Surprising, considering the sweltering heat this past summer, such as when they marched in the firemen's convention parade in all-black attire.
"When it's 95 degrees outside, it doesn't matter what color shirt you are wearing," Belfiore joked. "It was really hot and humid."
The Huskies started preparations for the upcoming season with 82 band members. They lost a few and began the new season with 80. "That's what we had last year," Belfiore said.
Prior to band camp, the Huskies held 16 rehearsals over the course of the summer, focusing on marching on Tuesdays and music on Wednesdays. The time invested during their offseason will only better prepare them for their upcoming performance schedule.
Much like a football team holds training camp, "we teach the students how to march," Belfiore said of summer rehearsals. "We learn music during the summer, which we memorize during band camp.
"We also hand out the charts, which are like our playbooks," he added.
The drill charts provide step-by-step instructions for each song, showing each members' movements on a chart which is placed over a diagram of a football field. Each band member is assigned a letter and number designation for placement purposes.
"Everybody has a very specific place to be on the field during the show, which is nine minutes long," Belfiore said. "This year's show is bigger, longer and harder than it has been in the past."
The Huskies, who have won three Tournament of Bands crowns in the last six years, have moved up to the Open Class this year after their run of success in the A Class, which Mifflin County has been in since 2017.
The TOB promotes bands to a higher class once they're scored 92 points in at least four performance categories.
"Essentially, we're doing the same things we've always done, we're just competing in a much more extreme division this year," Belfiore said. "We're pushing the students harder, but we feel they're ready for it."
That includes seventh graders, who Belfiore believes gain valuable experience by marching at a younger age. "It takes about two years for any student to figure out what to do in marching band," he explained. "We want them to get comfortable doing what we ask them to do."
He added the seventh graders brought into the program two years ago are marching more confidently as ninth graders this year. "They'll be better performers now for three or four years -- rather than two years," he said.
Belfiore said this year's seventh graders are "musically very, very advanced," for which he credits middle school band director Samantha Gates and elementary band director Jessica Poorman.
"They're keeping our program big and strong," Belfiore said. "Our success over the past six years is fueling the size of our program."
For the marching Huskies, it all starts at band camp.