Posted on 02/22/2018 3:14:38 PM PST by SandRat
SIERRA VISTA — On the back wall of the Buena High School band room, names of cities from across the United States and around the world are painted in different colors.
“That’s our legacy,” drum major Sam Martinez said while describing the wall.
Every two to three years, band director Duane Chun takes members on a “big” trip. This year from March 11 to March 16, 120 Buena band members and roughly 59 chaperones will travel to Honolulu for two performances and the experience of a lifetime.
“It gives the students a chance to perform outside of our four walls of Sierra Vista that they wouldn’t normally get a chance to,” Chun said. “Trips like this build camaraderie and build the team.
“It’s a shared experience they’ll take with them for the rest of their lives.”
The show band and the spirit band will perform one show apiece in Hawaii. The show band will perform on March 12 on the Ala Moana Center mall’s center stage, while the spirit band will perform a stand-up concert on the deck of the USS Missouri.
“Once we get off the plane, we hit the ground running,” Martinez said.
Chun said both groups will perform an “Americana” concert with Western tunes.
Chun plans a trip every two to three years because it gives every student at least one opportunity to go on a trip. Some students, like Martinez, get to experience two big trips in their high school career.
“It’s an amazing senior trip, and it’s a really cool opportunity to go out and represent our school and Sierra Vista,” Martinez said. “It’s nice to have our names out there, ‘cause that paves the way for future generations and bands.”
The first trip Martinez went on was to Orlando, Florida, though he didn’t have years to fundraise for it. After that experience, he knew he wanted to be a part of the next one, and began to collect money.
“From that trip, I was like, ‘I want to do everything with this band,’” he said. “They’re like my second family. I spend almost as much time at my home as I do here.”
Chun said he has received compliments from people in the different places he has taken Buena students previously.
In addition to their two performances, the Buena band will play with the Kalani High School band as part of an exchange program.
“Both bands will get together and play for each other, and have a pizza party for lunch,” Chun said. “I always want to do something local when we’re there.”
The group will also visit the Pearl Harbor Memorial and take a tour of Oahu, the island on which Honolulu is located.
The trip has been two years in the making, according to Chun. Last February, the school board approved the idea, and he was able to start collecting money for the down payment. He estimates the cost to be $2,000 per person.
“We laid the groundwork and started dropping hints two years ago,” he said. “There are no school funds at all.
“Everything comes from fundraising, the Arizona tax credit that is made on their behalf for this.”
Chun said he takes students on the trips because it gives them an opportunity to bond and have a special connection.
“It’s an opportunity, I think, and is valuable for our students.”
How cool is that?
I never even flew on a plane or leave California until I was 22 years old.
I now have nearly 3 million airline miles — all in North America.
It amazed me how much I learned from travel. Even watching local news, I learned we are SO SPOILED in So. Cal. in terms of talent and looks among other things and the what leads — sports in most placers east of the Mississippi and west of NYC and when weather leads everything.
I hope they have a great time, enjoy the Mighty MO and see Pearl Harbor and feel the lump in the throat when seeing the cairns of the brave departed.
And enjoy the smells of HI and the decry the frustration of ag check.
I wish I had that chance way back when.
Many HS bands take big trips like this, hence the funds raisers.
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