Wednesday, March 27, 2024

BOA Nationals: Reeths-Puffer, Muskegon, Mich.

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INDIANAPOLIS (Nov. 14, 2009)—”The Bucket List” is not only the theme of the 2009 marching band field show by Reeths-Puffer High School in Muskegon, Mich.; it was also a recent movie starring Jack Nicholson and Morgan Freeman. For our coverage of the Bands of America Grand National Championship semi-finals here at the Lucas Oil Stadium, we will restrict our comments to the former, which has been modified from the original both to fit in the allotted time and for content.

In college—or possibly earlier—we sit down and write a list of all the things we’d like to accomplish before we die. One list Reeths-Puffer brings onto the field has things like “Be a Rock Star” and “Play in the NFL” on it. The other list, since there are two characters in the plot, contains a few less specific items: “See Something Truly Majestic” and “Laugh Until I Cry.”

For those not familiar with the movie, the “bucket list” refers to a list of things we seek to accomplish before we “kick the bucket.” The lists written in college are mostly intended to be hypothetical, but when a doctor tells you your life will expire in six months, it gets a little more serious. A brief quartet, featuring a flute, clarinet, harmon-muted trumpet, and alto saxophone, brings the news.

With death looming, we liven things up a bit. Here, the drumline gets down and parties. Musical selections include “Radiant Joy” by Steven Bryant, “Avenue X” by Jonathan Newman, “Strange Humors” by John Mackey, and “Yosemite Autumn” by Mark Camphouse.

The entire band eventually joins the party, acting out items on the bucket list, laughing until they cry, playing lead guitar in a rock band, and just having a grand time.

Sometimes life is so much fun for the plot’s main characters that the reality of their impending death seems a distant thought in their heads.

Gradually, as our characters acquiesce in the narrator’s statement that “the most obvious things are often the most difficult to see,” the lists change, now including things like spending more time with families and other, more personal experiences.

And at the very end, only one item remains on the list: “Find True Joy.” And that’s the point of anyone’s particular bucket list, I suppose: the precise items are not as important as the act of making the list and doing those things that you decided to do with your life.

Indian political and spiritual leader Mahatma Gandhi once said, “Whatever you do will be insigificant, but it is very important that you do it.” It seems he knew exactly what he was talking about.

And so it is with bucket lists. It really doesn’t matter whether we aspire to be a rock star or an NFL running back, as long as we aspire—and as long as we remain true to our word and remember that any true joy we find, after all has been said and done, is derived not from the specific activities, but from our friends.

The marching band from Reeths-Puffer High School is directed by Chuck Hodson and led on the field by drum majors Ashley Hegedus, Jake Lubbers, and Annie Somerville.

Paul Katulahttps://news.schoolsdo.org
Paul Katula is the executive editor of the Voxitatis Research Foundation, which publishes this blog. For more information, see the About page.

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