Marching to perfection a sweltering team effort

You know how you’re driving down Kalanianaole in your air-conditioned car and you see the kids marching on the Kalani High School field, their instruments glinting in the unforgiving sun, and you think, “Wow, those kids are INTO it”?

And then you’re heading home hours later and the band is still marching and you think, “Those kids must REALLY be into it”?

Those kids are into it.

It’s not just Kalani, of course. Other high school bands are out in the sun and dripping humidity getting ready for the new school year of football games and marching competitions.

At Kalani their hours-long practices are right along Kalanianaole Highway, where thousands of people can look and wave.

Do they honk?

“Sometimes,” says senior Raquel Hernandez, the drum major leading this year’s 110-member band.

But is it a supportive, “Way to go!” honk?

“Sometimes,” she said, grinning.

School doesn’t start until Aug. 7, but marching band first met on the July Fourth weekend. There are 25 incoming freshmen plus several new upperclassmen who have never marched. Students come to Kalani already knowing how to read music and play an instrument. “Our feeder schools do a great job,” says band director Dennis Kaneshiro.

This week was summer band camp, which the students call “hell week,” with practices that run from as early as 8:30 a.m. through the afternoon. Field time has to be scheduled around football practices and Hawaii Youth Symphony rehearsals, since many in the band are HYS musicians.

The students have Home Depot aprons tied at their waists. In the pockets they keep notes on the coordinates and counts of each drill, and poker chips to mark their start positions.

Most are covered in sunscreen and many wear wide-brimmed hats.

“The plantation hats are popular,” Kaneshiro says. “You can get them at City Mill. HIC sells some nice ones.”

The percussion pit, with unwieldy marimbas and gongs, doesn’t march, but the musicians have to lug their instruments from the band room to the field and back again after practice.

“The vibraphones have wheels, and we put all-terrain tires on them so it’s not too bad,” said senior Harrison Fong.

Kaneshiro has an app on his phone that counts down the time in marching band season: three months, two weeks, two days. All this work is for a halftime performance seven minutes long.

“I have this joke when the kids sign up. I try to discourage them. I paint the worst picture of marching band — that it’s hot, it’s physical, there’s people yelling at you. It’s not the finished product. It’s all the things you have to do to get there.”

That’s precisely what the students seem to love about this test of musical endurance. “It’s the journey we take together,” Hernandez says. “Every day is the best day for me. Some people say, ‘I’m so tired!’ and I say, ‘I know! Isn’t it fun?’”

Reach Lee Cataluna at 529-4315 or lcataluna@staradvertiser.com.