Big Ten & Rutgers Bands: and here’s why....

Does anyone here not watch BTN? Okay, you, in the back. Go watch something on BTN....we’ll wait. Naah, we have too much to talk about.

So, you’ve probably seen the 30-second promo for the Big Ten’s marching bands; all 14 squads shown in action. Cool stuff.

And the fact that you see this on BTN, as opposed to, oh, I don’t know....the SEC Network?.....is because marching bands in the Big Ten are very, very big. Not necessarily in size, but in cache, importance, tradition. Good grief, the Ohio State band goes by the moniker The Best Damn Band in the Land. @TBDBITL

They have more than 18,500 followers on Twitter!

The Wisconsin band does a full post-game concert in front of thousands who stay after the football game. Yes, they postpone additional drinking to listen to the band!

Yes, Big Ten bands are a force.

Our Jim Hoffman, in his 30 for 30 series highlighted the Pride of New Jersey for its music and spirit.

Why, then, do we see a tweet like this?

Or this?

Uh, no, probably wouldn’t have happened in Ann Arbor. Or Columbus or Iowa City or any other place in the Big Ten.

You read my stuff; you know I could be accused of a bit of jingoism for Olympic sports and, yes, the band. Name one other writer here who has written at least four stories on the Marching Scarlet Knights? I’ll wait......

None! Last year was the band’s 100th Anniversary, their new uniforms, and even on the other Big Ten bands. We covered it. I’m all about promoting everyone.

But how does the band cancel on these two events? How does the band not play at the watch party at The Yard after it had been promoted as being there?

Answer: I don’t know, and I don’t have access to that information. Maybe there was an issue with musicians, maybe some gigantic scheduling problem?

You know what? I don’t care. That simply can’t happen. This, boys and girls, is the big time. This isn’t some small school that plays D3 sports. This is the state university, the Big Ten, a major public relations event.

I like Tim Smith, the band director. He seems like a very nice guy, and he was very willing to offer his thoughts last year when I wrote a couple of those posts. But right now, I don’t have the time - or the clout - to simply call him up and say, “Hey, Tim, what happened, man?” Whatever happened here, Tim needs to mend some fences. It is his last year as the director, and you want to go out on a high note. It will be interesting to see where the band goes for its next leader.

After all, this is the Big Ten.

#OneTeam....Western Michigan style

The team, the fans, the band. One team, and Western Michigan’s P.J. Fleck acknowledges that they all need to work together to create a great game day environment.

Everyone works together for the greater good of the entire organization. To. Geth. Er.

Speaking of uniforms....

Weren’t we? The @CollegeMarching Twitter account created football uniforms based on the uniforms of the school’s respective band. It’s kind of goofy and fun. And in the case of Rutgers, not that bad.

Home Opener

Saturday is not only the home opener for football, it’s also the season opener for the band. How about we all get there as early as we can, get in our seats - on time - and listen to the band perform. Howard’s band, too; they’re pretty good.