It is working. Hey, everyone. Welcome to Dramaathon. Whoo. Alright. We have an awesome, awesome show planned for you guys tonight. The first piece that we just played was called, well, it's the Trans Siberian Orchestra version of Carol of the Bells, called Christmas Eve Sarajevo. And, we had a nice little drum accompaniment to that track. That was something that I wrote along with Zach Richards, another one of our alumni. My name is Brandon Reed. I'm one of two instructors for the drum line, and I work very closely with Hannah Sherman, who is the other instructor. Before we get, or actually, wait.
Earplugs come after this. Okay. Hi, everyone. My name's Hannah. Huge thank you to Brandon for putting all this together. He's such a g for this. Yeah. Give it up for him. Real quick, we're gonna be really loud today, so if you guys got those earplugs, I am going to show you real quick how to use them. Can everybody hear me? Yeah. Alright. So, you are going to take the tip, the small part of the earplug, and you are going to squeeze it on both sides to make it really small. Yep. I would probably start with one first and then do the other. Yep. And then you're gonna stick it in your ear, not too far, but just enough,
and then let it expand in your ear. Do you feel that? You should it kinda is a little uncomfortable at first. And then do the other one, same thing. You're gonna make sure the tip is really small, squeeze it, put it in your ear and then let it expand. Everybody got it? Alright. Alright. Our next song that we're gonna play is, Beat Rat. It's one of my favorites. Enjoy. Alright. Coming up next, we have a, combined performance. So the two pieces we played at the beginning were mostly with, alumni, and the
next piece we have is a very fun combined piece that we as alumni get to do with the students. It's because it came from this, really awesome drumline camp put on by the Michigan State University drumline. Every summer, it's called the performing arts camp for drum line. And, this camp's been going on since 2011. I actually went to the first one, and it's been going on since then. So over time, a lot of us have gone to this camp. And every camp, they teach the exact same cadence called the pack cadence, and it hasn't changed over that time, so we can all come through and, play it all
together. So we hope you enjoy. Alright. So we are now entering the student ensemble portion of the night. The way that kind of this concert was set up is that it is kind of just a showcase of sorts of the percussion groups, starting at Dearborn High, but we, for the first time, have another group performing with us from another school this year, which you'll hear, just very soon. So we have a couple, student ensembles, and I'm going to have Hannah talk about what those are gonna be. Alright. So the next thing that we have going on, Colin's gonna play some DCI licks.
Does anybody know what DCI stands for? Yes. Correct. Drum corps international. It's a intensive drum corps. Definitely look it up. I don't have time to explain it, but it's super cool. And Colin is taking it upon himself to learn some cool licks and he wants to show you guys. Call him whenever you're ready. Thank you, Colin. Give it up for Colin one more time. That's super hard to do. Alright. Next up, we have Ben joining him. Ben is a senior this year, and, he and Colin have really improved this year and taken it upon themselves to learn some MSU drumline songs, including Martian Mambo, Diddy,
and then we'll showcase X a little bit later. Yeah. So these pieces, MSU drumline plays, it's one of their staples. They've played it for years. John Weber has composed them. And they usually play them before game days on Grand River. So, super cool. Go ahead guys. Good job, y'all. Sorry. I was just saying good job. Alright. Next, we have Diddy. Go ahead. Alright. And then their last one, we added Lily and Eva. We're gonna be playing x, which is a very intense Michigan State piece as well. Again, played on Grand River. Y'all ready?
Alright, Maples drummers, you guys can head on up. You guys are next. If, if we could get just one more applause for our student ensembles, the music they just played is insanely difficult, and they all learned it on their own. Hannah Hannah and I worked with them a long time out of the year. We did not touch those pieces with them, other than just watching them play through it. They learned it all on their own and we are just so so impressed with them. But coming up next, we are so so excited to have for the first time ever another group at Drumathon performing with us. These are the Maples drummers.
You're in for a real treat with this one, but to speak more about them, I'll have their director, Liz Myers, talk more. Thanks so much. Wow. This is our first time here. Thank you, Dearborn High, for inviting us, Brandon and Hannah, and we're really happy to be here. The Maples drummers began in, 2001 from, the teacher, Kathy Prouse. She responded to it was a response to 09:11. She wanted to showcase, Arab culture at a time when it was very, very strenuous
for families, especially in Dearborn. And she started a drum group, and it became a kind of a outreach of peace and cultural awareness and just showcasing the beautiful Darbuka drum and the richness of many Arab cultures that have come to the Dearborn area. And, I'm very fortunate to be continuing that on. This is my tenth year here and I took it over from Mrs. Prowse who, started it, and now I'll I'm continuing. So next year will be our twenty fifth year.
The drummers are between third and fifth grade. They work very hard to get into the drum drum group, and we'll start with their audition piece. In order to get into the drum group, they must perform the most difficult piece that we play, which is the Abud solo. And we'll play that first. And that's their audition piece. If they can play the Abud solo, that means they can make it into the drumming program. And this year we have a special event coming. We're presenting at Michigan Music Conference this year in January. So the students will be teaching teachers how to do the darbuka drum.
It's really exciting. Thank you for allowing us to come tonight. Just we'll be doing four pieces. That's it. Can we hear it one more time for the Maples drummers, please? Please. That that was just I just wanna say that was so impressive, and you guys are awesome. I'm so happy that someone told me to reach out to Liz Myers about her group because this is one of the highlights of the night for sure. If we have some of you coming to Dearborn High in a couple of years, we'd be very, very fortunate. All of them? No way. That makes me so happy. Okay. Well, we'll try to make sure we're up to your game by the time that
you're here. Okay. How about that? Okay. So the next piece we have, this is the last one that we have before the first intermission, and this is is a feature of the Dearborn High School Color Guard. The color guard is directed by Sarah Randall, also a DHS alum. She's been working for the group working with the group just about as long as I've been working with the drum line, all year round just like we work with the drum line, and they're always very, very impressive every year. So they've got three, tunes or three, pieces to show you today. The first two are from the halftime show from this year that Dearborn and I
played, called Born to the Beat. And then the third one is just a little bit of, oh, yeah, the sleigh bells, actually. A little bit of holiday cheer, for you as we head into the holiday season. So we hope you enjoy. Don't want a lot for Christmas. You once again, Color Guard. Can we give a round of applause for Color Guard again? Thank you so much. Alright. They are so nice to let our drummers go up there and dance with them. It's very very kind of them. They do it every time they come and we appreciate it. Okay. So we've got our first intermission coming up. It's gonna be I think I put ten minutes on there, but I think we're only gonna need, like, five minutes or so.
So if you wanna head back, there's some snacks that you can get. You can look at some of our drumline merch, like this very, very cool jacket. And we'll be back on here in about five minutes. And believe me, if, you aren't back by then, you'll know it. So I'll just say that. Alright. So what we just had, right there was what we call our exercise gauntlet. We kinda put it together just for this performance. It's like a combination of all the different exercises, which are kinda like, warm ups that the drum line plays to work on things like their fundamentals and their stick control, which is actually the name of one of those. It's just called stick control. But a couple others are eights, double triple, trippadiddle, they all got fun names, but
they do mean something. So I'm gonna go through right now and just do some quick introductions for our awesome drum line members. I'll start, closest to me we have Lynn Kazal on simples. Ben Blumenstein on tenors. Lily Crowell on snare. Colin Chamblin on snare. Sophia Lam on bass. And Liam on base. Alright. I think I'm turning over to you now. Okay. Turn over to Hannah. Alright. So we're gonna be doing the halftime, a couple selections from the halftime this year. Their show was Born to the Beat, which they did a each of the songs
was from different years that they were all born, each grade. So let me pull it up. So they're going to do Runaway Baby, and then they're gonna do which is by Brutal Mars, and then Bad Romance by Lady Gaga. Alright. So coming up next we have a couple, performance pieces that the drum line learned for this year. These are pieces that the drum line plays just by themselves. They learned actually, for their, before football game performance called Pioneer Pulse. We came up with a name for it this year. Before every home football game, they'll go out in front of the school by the flagpole, and they will play through all their tunes, including the ones you just heard,
as well as, some other ones, and of course the series at the end. So please enjoy Pulsar, one of their performance pieces. Alright. Next up, we have Eva on the stage. We are gonna do Sleigh Ride. This is a rendition that, is for pretty much our line, but we did play it at, Peace Park, which is super cool. We also added lights as you can see. Liam. Perfect. Enjoy. The next tune we have for you guys is called Band A Beat. This is a Michigan's other Michigan State performance piece, that they will play, before games
and also during games, as well, in the stands, as well as, for post game, on some occasions. And we have our awesome drum major, Eva, joining us for this one too. Alright. So we've got, our penultimate piece for you right now. It's a good word by the way, penultimate, keep that one in mind. This one is called Pioneer Pachuca. It is a piece that I wrote for the drumline this year, and it is actually based on a very very old, halftime show that this band did. It was the swing halftime show, back in the olden days of 2008, and they
played a song called Hey Pachuca, and some of the, kind of features you'll see in this piece are derived from that, kind of how the drum line played that piece. This is what we like to call on the drum line is a crowd pleaser, there's a lot of things in here that just kind of are fun and cool, and that we think you'll really like. Before, you know, as they're setting up, I do want to mention, you'll see the drum line is a bit smaller today than you usually see it, we have, a couple students who couldn't perform today due to illness, and due to just such scheduling conflicts. So one of those students is Tim, on bass drum, or bass two, Tim Blum,
and, Gio Bitanti on snare. So looks like everyone is almost set up. And as soon as you are ready, take it away. Alright. This leads us to our final piece of the night. If you are an alumni, and you are going to be performing with us, please make your way down here. Before we get into that, we have some very important, people we wanna mention who we couldn't do this concert without, just give some thanks. First of all, mister Brian McCloskey, you heard him on the horse Winnie there during Sleigh Ride. We're very grateful for him and everything he does for the drumline.
Yeah, please give him a round of applause. I already mentioned them, but they deserve two rounds of applause. The DHS Band Aid Booster Club and all the volunteers that make these concerts possible. Our guest performers from the Maples drummers and the DHS color grad. As well as Sarah Brookhisen of Edsel Ford for lending us some of their equipment we can use to accommodate the many many drummers that you will see on stage for this performance. One note, for everyone on stage, please do not leave after we're done. We're gonna take group picture, so, just don't run off anywhere. Before we do that, we'd like to do a quick, recognition for all of our
seniors on the drum line who are performing in their last drum a thon as students, not necessarily as alumni. First, I would like to recognize, Ben Blumenstein on tenors. Ben is one Ben was one of our two section leaders this year. He played snare drum for one year, and then tenor drums for three years. And he has some big ambitions of playing on the Michigan State drum line next year. We wish him all the luck and we know he absolutely can represent us well on that group. Please another round of applause for Ben. I would also like to recognize Gio. Gio is is he here? Gio, are you here?
Okay. Gio is also one of our seniors. He was on bass drum for two years, and he was on snare this year. So please a round of applause for Gio. Alright. And finally, she's not technically on the drum line this year, but our drum major, Eva Hammoud. Eva has been such a huge part of this drum line. All four years she's been here she started on bass drum, then moved to snare, and, she decided to leave us for a more important role this year of leading the whole band as the drum major, which I will say in all the time that I've been here has never happened to a member of the drum line before. She's been our first in, I think, possibly ever, but certainly a very long time.
So once again some applause for Eva. And seniors, we also have a parting senior gift. Sofia, would you like to present your senior gifts? Hi. I don't I don't know how many of you guys were here last year. I did this last year for our senior, Savros. So can I have our seniors come here, please? He's right there. Gio, you can come. I didn't leave you out. So, basically, last year, I, I bought a hat for Stavros, and I had all of our drumline members sign it. And so I did that, guys, for you guys.
So I have GEOs with all of our signatures. I have EVAs with all of our signatures, except Tim, because he's not here. But they only had long sleeve. That's fine. I have yours. Thank you. That's why I asked for your shirt size. Oh, I was wondering why. No. I'm gonna buy yours. Oh, there's Mark right here. Yay. Alright. Once more for our awesome seniors, please. Alright. So the the last performance we have for you tonight, it is the one we always end on, it is the series. The series is the drumline's marching cadence.
They play it wherever they move. If they're going from a place to another place, they play the series for the whole band to get there. I've already talked about this a million times in past concerts, so I won't talk too much about it today, but it's just just know it's a very very important tradition for this drumline, for this whole band. There's so much history with this piece, they've been playing it for at least twenty years now, and it's just so much fun to play. The last thing I want to do is recognize all of our alumni who came back to perform today. So from the class of 2025 we have Stavros Stalianu. He'll be, auditioning for the Michigan's or University of Michigan drumline in a couple months
here. We wish him the best of luck. We have Maddox Rowe. From the class of 2023, Avery Andrews on bass drum. Avery's a current Aquinas College drum line member. And Charlotte Carew, bass drum. Madison Rodoski from the class of 2018. Zach Richards from class of 2016. Zach representing the Eastern Michigan University. Drumline, go Eagles. James Polidori from the class of 2015, representing the Michigan marching band, go blue. Hannah Sherman, class of 2018. And Spartan marching band alum. And myself, class of 2012, University of Michigan.
Go Blue. Alright. If you've been neglecting your earplugs, I know some of you have, don't try to lie, this would be a good time to put them in. We hope you enjoy.