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Struthers sees big band success at middle school
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Josh Hawkins, band director for Struthers schools, directs the middle school jazz band during practice Tuesday morning in the Struthers Middle School auditorium. The students are preparing for their second concert as a jazz band.
By Megan Wilkinson | mwilkinson@vindy.com
STRUTHERS
When Struthers band director Josh Hawkins noticed sign-up numbers for the high school jazz class dwindling well below 10 students, he decided to try an experiment: a jazz band with middle school students.
“I knew we needed to do something if we wanted to have a bigger class in the high school,” he said. “I felt the kids needed to have some kind of experience with jazz before they hit high school, because not many of my middle school students knew about this genre.”
Hawkins said he handpicked seven seventh- and eighth-grade students whom he “knew loved to play their instruments, loved band, loved music” and he “spun the club to them as something special for them.”
The band started as a before-school activity last February where seven students would come on a good day. But as those seven kids started to tell their friends about the group, by fall, as many as 30 students would show up to the early morning jazz sessions, Hawkins said.
Hawkins said he tends to restrict the group to seventh- and eighth-graders, explaining that jazz is a harder genre to perform. He said a lot of last year’s sixth-graders were interested in the group and joined.
“These kids love this music and they love being there,” he said. “They’re giving up sleep to come, which is great.”
Pete Pirone, middle school principal, commended the group’s growth at the school district’s board of education meeting about a week ago. He added that the middle school began to talk with Hawkins about this possibility last fall.
“We’ve been trying to grow our arts program recently, so obviously the addition of a jazz band in the middle school is a success to us,” Pirone said.
Because most of the students have been musicians for only two years at best, Hawkins said he will play more complex instruments such as the tuba, bass guitar or guitar to help fill out the sound at practices and concerts.
Hawkins said his middle school jazz group has performed at only one concert so far, which was last spring. He said the students are set to put on their second performance at the school’s Christmas concert next Thursday night. Hawkins said the students will perform two jazzy Christmas songs.
While Hawkins hopes to see the kids perform at out-of-school events down the road, he said he doesn’t want to overwhelm them yet.
“Right now, they know two jazz Christmas songs, but you can’t really play an out-of-school event with only two songs,” he said. “You need at least 20 minutes of music for something like that. I don’t know, but I think if things continue to grow, we could add some shows.”