Gasconade County R-2 Director of Bands MJ Orf had East Central College Band Director Dr. Aaron Bounds come visit the school on Feb. 24 as a guest instructor.

Bounds talked about driving down to Owensville.

“I was there for about an hour and fifteen minutes talking to the students and the teachers and stuff,” said Bounds. “I know the band directors there (R-2) very well, Megan Orf and MJ Orf, MJ’s been there, I think four or five years, this is Megan’s first year there and they’re building a great program, so I wanna get out there and do some recruiting and work with their kids and build that relationship.”

When Bound visits schools they’re called clinics when he works with bands.

“When I go work with them (schools) whatever music they’re working on,” said Bounds.”I kind of give them some tips and things that they can work on and improve upon.”.

He has intentions of coming back to Owensville.

“I will probably go out there again probably March or April as we get closer to the Jazz Clinic where we work with our Jazz Band,” said Bounds. “We’ll meet before school at 7:15.”

Orf talked about his program.

“It’s grown quite a bit,” said Orf.”I think when I got here, it was probably around between 90 and 100 kids total (6-12) and this year we have about 175.”

He expects the band will continue to grow.

“It’s just really cool to see the growth and the involvement from everybody,” said Orf.

He talked about music choices for the upcoming marching season.

“The process that I usually do is I find a piece of music that the audience will be able to get entertained from, but also compete with,” said Orf. “I want to do something that will challenge the students and show growth in a way.”

Finding a theme that is easily grasped is important for the marching season music choices.

The band directors are currently narrowing down their options.

He talked about the awards that the band won during this year’s marching season.

They were scheduled for four competitions, one of them was rained out.

The fist competition they went to was on Sept. 20 to the Sullivan Marching Festival.

They placed fourth in Class 3 and made it to finals and finished 10th in finals, finals is out of everyone that competed in the competition.

The band went to Washington’s competition called the Gene Hunt Marching Band Invitational on Oct. 4 and earned third for Class 3 along with receiving the general effect award.

“We also won the fan favorite award,” said Orf about the competition at Washington.

The band went to Central Methodist University (CMU)on Oct. 11 and got first place in their class. The color guard won best auxiliary while at CMU.

Mineral Area College was expected to be their last band event, but that competition was rained out.

The band boosters are scheduling an event for April 11.

“Barbecue and blues, I think is what they’re going with,” said Orf. “They’ll be selling tickets essentially to the event, which will be a dinner that they (band boosters) will prepare, and the Jazz band will be the entertainment for that evening.”

The middle school spring concert will be April 20 and feature the three middle school bands. May 5 will be the spring concert for the high school band and the jazz band.

“I also will take the jazz band out, I do some recruiting,” said Orf. “I use the jazz band to go to the elementary schools and we play for their student bodies and I get the fifth-graders riled up and inspired to do band next year.”

He will take the high school band out to a concert clinic to help students prepare for their upcoming competition as well as concerts.

Bounds was at the school to help the band prepare for their upcoming state competition.

“He did a really nice job,” said Orf. “We like to have guest conductors/instructors come out and helps us because he was helping us prepare for our state stuff later this month.”

He expects to bring in more guest instructors to help finalize for the competition.

“It’s nice to have other people come out and send out what we’re trying to teach,” said Orf.

The event that the band is practicing for is the MSHSAA District Solo/Small Ensemble on March 28 at East Central College, the event is optional for band members.