Band camp is here for marching band directors. The music and drill are coming together. Soon, the buses will be back on the roads to the first game or festival. New music and instruments arrive at band rooms. Chairs and stands are reset. The hallways will fill again with eager students. The private or group lesson schedule is carefully crafted and sent. Somewhere between the first sectional and the first fire drill, the pace of the year will simply arrive — whether you’re ready for it or not.

This post is for the director standing at the edge of this year. That feeling is real. The calendar fills in fast: camp, back-to-school night, the first football game, the first assessment prep, the first parent email that needs a careful answer. It is so easy, in these opening weeks, to set the tone for the whole year without meaning to — a tone of more. More rehearsal time. More literature. More hours in the office after the buses have left and the band room has gone quiet. More of yourself, given away before September even ends.

Instead, myself included, I want to offer a different tone to set.

Do less. Move towards better.

I’ve said this before and I’ll say it again, because it’s worth repeating at the start of a year, not just the middle of one: doing less is not the same as being unproductive. It is a shift from the quantity of what you’re doing to the quality of the experience you’re creating — for your students, and for yourself. Two questions can anchor you as you build out your first few weeks: What is in the best interest of my students so they forge a meaningful, sustainable relationship with music? And what can I do to facilitate that in a healthy, productive way — for them, and for me? That second half of the question matters just as much as the first.

I think that sometimes we as directors feel compelled to fill the schedules of our students out of fear to lose students to a different activity. Consider how you can leave your audience wanting more, but your students fulfilled – in love with music, excited about what they are creating and contributing, and sustained by what the experiences are giving them. Flipping the perspective, are the experiences sustaining your love of music, love of teaching, and what the experiences are giving you? A sustainable program starts with a sustainable director.

Pearls form slowly, diamonds take steady pressure.

Pearls form slowly — a secretion around an irritant, layer by layer, over time. Diamonds require steady pressure too, not a sudden and certainly not a last-minute crush. The same is true of a band program in its opening weeks, and it’s true of you. The instinct at the start of a year is to apply maximum pressure right out of the gate — full rehearsals, full expectations, full intensity — as if urgency now will save you time later. I am not convinced that it does. The right kind of steady pressure, applied consistently, builds something valuable. Sudden pressure just crushes the coal. Pace yourself the way you would pace a good rehearsal: know where you need to be by October, by the winter concert, by contest season, and let today’s rehearsal be one honest step in that direction — not a frantic sprint to get there by Friday.

The most practical way I try to do this is by reverse engineering my rehearsal schedule. Taking into account how certain periods of our time can be affected by circumstances outside of our control, we can set reasonable goals for ourself and our students. When the goals are shared, students become invested and aware of their preparation and how it impacts the success of their band. It’s an interesting habit (reverse engineering rehearsal schedules) to develop. Habits either imprison you or liberate you. I would rather embrace the freedom of knowing how well my ensemble is progressing against a pre-determined schedule rather than feeling trapped by not knowing if there is enough time to reach a musical goal for which I am on the only one aware.

Be where your podium is.

I’ve written before about being present where your podium resides — mindful of the long journey, but not at the expense of the moment in front of you. That’s a lesson for the whole year, but it starts now. Camp week and the first weeks of school will ask a lot of you. They will also offer a lot to you, if you let them — the first time a section locks in together, the first kid who finally gets it, the quiet moment of watching the program come back to life after a summer away or even a program that is coming back to life after a downturn in enrollment or pride. Don’t let the bustle of the season steal those moments from you. Be where your baton and whistle are. The paperwork, the emails, the logistics — they’ll still be there in an hour. This moment, with these students, will not wait for you. When you are there in that moment, celebrate the victory with them so they see the joy in opening another door in music for them to walk through.

Seek balance and moderation in all things.

I believe fairness — real fairness, to your students, your family, and yourself — requires seeking balance and moderation in all things. That’s not a soft idea. It’s a discipline (ultimately a habit), the same as any other skill you’d teach in a lesson. It means being honest about what a sustainable week actually looks like before the year runs away from you, not after you’re already exhausted in November. It means the same grace you extend to a student working through a hard passage is grace you’re allowed to extend to yourself, on the weeks you don’t get it all right either. It means building parts of your schedule specifically devoted to the logistics of correspondence (e.g., phone calls, emails), researching and study (e.g., learning new music, preparing your scores for rehearsal), and time away and off so that you can recharge. Habits are useful things to build into your own routine, but keep in mind that your own willpower is a finite resource. It needs time to be recharged. Finding that balance point so that your time with family, with your friends, in the hobbies that you cultivate and enjoy keeps your spirits high and recharges the willpower you will need.

This had better not be the last time you find your own joy in it, either.

We talk often about making sure students carry music with them for life — that the ensemble experience isn’t a chapter that closes the day they graduate. The same charge belongs to us. The love of music, the reason you walked into this profession in the first place, has to survive the logistics of the profession. Protect it. Whatever that looks like for you — an hour with your own instrument, a rehearsal you attend as a player and not a director, a trip to see the symphony or a Broadway show, a Sunday that stays a Sunday — guard it as fiercely as you guard your program’s Friday nights.

The season ahead will test all of us. It always does. But the way you begin it can set the tempo for how you carry it. Do less, better. Apply steady pressure, not sudden panic. Be where your podium is. Seek balance in all things — including for yourself. Life, love, music. Until next time.