On Friday and Saturday, March 21 – 22, 2025, Lafayette’s three concert bands performed at the District 7 Concert Band Assessment at Scott County High School in Georgetown, Kentucky.
The concert bands have been preparing for this event since the beginning of the semester, with lengthy rehearsals after school almost daily. Even though the bands played the same pieces as they did at UK’s Windfest event, they have been consistently working to improve their performance and receive feedback from various educators to make their performances the best they can be.
At assessment, judges give bands a rating based on various categories. Some of these might include tone, articulation, clarity of notes, and presentation. From there, bands are scored through a number system on each of those categories, with 1 being the highest rating (Distinguished) and 4 being the lowest (Novice). Every Lafayette band received a Distinguished rating in every single category, which is very difficult to achieve.
Another major part of the event is the sight-reading portion of the performance after each band performs their prepared pieces. During this portion of the assessment, bands were taken off stage to the band room where they had five minutes to review the piece given by the conductor without playing through anything. From there, each band had to sight-read and play the piece on the spot, given a score based on how well they performed this new piece of music.
Sophomore Acadia Meyers, a member of the Wind Symphony, the highest concert band here at Lafayette, noted, “Throughout the time frame we were given to work through the piece on our own, we were able to collaborate and work as a team to ultimately reach the ending goal of performing the new piece to the best of our ability.” This quote emphasizes the level of maturity and collaboration it takes to succeed in sight-reading and how well the concert bands did.
This event was a great way for Lafayette concert band students to engage in collaboration and teamwork and develop their musical abilities as a whole. Not only that, but it also helped to prepare each group for the spring concert on May 13, 2025. Stay tuned to the Times for more information on that event later this semester.
