For those of you that don't know, in addition to playing euphonium in the band, I also cover Penn sports teams for the Daily Pennsylvanian, Penn's student newspaper. I've yet to cover either football or men's basketball, as these sports are normally reserved for juniors and seniors to cover. However, the biggest sport that I've covered over my two years has been the women's lacrosse team.
Now, once the men's basketball season comes to a close, the Penn Band normally goes into hibernation mode. Well not quite. We do a few scattered spring events here and there. And so far this year we've done two women's lacrosse games. Now, I've had to cover both of these games for the DP, so I haven't played with the band. Doing so would constitute a direct conflict of interest, since I'd be rooting for a team (by playing an instrument) and then covering said team for an objective media source.
However, a much iffier issue of conflict of interest occurred after the most recent Penn Band-attended women's lacrosse game. Yesterday, the No. 5 Quakers faced No. 1 Northwestern who was undefeated and on a 36-game winning streak. The Wildcats also had won the last three national championships. It was a huge game, so the band decided to come out and support the team.
Well the Quakers pulled off the stunning upset. (Here are my live game updates of the match; notice the Penn Band references). Anyway, after the game I was waiting to interview some players/coaches. Penn senior captain Rachel Manson, whom I've interviewed several times before and knows me by sight, turns to me completely out of the blue and says, "Because the Penn Band came." Since it seemed sort of off the record I asked her to state it for the record. So she repeated herself, "Because the Penn Band came we won today." I was sort of in shock she said that, but what a quote.
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Now here's where the conflict of interest comes into play. To give some background, the last time the Penn Band came to a women's lacrosse game was the Wednesday April 2 game against Johns Hopkins. I wrote the preview for that game, and I interviewed Manson for it. Being the idiot that I was, I told her that the Penn Band was coming and then asked her what her thoughts were. She was pretty impressed and said she remembered the band coming the previous year for the Princeton game in which the Quakers clinched the Ivy title and how it made that game really special. After the interview I told her I was in the band and that I'd probably play with them (eventually I didn't since no one else could cover the game for the DP).
I wanted to run her quotes about the Band, but my editors wouldn't let me since they said it was a conflict of interest since I had brought it up myself, and she responded to my theoretically biased question. Now I didn't really argue that too much, and retrospectively it makes sense.
Flash forward to yesterday. Before I even wrote my story I went up to my editor and explained the situation with Manson's most recent pro-Penn Band quote. However, he disallowed it yet again, saying even though she was completely unprompted to mention the band, she still knew that I was in the band and that potentially skewered her quote.
I didn't quite understand this logic since the previous time he had told me it couldn't run because I had brought up the band on my own. But then again, he has the final say, so I declined to write it in.
I also wrote an email on the band's list serve asking the journalists of the band whether they thought there was a conflict of interest. A band alum who works at a national media outlet yet wanted anonymity agreed with my editor that this might appear to be a conflict of interest since I am a member of the band. So if a professional journalist agrees, that's enough for me.
But even if it didn't make it to print, it's still true that at least one women's lacrosse player thinks we're the reason they earned potentially the biggest win in program history.
But it gets even better. At the time Manson said it, I thought maybe she was joking, or just reacting instinctively, something temporal. But last night after I sent her a facebook comment congratulating her on the win, she responded by reiterating her comment about the band: "I'm telling you on the record it is all because of the Penn Band," she wrote.
Moral of the story: The Band, despite all the s*** it can get sometimes from various sources, is still appreciated by athletes. And that's what matters in the end.
NB: Thanks to Brian for catching the mistakes up to the --- line. But I'm sure there's still some out there! Who wants more nickels!
Monday, April 28, 2008
The Penn Band wins a Women's Lacrosse game
Wednesday, April 9, 2008
Penn Band meets the workplace
What a game it was last night! Two milestones were achieved:
1. It was the first time in over a decade (not since 1997) that the national championship game of the men's NCAA tournament had gone into overtime (very exciting!), and
2. It was the first time since I've been filling out these silly brackets (c. 2002) that I a) shelled out money to participate AND b) won (half the pool)
I went back and read the fine print, and it revealed that I was entitled to half of the winnings! I'd steadily held first place since the beginning of the tournament, but my UCLA/UNC fantasy bumped me down to (a still respectable) 5th place finish in the graduated points system that many brackets utilize. However, I was still head and shoulders above anyone else in terms of total number of games chosen correctly (47-- how does this number compare to other pools? For perspective, there were only 35-40 people in mine).
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And now...it's the first installment of a semi-regular series! "Penn Band and the Workplace," or something not quite as lame. Basically, I plan to mention the instances when something I learned as a bando has shockingly paid off in The Real World.
Photo: Wired.com (no individual photographer attribution), 2007.
Although this year's Quakers squad wasn't able to win the league's automatic bid and send 29 of us (plus Greer? Minus Greer? I can never remember) on an extended Spring Break, here is a potentially useful tidbit of information for the freshmen (and newbies...I'm looking at you, Class of 2012): claiming that you made your bracket selections based on your "past NCAA tournament experience" gives you total street cred (if you have a dorky job, like me). Acceptably dorky people/positions include, but are not limited to:
- graduate students (any field, but statistics is probably the perfect one)
- researchers (hard science, soft science, post-docs, lackeys)
- health professionals (physicians, nurses, MAs, health educators)
- computer people (programmers, IT)
- engineers
- people in the financial sector who are forbidden to interact with clients (awkward social interactions)
Why is this gem a winner? Because, short of being this guy, everyone will correctly assume that your "tournament experience" was as a member of a band, dance team, cheerleading squad, or as your school's mascot...but they'll respect you for it regardless! You could be as inept as Palo Alto's infamous tree at playing the bracket numbers, but you can stroke your bruised ego with a passing mention of tourneys gone by. A sample interaction (based closely on an actual conversation):
Dr. Stat: "Lisa...nice picks!"
Me: "Thanks, Dr. Stat!"
D.S. "What's your secret? I went down in flames the other day!"
Me: "Well, being a member of my college band, I had the opportunity to go to three NCAA tournaments, so I saw a lot of unbelievable things unfold right in front of me. Last year in Lexington, we caught the end of the Stanford/UW-Milwaukee game before ours, and Stanford ended up losing, despite the 7'0" twins! I think they're highly overrated, so I picked them to lose. It turns out they didn't, but I knew ("based on my tournament experience" heavily implied) they very well could."
D.S. "Well, I hope you win!" (fabrication)
Of course, if you make many correct predictions, they might assume you've figured out a way to beat the house!
Take-home message from these ramblings: play up your first-hand involvement in college athletics! It doesn't matter if you're intentionally vague about your actual participation because, well, people will put two and two together. And you will be perceived as too cool for school among your fellow nerds.
Saturday, April 5, 2008
Thank You Seniors!
as read on Saturday, March 9th at the Palestra ("Senior Night")
At this time, we would like to recognize the graduating members of the Penn Band for their dedication and loyalty to Penn Athletics. Not only do they show up at every men's and women's home game, but they travel to virtually all of the away games as well. And they are more than just the band; they are fans, too. In a hostile Ivy gym, they are often the loudest and most vocal show of support.
In supporting Penn and Penn Athletics, some of these students have logged more miles than some Heads of State - bus trips all over the North East to all of the Ivies, plus trips to such venues as
an Ancient History major,
with a minor in French,
secretary of the band’s honor society,
from
Megan Brindle.
a dual degree candidate with majors in American History and Political Science,
past low brass section leader and current president of the band honor society,
from Harrisville PA,
Melanie Foreman.
a Cognitive Science major,
With minors in French and Psychology,
from
Shannon Fouse.
a dual degree candidate with majors in Chemistry and Nanoscale Material Science Engineering,
with minors in Creative Writing and Mathematics,
past president and current drum major,
from
Rebecca Goldman.
a dual degree candidate with majors in Management and Bioengineering,
with a minor in Mathematics,
from Ellicottt City MD,
Barry Huang.
a Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering major,
with a minor in Music,
past saxophone section leader,
from
Janelle Johnson.
an English major
With a minor in Cinema Studies,
past equipment manager,
from
Annabelle Lyons.
a dual degree candidate with majors in International Relations and European History,
With a minor in Hispanic Studies,
chair of the band’s CD committee,
from Newbury MA,
Sofie Owen.
On saxophone,
a Biological Basis of Behavior major,
from
past chair of the band’s honor society,
Brooke Prashker.
On flute,
an Architecture Design major,
With a minor in Economics,
from
Raimy Schutzman.
On bass drum,
a dual degree candidate with majors in World History, Finance, and Accounting
with a minor in French,
past percussion section leader,
from
Sunaina Seelam.
On bass drum,
a Science Technology and Society major
with a concentration in Business and Information Technology
past percussion section leader,
from
Elaine Simeon.
On snare drum,
a Bioengineering major
with minors in Economics and Mathematics,
from
Sagar Singh.
a dual degree candidate with majors in Finance and Management,
past percussion section leader,
from Tualatin OR,
Connie Wong.
Let’s hear it for your Penn Band seniors!
Sunday, January 27, 2008
EOTY Awards
Yet another insight into the querkiness of the Penn Band. At the end of the year (EOTY) we have a gathering to give out awards. Most are sarcastic and funny. I got a great award this year (Most Valuable Bando!), and my section - along with the chops - got a great award, too. (There are army men hidden all over 322 S. 42nd.) Good times were had by all. Thanks to the old board for all you time. You weren't appreciated enough, and I am sure the next one will not be either.
*Fanfare End of the Year Awards, 2007*
The 43rd Annual John Baker Tossed Cookies Award- Lauren Fikse for redecorating the living room at 233.
The 40th Melons Award – Ellen Williams.
The 110th Annual Dealing with "stuff" Award – Annabelle Lyons.
The 12th Annual Ilena Olster Award- Rachel Mathisen for her outstanding contributions to the Bitchiness of the band.
The BFL Rookie of the Year Award- Stephen Abrams dash Downey. For his fearless physical assault in the name of football.
The 4th Annual Jevelyn Award- Skeast Girl (Cindy and Andrea) for their inability to be separated for even one song.
The Third Reich United Nations Award- Vicky "Colossus" Parysek. Because you're not really Polish.
The best-kept, shiniest, nicest instrument award- Mike Jarell.
The 11th Annual Clarissa Fesler Verbosity Award- Gordon Watkins, because none of us can get a word in edgewise.
The 17th Annual Susan Ross Memorial Award- Robert DeSocio
for his tireless commitment to the scanner.
The 3rd Annual "You know it's cold if he's wearing pants" Award- Tom Hensle.
The "You Graduated Morons" Creepy Old Guy Award – Jeanne and Erica.
The 1st annual "Penniless Sitar Player" Award- Jaci Rifkin.
The Most Valuable Bando Award- Mel Foreman, for everything she's done.
The 109plus-or-minus-one-th Annual Zookeeper Award- Becca Goldman for not killing us all.
4th Annual Mayuko Endo Stream of Consciousness Award: Joe Catania.
The 1st annual Dundee for Whitest Sneakers: Alex Kenney.
1st Annual bring your friends award: Ray Fung, for causing the percussion section to run out of instruments.
4th Annual "Evil Bob Kennedy" Award: Alvin Cheng, for always being so mean.
12th Annual Honorary Bando Award: Jose the bus driver.
The 11th Annual Joe Bando Award- Kyle Pickett for most embodying the characteristics of one's everyday Joe.
6th Annual Worst Excuse for missing band award: Jen Johnson, Dan Ross, Raimy Schutzman, and Sasha Renninger for just being too damn lazy to make it to rehearsals.
25th Annual Captain Francis "Gary" Powers Spy Award: The Brass sections for infiltrating Cornell territory and making it out alive.
3rd Annual too much information award: Zach Klitzman, for letting us all know about his random boners.
Most Likely to Have His or Her Name Mispronounced: Devanshi Jalan.
The 2nd Annual Product of Bandcest Award: Katie Palusci, For her inevitable contribution to the propagation of the Bando species.
Wednesday, January 16, 2008
Running Disney LiveBlog
I'm not sure how many people read this blog but don't read the Band's listserv, Oxymoron, but just in case, here are the blog posts I wrote while on our Disney trip. I'd have posted them in real time, but I didn't have Internet access in Orlando.
Day 1: The Penn Band . . . ON A PLANE!!!
Brian Greenberg here, intrepid alumni blogger, reporting live from the All Star Music resort in Walt Disney World. The kids are recharging for their first full Disney day, the wife has passed out while examining tomorrow's myriad of dining options, I'm writing this, and most of the band is in the piano-shaped pool playing Marco Polo (at last check, Adam Sherr's daughters were winning handily).
The day began at the Philadelphia International Airport, where 30 bandos and 20 "chaperones" (hah!) met around 7:30 AM for their 9:30 flight. Most folks had either coffee to wake them up, or iPods to keep them from waking up. Carly had a big, furry Russian ski hat. Still not sure what that's about.
The flight was uneventful. Adam and my son, Avery, had a Sudoku race in the in-flight magazine. I'd love to report that Avery won, but Adam did prevail. It was pretty close, though.
In Orlando, we waited on what I hope will be the longest line of the trip, while the Disney Welcome Center processed hundreds of people at once. Eventually, we made it to the hotel where we once again waited, this time for all of our room keys to be ready. Joe passed the time by learning how to talk without cursing, in deference to the children of Disneyworld (in particular, the ones we brought along).
From there it was a buffet dinner at Hollywood & Vine (the first test of our meal plan), then some free time, and then the Fantasmic show at Disney's Hollywood Studios (f.k.a MGM). Noah informed me that my credibility was on the line, since I had told everyone it was an awesome show. I haven't seen him since it ended, so I don't know the verdict yet, but I can tell you that it certainly met my high expectations.
That's the update for now. Until tomorrow. . .
Day 2 - The Band of a Thousand Dances
Howdy, folks. Brian Greenberg, intrepid alumni blogger, here again for a daily dose of Penn Band in Disneyworld news.
Today saw the band basically scatter to the winds, with different groups going in different directions to do their own thing, before we all get back together tomorrow for a Princess Breakfast & our command performance. But alas, I'm getting ahead of myself.
I can tell you the most about the travels of "the three families" (they being Greenberg, Gupta & Sherr - sounds rather like a law firm, no?). We started our day in Animal Kingdom with the safari, in hopes of seeing animal feeding time. We didn't see any feeding, but we did see lots of animals, including a white rhino that almost charged our bus. Also in Animal Kingdom, we saw the Lion King show (big thumbs up), Finding Nemo - the Musical (big thumbs down), and It's Tough to be a Bug (Meh...). Then we headed to Epcot, where we saw the newly renovated Spaceship Earth (now no longer predicting a future in which people communicate electronically over long distances), the Finding Nemo ride (also a big thumbs up), Turtle Talk with Crush (amazing technology, but none of our kids got called on, so the show wasn't so great), and Soarin' (simulated hang gliding - a big hit with everyone but Adam, who's not a fan of heights - real or simulated).
We ran into HHTT at dinner, who's group had abandoned him for their second steak meal in a row (way to make that meal plan pay, folks!), so he accompanied us to Test Track, which was a fun ride, but the wait was too long. Next was Illuminations, Epcot's fireworks show, which proves that Disney can basically turn any location into a production number with enough money, special effects and pyrotechnics. After that, Tom rejoined some bandos for their trip through Soarin', while we walked "around the world," stopping only to watch a draw bridge go up & down and for a late night snack of French crepes.
As for the rest of the band, stories I heard suggest a good day as well. Some were in Epcot all day, checking out "Honey, I Shrunk the Audience," which come to think of it, might explain how Noah lost all that weight. Test Track got good reviews as well, as did Mission Space. A bunch were in MGM (Beauty and the Beast got a fair to thumbs down review...); but Tower of Terror and Rockin Roller coaster were hits. Oh, and the award for Most Dedicated Grandfather most definitely goes to Greer, who went on It's a Small World *TWICE*, at the request of his granddaughter. He did give rave reviews about Philharmagic, though, which is a 3-D movie of Mickey conducting an orchestra. Talk about gravitating to stuff you can relate to, huh Greer?
Anyway, everyone had a magical day (or so we kept getting told by the Disney folks), and now it's onward to tomorrow, when we all pray that the rain holds out and the Disney marathon doesn't mess with our travel plans too much.
And for those who are starting to feel sorry they didn't come along, here's a little consolation: call tomorrow morning is 7:45AM, and it's for breakfast with Princesses, not a performance.
Day 3 - The Penn Band Goes Downtown (Disney, that is)
Day 3 started with a 7:45AM call. Or, as those running the Disney marathon call it, sleeping in late. We boarded a special character breakfast bus to the Ticket & Transportation center ("special" defined here as "waits in traffic like every other damn bus..."). At any rate, we finally made it to Norway for our Princess Breakfast at around 9:15. I'm happy to report that despite meeting the Low Brass section, Belle still identifies "The Beast" as a Disney character and Snow White can still legitimately keep her name. Mulan, on the other hand, was all about the flirting - trying on HHTT's "spy glasses" and asking others to "join her army.". (Editor's Note: I'm told this is less weird if you're one of the three people who saw the Mulan movie).
Anyway, the surprise sexual tension of the meal came in the person of Alexander, the Norwegian waiter, who not only saved the day by scaring up pancakes and waffles for my kids when none existed on the menu, but also spent a fair amount of time going over the bill with Vicky ("going over the bill" defined here as actually going over the bill). And so, despite encouragement to get Alexander's "digits," Vicky passed. The next suggestion was that maybe HHTT should try for some digits, on the off chance that he was more Alexander's type - not that there's anything wrong with that (Editor's Note #2 - you'll have to forgive me, this is what happens when you blog right after watching Seinfeld). Anyway, at the end of the meal, it was left to me to get Alexander's manager's number in the form of the restaurant's business card. Still no word if the back of that card ever wound up with Alexander's digits or not.
From breakfast, it was the monorail to the Magic Kingdom, where several band members met up to encourage my son, Avery, to go on Space Mountain. Not that he needed encouragement. He informed Koosh that he only made the 44" cutoff because of his hair. Koosh, of course, had no such concern, although he did have the opposite problem - concern that he was too tall to ride, and that a low hanging crossbar could make the entire hair discussion sadly irrelevant.
Then there was lunch, where I discovered that Adam Sherr is a Celine Dion fan. It's a long story, and I'll let him fill in the details.
Suffice to say, it ended with "you're going to put that on the blog, aren't you...". Oh yes, Adam - oh, yes.
By 5:30, the band was back in it's fabled Maroon & Khaki (made famous by that 1898 song, "Hurrah for the Maroon and the Khaki.". But I digress..). Anyway, aside from a brief threat of rain, which was quickly taken care of by the Disney people (these people really do control the customer experience out here), we hit the stage at 6:30pm. Our audience consisted of the four families (Greenberg, Gupta and Sherr + the Cheeseman crew), as well as Bjorn, Melody Joy Kramer, and that typical crowd that gathers whenever a Disney announcer says over the loudspeaker, "And now, ladies and gentlemen..."
The band formed a traditional semi-circle, with the exception of the drumline, which was behind the band, obscured from their view of the conductor, outside of the spotlights (to make music reading difficult), and playing the sub-par instruments provided by the Disney people. As we've come to expect of the drumline, there were no complaints ("no" defined here as "lots").
Despite these minor difficulties, the performance went off without a hitch. Well, OK - one hitch. But it was one of those songs the band doesn't know too well. A little tune called The University of Pennsylvania Band March. Something about "tempo" and "playing together.". I was a little confused. At any rate, when Koosh posts the postage stamp-sized Flash video, you can see and hear for yourself on pennband.net.
So after that, it was all over. Except for the time when Joe and Noah attempted to pick up a high school dance team with no shirts on (Joe and Noah had no shirts, not the dance team). And once again, we were all impressed with Disney's customer service, who improved everyone's experience by getting them to rerobe (Editor's Note #3: no, that's not a word, but it should be).
Thus concluded day three. Day four promises the opportunity to get on all the rides and shows that we missed thus far, and to spend as much as possible on the prepaid meal plan cards. Wish us all luck!
Day 4 - Ow, My Aching Feet
Another day of "scatter and do what you want," so not much to report in the Band Blogging sense. GG&S conquered the Magic Kingdom, hitting just about every ride once, and several of them multiple times (I'm looking at you, Buzz Lightyear). We joined up with the Cheeseman crew for dinner in Cinderella's castle, where Adam got chased down a hallway by two giant mice. Again, I'll let him explain.
The only other thing to note is the rain, which came rather impressively in the early afternoon, but stopped by early evening, leaving nice enough weather for an awesome fireworks show over the castle, but leaving behind puddles big enough to sell a couple of pair of Mickey Crocs to kids with wet feet.
As for the rest of the band, we were up so early, moving so fast, and left so late that I didn't even get to ask anyone else what they did yesterday. I'll leave those stories to my fellow bloggers.
One last note before signing off from Orlando: those of you who wanted to go on this trip but couldn't, you missed out on a great time. Those who could go, but decided not to, screwed up big time. The Disney attitude, atmosphere, and entertainment value is the professional equivalent of what the Penn Band does at the college level. Being here is always fun; being here with the Penn Band was a extra special bonus. If you get another chance to do it, take it. 'Nuff said.
On a related, personal note, the Greenberg family would like to publicly thank Greer, Adam and Koosh for inviting us along - it was fantastic. We'd also like to thank the rest of the band. These trips are mostly about making memories for the kids (and their parents), and without necessarily trying, you guys did that for us this week as well.
See you all at basketball homecoming and, of course, in OxyWorld...
Sunday, December 16, 2007
A cool video to show your family this winter break
I always had difficulty explaining to my extended family what interested me in becoming part of a scramble band. Surely it had to be the horrendous khakis and preppy sweaters, right?
Like many college band folk, I'd joined band back in elementary school and had never been humiliated enough to leave. I even won the "Best Marcher" award at the end of my freshman year marching band season-- resulting in my aunt collapsing with laughter over Thanksgiving dinner at what a loser I must be.
Most of my family knew that I'd had the opportunity to travel to some cool places, go to a few NCAA tournaments, and have a moderately successful social life (comparative to high school) as a Penn Band member. They could see that I was happy, so they too were happy. Then came the Great Mascot Scandal of '06...
The road trip was Brown/Yale, and we'd just played a Brown team hungry for revenge over the previous year's blowout. We ended up with the W, packed up our instruments, and loaded everything on to the bus...but there were some obvious omissions, most noticeably the Quaker mascot costume. We were staying with the Yale bandos that night, so we had no choice but to leave and drive to New Haven before it got too late.
Thankfully, Athletics had held on to our older Quaker mascot costume from the previous year-- we ended up making it to the NCAA tournament that year and had the old costume at the ready. We all figured that a Brown-affiliated person had to have been behind the stealing, but no progress was made into any kind of investigation...until six months later when a few of us Board members received a strange e-mail from an obviously fake address, which linked to this video (screen shot shown above, can't figure out how to embed videos yet).
Let's just say that this was one of the more bizarre things that we had to deal with as a Board that year. Shortly after that I received an accusatory e-mail from the then President of the Brown Band, stating that we should basically look within our own organization for the source of theft (yeah, right). The e-mail (legitimately) mentioned an amendment to the Brown Band's Wikipedia entry, "The Brown Band also has a long tradition of stealing other schools' valuable items," which I found hilarious (and I KNOW WHO YOU ARE-- but your secret stays with me to the grave). The missing mascot costume was un-mysteriously and anonymously returned after Penn Athletics intervened and officially filed a claim.
Long story short, the video always provides a good deal of amusement in my family, and it's a nice example of how college kids can creatively play pranks on their rivals without having to resort to petty ad hominem attacks (although, let's face it, plenty of that goes on, too).
Wednesday, December 12, 2007
Baking Day
So how awesome is it that I randomly decided to spend an entire day baking and half the band shows up at my apartment? Well, maybe not quite half the band, but I will say this: bandos are great about supporting crazy get-togethers (especially when they involve free food).
Of course, I don't think any of us got the optimal amount of studying accomplished (or really any).
Here's to finals and winter break!
<3
