Indoor percussion team takes 7th at championships

 
By Seamus Saunders
Contributing Writer

The Brentwood High School indoor percussion team placed seventh among nine schools at the Mid Continent Color Guard Association Championships on April 2 at Ozark High School. It was the last of three competitions for the season.

This year 13 students participated. They had three new coaches and a lot of support from parents. Head coach Scott Waggoner led the team with assistance from parent Me’Shel Riedel and former Brentwood student Remy Cognac. The way Waggoner describes it, coaching drum line is like no other sport. He had a vision in his head and had to translate it into a four-minute show, which involved writing the music and creating the movements.

“I had words and kind of stick drawings,” Waggoner said. “For every minute out on the floor moving, it takes 24 hours of rehearsal time to learn and perfect.”

With only 243 students, it is surprising that Brentwood High School can even field a drum line, much less have about 6 percent of the student body participate. Still, size is an issue because the team did not have enough participants for a marching band in the fall. Bigger schools have marching bands, which allow them to build chemistry and march together for months before the indoor percussion season starts.

As the only school in the 2A sports class that competed in the MCCGA, Brentwood was the smallest school at the championships. The second smallest was Hollister, which has 486 students. But BHS still managed to beat two schools, Hazelwood East and Smith-Cotton, each of which has 1,400 students.

“It’s tough to not compare ourselves to other bigger schools,” said senior Lindsey Jones, “but when you realize how small our school is, it’s amazing.”

Despite its size, having new coaches and finishing last at the MCCGA championships in 2015, Brentwood took steps in the right direction this year.

“Starting with a new coach is always hard, and we started from scratch,” said junior Jake Burkhardt. “But compared to other years I have done drum line, in the end I felt confident, I learned a lot and I was proud of our performance. I could never say that before. I am really excited for next year.”

2015-16 BHS indoor percussion team
Head coach: Scott Waggoner
Assistant coaches: Me’Shel Riedel, Remy Cognac
Seniors: Lindsey Jones, Noah Lee, Alex Riedel, Sam Tilton, Jill Yancey
Juniors: Jake Burkhardt, Blake Lawrence, Courtney Ketterer, Luke Tilton, Mickey Torres, Kasia White
Freshmen: Gabe Lawrence, Caitlin Souers

MCCGA Percussion Championships
Ozark High School, April 2

Brentwood was among 49 schools from Missouri and Illinois at the championships. Following is how it placed in the Percussion Scholastic Regional division:
1. Odessa, 82.15 points
2. Hazelwood Central, 81.20
3. Hollister, 78.20
4. Illinois Valley Central, 75.80
5. Hillcrest, 75.65
6. Reeds Spring, 73.80
7. Brentwood, 69.65
8. Smith-Cotton, 68.55
9. Hazelwood East, 62.25

All photos by Seamus Saunders