Band Unity Activities

[~*Not~a~Stalker~*]

So as the new drum major, I really want some fun but not too distracting activities for band camp. The majority of the band will be new freshmen and Jr. High kids this year, so it's especially important. I've heard a lot of bands doing dress up days, like spirit week, superhero days, etc. Any ideas?

[fruple]

Dress up days are fun. We have toga days, funny hat days, switch clothes with a section mate days, etc. Making the sections compete against each other is a good idea too. Like, whichever section has the best spirit that week or best clothes or whatever gets like free icecream.

Other fun things are like playing ultimate frisbee, or just really spontaneous things. The one thing I thought was cool about our director last year was that at random times he would just tag the drum major and yell "You're it!". We'd play like freeze tag or ships across the ocean or whatever for physical fitness.

Another cool thing is spending the night at the school. Like, get some sleeping bags and camp out in the band and orchestra rooms. You can chill with everyone, eat, whatever. Having nerf wars in the school at night is great for bonding because it's something only the band does here. This can be done during band camp, or like the last day. Make sure the school lets you use the showers.

Rent out a pavilion at a park or something and have a potluck. Or save up money and have the band go to a water park and have a picnic after. These are really fun and really help bond people. Have a giant bonfire with everyone, mess around until it's dark, then have everyone gather around the fire. Have the leaders and directors talk about their goals for the band, what they want to happen, whatever can be inspirational. Get all the seniors to tell their favorite memories from past seasons, words of advice, what they want to accomplish. Every rookie (well, most) wants to make the seniors last year a great one. Stress that fact. This would take an extra day, but whatever. It really helps bring everyone together.

Other band camp activities, water balloon fights. Or like spray people who mess around with a squirt gun, then just start a war. Take a few hours off during the hot part of the day and eat and watch drumcorp videos, or even just music related videos. Elimination basics are pretty fun too. Have the last people standing give their instruments to the directors, and allow them to critique the directors. It's really a good time.

I'll try to think of more that you can actually do during band camp, but those are some pretty fun ones that I remember. If you have a good leadership team, have them bring their section over to their house during lunch break and cook for them all. That was always fun.

[Euphoniums PWN]

Some lame parent complained when we were "initiated" my freshman year, so we're not allowed to do fun things like shaving cream and silly string anymore. But sometimes we do various unity activities like socials and mixers and stuff like that. We attempted to organize a Halo tournament, but that got shot down for some reason.

I think having section leaders/other staff cook for their sections is a good idea - it shows that leaders have to take on responsibility, not just boss people around.

[290Piika]

We actually had some band camp games last year.

One is definitely a drill-down. You can't have band camp without a drill-down (which is where everyone's in a block and people get eliminated as they mess up commands; try confusing words. "Band ten hat", etc.)

Uh, let's see, what else...

There was a sort of game where when a silly command (act like a pirate, act like bacon, row a boat, etc) was called, you had to get with a group of people and pose.

Water balloons on the practice field. Frisbee, too. Bandos looove it.

A game where you have a sheet between two competitors to learn everyone's name. When the sheet's taken down, whoever says the other person's name correctly and first wins.

Of course, a band potluck (which we have at the end of band camp) in the MPR/cafeteria is always a lovely idea. The band parents get together and make us hamburgers and such. :]

On the Tuesday night rehearsal before Halloween, seniors are allowed to come in Halloween costumes. I guess that doesn't help for band camp, but yeah.

[bluescalesdragon]

...Hmmm....we're not allowed to have that much fun at band camp. Except for that one epic water balloon fight my freshman year. It lasted all of 20 seconds. We didn't have enough balloons.

Now we have to start all our water fights during lunch break.

[Deleted]

Let the low brass and percussion play basketball or football (depending on the numbers). Two-hand touch is probably preferable to tackle.

[~*Not~a~Stalker~*]

Thank you guys for all the ideas! I really want the new kids to feel like they belong, and I think some of these things would be a good way to get that started...I know how much it sucks coming to your first week of camp, terrified and alone and all that.

We actually do something sort of like a potluck, except we just gather at the park pavilion and eat ice cream. I was also thinking maybe a mini section Olympics would be fun, stretched across the week...like playing musical chairs one day, who can hold out a note the longest, etc. Of course, I still have to run all of this by my director. Haha.

[hansel2011]

We play football before practices and pretty much any free time we get. We all bond that way. One day someone started a foot ball game and everyone else got in on it, so now everyone including my bd plays. It is fun becuase we play tackle.Then we will all gang up on our bd and he gets it hard. lol. Fun times.

[sakura11irving]

In my band, we have two days where we sleep at the school and it's ONLY the rookies and the leadership people. We play games along with teaching how the rookies to march and better play their instrument.

We also have a tradition at band camp of square dancing!! On one night of band camp, we also are given a random item (per section) and we have to do a skit around it. I've received everything from Spam to ketchup and mustard squirters.

[gibson]

What we did at my band's band camp... was each night we had a different activity. One night was a team building movie. The next night was a game night. We played games to get to know each other, like Over the mountain... we also did the human not thing. And then we did a skit night. Where each section of the band had to make up a skit... but then if you wanted to get some friends together they could do their own too. I remember I was like in 10 different skits one year. Anyway, and on the last night of band camp we had a candle light ceromony to unite the band and become a family. It was a really good week.

[bluescalesdragon]

I'm thinking each section leader should organize a section T-shirt making day for their section this year for my band. Or just have a massive section t-shirt making night. Idk. The alto sax section, of course, wants to put A-S-S on their shirts. And I think I will definitely try to bring water balloons to band camp this year.