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Chrys Weedon<\/strong> | Entertainment Editor<\/span><\/p>\n Once a year, flocks of well-dressed high schoolers walk in groups through campus, untethered and without a tour guide. That\u2019s because every Spring Term, Western hosts high school bands from across the state of Oregon to compete in preparation for their state competition. Outside of league festivals, the event at Western is one of the bigger festivals in Oregon. This year\u2019s competition took place over two days, April 4-5. <\/span><\/p>\n Josh Mendoza, a sophomore music major and president of the band council, is in charge of the band festival this year. Mendoza kept in contact with band directors, scheduled the bands and coordinated the volunteers. \u201cIt\u2019s a good experience for high schoolers to compete,\u201d said Mendoza.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cI didn\u2019t do it alone. I have Dr. Nail\u2019s help, and (Josiah Glaser),\u201d commented Mendoza. Glaser was the student responsible for the competition last school year.<\/span><\/p>\n Mendoza headed the competition this year because he is the president of Western\u2019s band council. <\/span><\/p>\n \u201cUsually the band council takes charge of the festival. It\u2019s been like that for the past few years,\u201d said Mendoza about the festival, \u201conce I\u2019m a band director, I\u2019m going to have to host the festival for my school. It\u2019s a learning opportunity. It gets you connected with band directors across the state, it gets my name out there for networking. It\u2019s just an all around a really good experience.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n Usually, Western invites 32 high school bands to compete. This year is slightly different, however: 36 bands were included in the festival. <\/span><\/p>\n \u201c(The bands) kind of move from place to place; they\u2019ll show up, we\u2019ll take them to storage \u2026 and then they\u2019ll go warm up \u2026\u201d described Mendoza. \u201cThey\u2019ll do their performance, where they\u2019ll get critiqued by judges.\u201d After being critiqued, each band will go with one of their judges to a clinic, where they\u2019ll be given pointers and the opportunity to practice with the judge. Their judge will also tell them ways they can improve or things they may want to try doing differently when they go to competition.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cIn Oregon, there is six different (school) classifications, there\u2019s 1A, 2A, 3A, 4A, 5A and 6A,\u201d said Mendoza. Each band gets judged on a variety of different things. <\/span><\/p>\n \u201cTheir quality of sound, that\u2019s out of 30 (points), technique is out of 30, musicality is out of 30 and then other factors which would be appearance, their choice of music\u2026 the total score is out of 100,\u201d Mendoza read off the scoring sheet. Each band is evaluated by three different judges, who all add up their scores. In the end, each group receives a score out of 300.<\/span><\/p>\n Choice of music can be important in terms of score. <\/span><\/p>\n \u201cIf you\u2019re a really high level band, you want to be challenged\u201d Mendoza said. If the pieces chosen by a band aren\u2019t seen as challenging enough to the judges, it will negatively affect their scores. Each band has 30 minutes maximum to perform, and they are required to be playing music for at least 18 of those minutes.<\/span><\/p>\n Mendoza closed stating that, \u201cIf people want to get involved in (the festival), they can come volunteer.\u201d Willing volunteers can contact Dr. Ike Nail at naili@wou.edu<\/a> or Josh Mendoza at jmendoza17@wou.edu<\/a> if they are interested in volunteering next year. <\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n