In the Navy...


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Posted by Farah on December 19, 2000 at 13:12:00:

Since it is hard to explain what a typical day in the Navy Band is for me, I will give examples of a "typical week"

But first, for a typical year schedule:
The US Navy Band in DC rotates about 40 people per week for ceremonies and we have 25 that are "permanent stage." Permanent stage people are determined by seniority. We always have a concert band performing except during the week of christmas, new years, and a couple of weeks during the summer before we begin our fall schedule.

The rotating people are split up in to 2 groups (20 for "A" band and 20 for "B" band) and in no way are determined by seniority it's just simply to determine which rotating band will be on stage that week. For example, last week, the 20 members from A band were on stage with the 25 permanent stage people to give the Christmas concert, while the people in B band covered ceremonies. The next concert we give, B band will be on stage while A band covers ceremonies--you get the picture.

Ceremonies include (but are not limited to): Playing for dinner parties (Patriotic Opener (Pat-O)), funerals for fallen officers, morning colors (once a month), wreath laying at the Navy Memorial, Pentagon arrivals, CNO arrivals. We do mostly funerals. When the temperature is freezing or below, there are no funerals--called "freeze outs". I'm sure many of you have experienced the valve freezing moments in extreme weather. Besides, when the band is wearing heavy gloves, the woodwind players can't play anyway.

Ceremonial Weekly schedule:
On a moderately busy week, the band may perform 6 funerals, 1 Pat-O, and maybe a wreath. Now, on funerals, the band is only about 15 people, so the other 3 or 4 don't have to work that day but may work on the next funeral. Pat-Os an wreath typically uses the entire band. So I'd say that's about a 16 hour work week. Not including travel and "wait around" time which would equal about 2 or 3 hours a week.

Fringe benifits: On Pat-O's, we are usually fed sandwitches, sodas, sometimes catered meals depending upon the type of dinner party and whether the host wants to feed us or not. But they almost ALWAYS have cookies which I have, from time to time, wrapped up in a napkin and placed delicately inside my horn case for later consumption. :)

So, How is it decided who works what job? For every job each person in the band does, we get something called "man-hours" Lets say there are 6 funerals this week: 3 on monday, 1 on tuesday, and 2 on friday. My buddy-horn player Dave who is on my rotation. (Hi Dave!) does the 3 on Monday. He gets 7 man-hours for that ONE day! You can bet that he won't have to work the rest of the week while I will have to do the 2 on friday and 1 on tuesday. Now, I never check my man hours because it is slightly taboo to do this (Why do you want to know your man hours?! Working too much, are you?) and I don't really care anyway.

Like I said, this is a moderately-busy week. A reallllly busy week would be 6 funerals, 2 Pat-Os, a wreath, a CNO arrival and a weekend job. That would be about 25 hours. I haven't had one of those in about 4 months, literally. I average about 10 hours a week of work.

On stage week:
We would have typically 3 two-hour rehearsals, then the concert. This comes out to about 12-13 man hours per week. I really am guessing here, but I do know that if you are a permanent stage person and a Pentagon comes along when the band needs more than 20 people in the band to do this ceremony, you WILL get put on it. Pentagons are cool anyway and suck much less that rainy funerals do. We also tour about 30 days out of the year. Tour is a blast (although hard work), you get tons of man hours, and goof-off in other cities. I've been told that this is the time you really get to know the band members and go shopping (if you like that kind of stuff). Of course, none of us *ever* drink beer on tour {snicker}.

Then you have your collateral duties. These are jobs you volunteer for that can last you about a year at 5 hours a week. This doesn't count in determining your man hours. If you want to make rank, you get yourself a collateral duty. I am now on the Finale team at the navy band and what I do is put our music on Finale so the music is legible--something we badly need! A good deal of our older music is hand written, so, BINGO, a great place to start. This takes me about 5-10 hours a week (when I really get started) but the great thing is I can do this work at home. Which is incredibly nice.

To wrap this up. I really don't work all that much. When I'm not working, I'm practicing so I can sound good, and then I just plain-jane sit on my butt. I do go to the gym for swimming about 3 hours a week which is all I need, I don't complain, and I try to have fun at work. It's great when something goes wrong because you just laugh about it on the bus. You have NO idea what kind of silly stuff 4 star admirals do. Of course, they've put in their time, so they do deserve some screw-up room.

I go to work sometimes only once or twice a week, make sure my uniform and shoes looks nice, try to be pleasant and anytime we have a visitor, I try to go out of my way to welcome them. Practice hard and you'll have a job like it. I love it. Farah


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