In a world full of music and melodies El Rancho High School’s drumline is making noise with their latest show in their recent competition season. Remaining undefeated this entire season, their show will make your heart skip a beat.
Winter Drumline, often simply referred to as “Drumline” differs from the usual Marching band in the sense that while Marching Band occurs in the fall season and takes place outdoors, Drumline is indoors and takes place in the winter-spring seasons. These shows are concert-type performances that are performed in an ensemble.
El Rancho’s show titled “For ManKind” is a dynamic show beginning calm but alluring and slowly but steadily progresses to the climax where all the instruments come together in unison. While this is happening, John F. Kennedy’s famous Moon Landing speech is played in the background which then transitions into the audio from the monumental day of the moon landing. This imagery creates an immersive listening experience for everyone around.
While the program is seeing major success as of late, this hasn’t always been the case. Ever since coming back from the COVID-19 pandemic, the Marching Dons as a whole have had trouble gathering dedicated members to form a strong team. But this school year proved to be different.
This was a sudden skyrocket in members for all areas of the program such as Drumline, Colorguard, Percussion, etc. The team is slowly but surely making its way back up the ladder and getting stronger by the day.
And the dedication from the student does not go unnoticed either. Band Director John Rush states “To get them to convert from mallet instrument to keyboard instruments, it’s a lot of work, and a lot of dedication on their part too, it’s great.”
Rush, who began teaching at El Rancho in 2022, has become an important asset to the program, being a catalyst to its success. Starting the program from scratch has been no easy task but it seems Rush has done it with ease.
Although this in itself is not surprising, having 30 years of teaching experience under his belt, it sure is working to his advantage.
Rush says that his passion for music began in high school and has never stopped. Throughout his junior and senior years of high school, Rush was a drumline captain and wrote many cadences for his school. After graduation, he was asked to return as an alumni to be a coach of his school’s drumline. This type of passion for music is the driving force in the success of this year’s team.
To anyone interested in joining the program Rush leaves one final message “Not just drumline, but the program in general, it’s growing and it’s getting better and better every year, so no experience necessary, come and have some fun.”
