Our kids are making Hudson history! 79 of our students auditioned for the GISD All-District Band on Saturday (11/9) and 48 earned a chair, including 8 first chairs! This is a huge accomplishment and we are very proud. The hard work they put in, the courage they showed, and the growth they’ve experienced is tremendous. They absolutely dominated this contest. We love our Hawk Band kids!

Thank you so much to those who donated snacks and drinks for our PAT party, loaned games, served as a chaperone, and/or shared your student's fundraiser page to help us raise almost $40,000 at our fundraiser! We are so thankful to you all and have big plans for the funds. It's still not too late to keep sharing those fundraiser pages - we'd love to hit our big goal and still have the online donations open for another week.

Here's the link to share our online fundraiser.

We have one more big task to complete for this fundraiser - prizes! We will draw names for students who get to choose their prize based on entries they've earned for money raised and other participation avenues on Wednesday evening. Those students will be notified on Thursday and will need to be at Hudson on Friday morning at 8:20am in order to choose their prize from the prize cabinet. Every student who doesn't get to choose a prize will still go home with one on Friday!

The Fall Practice Challenge is well underway and students should be practicing 5-6 times per week in order to complete the challenge. Find the challenge paper here. It is due on December 17th in order for students to be invited to the Elf Pajama Dodgeball Extravaganza to celebrate achieving this practice goal.

For families making monthly payments towards their band fees, the next payment is due November 15th. This should be the 3rd payment made for those on this plan. Please check your student's Presto account to see outstanding band fee amounts, make online payments, etc. Don't forget about school-owned instrument usage fees if your student is using a school-owned instrument or using them daily as a percussionist. Thank you for your prompt attention to this matter!

Wind Symphony percussionists will stay after school on Wednesday, November 6th and walk to Heritage Park to take photos for the MFA program book. Please make sure to bring ALL SOLID BLACK clothing for the photos (you can change after school if you want.) We should be finished with the pictures by 5:30pm.

If you would like to serve as a chaperone for the Advanced Bands Epic Waters Festival trip on Tuesday, December 10th, please sign up here. There are a maximum of 18 chaperone spots available on a first come-first served basis. The chaperone cost is $45 and must be paid by November 22nd. You may be asked to ride a bus with us.

Students who have turned in their trip contract will now see the trip fee charged to their Presto account. All payments made last week are also reflected there. Final trip payments are due by November 22nd and ALL fall band fee and instrument usage fees must be paid in full by December 6th for students to attend the trip!

November

4 - Rehearsal

11 - Rehearsal

18 - Rehearsal

December

6 - Rehearsal

11 - Rehearsal

16 - Rehearsal (During WIN)

17 - Winter Concert

Every year, the Hudson Band adopts "angels" from the Salvation Army Angel Tree. We take a group of 8th grade students shopping over Thanksgiving break to help provide toys, clothes, and needed items to those in need. We will collect monetary donations from November 14-22 to anyone who would like to contribute to the cause.

This is one of my favorite things we do every year and I love seeing the students get excited about helping others. 8th grade students will be allowed to put their name in a drawing to be selected as one of our shoppers and we will let them know the week before Thanksgiving break if they have been randomly selected to attend the shopping trip. The shopping trip will take place on Monday, November 25th at 8am at the Walmart Supercenter in Sachse.

December Events

10 - Advanced Bands Epic Waters festival trip/performance

12 - Beginner Band after school rehearsal from 4:15-5:30pm

13-14 - GISD All-District Band Clinic/Concert @ Lakeview Centennial HS for students who earned a chair after the auditions in November

16 - Beginner Band Holiday Concert @ Sachse HS at 6:00pm

17 - Advanced Bands Holiday Concert @ Sachse HS at 6:00pm & Fall Practice Challenge papers due

18 - Wind Symphony Holiday Tour

19 - Elf Pajama Dodgeball Extravaganza for students who completed the Fall Practice Challenge

It’s not too early to get a jump-start on reaching out to corporate band sponsors! This year we have multiple levels of band sponsorships so potential donors can decide how they would like to support our band. Corporate sponsors in any of the four sponsorship levels will have their business logo included on our band website and in concert programs the entire school year. Feel free to print this flyer about the Hudson Band and the sponsorship levels and reach out to businesses in your community. Have your student ask a band director for copies of the flier too! Feel free to contact me at fundraising@hudsonband.org if you have any questions because I’m excited about fundraising and the opportunities we have this year!

After a rigorous judging process, our Wind Symphony Percussion Ensemble has been accepted to perform at the Music for All National Festival in Indianapolis, Indiana in March of 2025. We are thrilled to get to showcase these students on a national stage and can't wait to get started preparing for our performance. You can help by sharing info about our sponsorship levels, participating in fundraisers, and joining us for spirit nights at local restaurants this year. This is a huge honor for our program and excites us for other possible opportunities like this in the future!

The BEST investment you can make for your student's musical education is with PRIVATE LESSONS! We have the most wonderful group of private teachers around who are dedicated to providing quality one-on-one instruction to our students. Most of our teachers have been working with our students already this summer at our camps and have already told me how much they are enjoying getting to know your students. To sign your student up for private lessons, fill out this enrollment form and get it back to us ASAP. The teachers will schedule students as soon as they receive their enrollment form, so be first to get the most desired lesson time! Private lessons are $25 each week, payable directly to the private teacher. If finances are the only thing keeping your student out of lessons, we do have limited scholarship money available to help. This private lesson scholarship application is due Friday, August 23rd. We will issue scholarships at that time to as many students as possible, based on financial need. If you would like to contact the private teacher for your student's instrument, you can find all of our teachers' contact information on this page.

Students in the Advanced Bands will begin their biweekly before/after school sectionals the week of August 26th. Sectionals are required and grades will be given during sectionals. Please make arrangements to schedule appointments on the off days or weeks so your student does not miss these important rehearsals. Please see the links below for the sectional schedule for each band.

Wind Symphony Fall Schedule

Honors Band Fall Schedule

Symphonic Band Fall Schedule

All band students should now have a band locker issued to them. Band lockers are for storing band instruments and band binders during the school day. We expect all students to take home both their binder and their instrument EVERY DAY because consistent practice is the best way to improve on an instrument. We do have combination locks available to students who request one, but we do not initially issue locks with the lockers. We HIGHLY RECOMMEND students to keep their locker locked all the time. Students are welcome to bring their own locks, however, they are REQUIRED to either share the combination with the band directors or give us a copy of the key. We do our very best to keep things safe, but the best way you can help yourself is to lock your locker and LABEL ALL OF YOUR BAND SUPPLIES!

Much like the beginner band year, as students continue with band there are new/different/extra supplies that will be needed. Many of these are the same supplies that we requested for this past year, so if your student will be an 8th grader, they likely already have these supplies. Please make sure your student has these supplies when we start school. The supplies on the list have been linked to Amazon to try and make it super easy for you - just add to cart and check out!

You can find all of the Beginner Band supply lists for each instrument on our band website. They're found on the handouts page, where there's also a list of our recommended music stores that can help you rent instrument or purchase necessary supplies. Don't wait to get your supplies ordered - it takes a few days for the stores to fill the orders and you don't want your student to miss out on the first sounds of the year with their class!

This year, we will be using a new fine arts management program called Presto. For our returning members, this is replacing Charms. This program allows us to keep track of band finances, inventory, music library, communicate with members, and much more. On Thursday, August 15th, all parents and students should have received a welcome email from Presto with details on how to log in. You will be able to see upcoming events, outstanding balances, make online payments, keep track of your student's school-owned uniforms and inventory, etc. We believe this system to be much more user friendly than Charms and are excited to transition to this new program!

You can watch a quick tutorial video below!

• Reams of copy paper
• Cases of bottled water
• Puppy pads (for emptying spit valves and saving the carpet)
• Candy/Stickers/Trinkets (to use as student incentives)

As many of you can probably relate to, I have become a bit overwhelmed by the amount of communication forms we are using. I have made some changes to my own notification settings on the apps. If you send me a message in Talking Points, you will notice an automatic message that lets you know your message has been received, but will be responded to on a school day during the hours of 8am-5pm. The same will happen to messages send on the Band app. The great thing about the Band app is that other parents and students have the ability to comment and answer questions as well (and I hope you all will chime in when you know the answers to questions that are being asked there).

The best way to contact the band directors is through email. Please know that we team-teach our classes and each of us only has one 45-minute conference period each day. If you haven't received a response to your message within 48 hours, please message us again. We all strive to respond within 24 hours, but that isn't always realistic. We are all setting boundaries to leave work at work (as much as possible), so we can be more present for our families at home. We spend many extra hours and days with your students, who we love, but our families must come first. Thank you so much for your understanding and for showing us grace as we put these boundaries in place.

For the remainder of this year, we will continue to share information through email (in both Presto and Skyward), post on Canvas and Skyward, and send through Talking Points and the Band app. At the end of the year, we will likely send out a survey to find out which form of communication works best for you. Our hope in the future is that we can simplify our processes and make our communication easier for everyone!

Heather Becker - Director

Dan Urban - Assistant Director

Ryan Neff - Assistant Director

Sue Manaois - Percussion Director

Website: www.hudsonband.org
Phone: 972-675-3070 ext. 52218
Facebook: facebook.com/hudsonmsband

Instagram: instagram.com/hudsonhawkband