Spirit to triumph for the Cardinals
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By JEFFREY HAGE jeff.hage@lee.net
Tuesday, October 10, 2006 1:56 PM CDT
Some things just make sense, says Brian Collicott, Chippewa Falls High School’s band director.
That was the case when members of the Chi-Hi music faculty met at Collicott’s home last January to begin planning for the 2006 marching band competition.
It had been about three months since the band program was shaken by the bus accident on Interstate 94, near Osseo. The band had lost its beloved leader, Doug Green-halgh, and well-liked student teacher Branden Atherton. Many band members had been severely injured and others were emotionally scarred.
The group was meeting in January because planning a band competition takes months, Collicott explained.
A theme was needed because there was music to be written by February. That’s so it could be in the hands of band members by the end of last school year and learned over the summer.
It was at that meeting that “Triumph of the Spirit” was born.
“It was a good title and made sense considering what the band has gone through this past year,” Collicott said.
The Chi-Hi Marching Band will perform “Triumph of the Spirit” before its home crowd at the eighth annual Music Along the Chippewa, a 15-band music extravaganza Saturday at Dorais Field at Chippewa Falls High School.
But Collicott says “Triumph of the Spirit” relates to far more people than those involved in the band program.
“It applies to so many different people and celebrates the human spirit of those who have rose to meet their challenges,” Collicott said.
Joining Chi-Hi in celebrating its return to the field will be bands from Menomonie, Antigo, Marathon, Cumberland, Baldwin-Woodville, River Falls, Hudson, Spooner, St. Croix Falls, West De Pere, Whitnall, and Merrill from Wisconsin and Irondale and Grand Rapids of Minnesota.
Because not a lot of schools host their own band competition, the Chi-Hi event draws some of the top bands from the region. They use the event for a final tune-up before the State Band Competition a week later on Oct. 21 at the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater.
The competition will also feature one of the top Division 3 college bands in the country when the UW-ECBlugold Marching Band plays an encore.
“The Blugold band is so loud and so fun,” Collicott said.
“Combine the university band with the 15 high school bands, and the Music Along the Chippewa will prove that musically, we’re doing some good things in Northwest Wisconsin,” he said.
If you go
“Music Along the River” is being held Saturday, Oct. 14 and begins at 5 p.m. at Chippewa Falls High School’s Dorais Field. Tickets are available at the gate at $7 for adults, $5 for students and seniors. Those under 5 are admitted free. For more information call the band office at 726-2406 ext. 1426.
Triumph of the Spirit
Oct. 16, 2005, is a date Chippewa Falls residents will never forget.
On the first anniversary of the fatal school bus crash, the Chippewa Herald will examine how lives were changed and people rose to meet the challenges of a devastating tragedy, as true human spirit prevailed.
Our 3-part series starts in Saturday's printed edition of The Chippewa Herald.
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