Redwood Winter Percussion makes Open Class this Season

By Aiden Lupian

After the marching season, the Redwood High School’s marching percussion carries on with competitions throughout the school year, but instead of stadiums and fields, they compete in gyms and indoor arenas.

Last year the percussion group was able to take 1st place at the Championships and end the season at the top of their class, that class being Scholastic A Class. But this year the Redwood Winter Percussion was able to bump up into Scholastic Open Class, meaning more competition and harder groups to compete with.

Front Ensemble Section Leader, Adam Jeffries, ‘23, is proud of the group for getting into Open, he says, “I feel proud of everyone in my section for being able to advance to the open class, as it’s something Redwood hasn’t accomplished before. Everyone worked so hard to obtain such a status and I love being able to truly be competitive.”

Battery section leader Matthew Spalding, ‘23, adds, “Competing against Clovis schools and other upper-level groups makes us feel like we have a name for ourselves and we put Redwood on the map.”

In Open Class there are schools such as Clovis East, Clovis North, Clovis West, and even Buchanan which are all very successful groups that are very difficult to compete with. Redwood’s Percussion has competed twice so far in this class and got 6th place on both occasions and while it might not sound great, time is needed to get used to this new and challenging class.

When asked about how satisfied they are with Redwood’s placements tenor drum player Jacob Siegel, ´23, says, “To an extent, I’d say Im satisfied with our placements for open class. Sixth place isn’t anything to write home about, but knowing that we´re keeping up with all the Clovis schools is a feat I didn’t think we could do” and fellow tenor drummer Danica Palardy, ’23, is on the same page with Siegel saying, “I am satisfied with our placement at the last two comps because this is the sport; We have to work our way from the bottom if we want to work our way to the top if we want to be great. Though we´ve gotten last place, our performances have been exceptional.”

There is also some work to do when it comes to getting the message across to the audience, this year’s program is titled “Muted” and as the show grows the message must become more obvious for the audience.

Siegel says, “Our focus is definitely conveying the theme of the show. Right now we look like a group of people moving around on the floor, but once we have the theme locked in we´ll be good.”

As the group gets used to this new class they have a lot of goals they want to achieve by the end of the season.

Jeffries says, “The main focus is achieving at a higher level, and pushing all limits of our performance. Everyone needs to truly push themselves to be the best performer they can be.” Spalding adds to this, saying, “The main focus is showing others we belong in the open class. Once we get adapted to the environment our goal is to perform and show others that Redwood is good and has come to compete.”

Aiden Lupian

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Aiden Lupian (´25) is a second year writer for the Gigantea who loves to tell a good arts story and really looks forward to all the stories he can write, and people to connect with