UAB Middle School Honor Band Festival

The UAB Honor Bands for students have become regarded as the best honor bands in the region. Students must receive a recommendation from their school band director to participate. This weekend festival is comprised of two middle school and two high school honor bands that rehearse on a Thursday and Friday and perform a concert in the Alys Stephens Center on Saturday. The honor band festival takes place on the second weekend in December.

UAB Middle School Honor Band 2022

Event Dates: December 8-10, 2022
Deadline for Nominations: October 24, 2022

The 2022 UAB Middle School Honor Band will consist of two bands. Auditions for the band and chair placement will begin Thursday, December 8th, at 12:30 pm. All bands will rehearse Thursday through Saturday (December 8-10). The concert will be held Saturday, December 10th at 4:00 pm in the Jemison Concert Hall of the UAB Alys Robinson Stephens Performing Arts Center.

  • Eligibility

    Sixth, seventh and eighth grade students will be eligible. Every effort will be made to include representative numbers from each grade in the selection process. Over 200 invitations will be extended to students for participation in the UAB Middle School Honor Band Weekend.

  • Division of Ensembles

    A pre-determined instrumentation for each ensemble will be used (please see the enclosed breakdown). All players will be divided equally between the two middle school bands (ex. flute #1 – Green, flute #2 – Gold; clarinet #1 – Gold, clarinet #2 – Green; etc.).

  • Selection Process

    Priority for selection will be made as follows:

    • Band director's ranked order of recommendation
    • 2022 all-state students
    • 8th-grade students with past-experience at UAB Band events
    • ALL students with past-experience at UAB band events
    • ALL students with positive band director recommendations

    Given these selection criteria, every attempt will be made to take all eighth graders that apply to the UAB Middle School Honor Band Weekend. Heavy emphasis will be placed upon each director’s ranking scale in making our preliminary selections – please give this a careful thought. Obviously, any additional pertinent information will assist in the decision-making process. In order to have fair representation from all schools, we ask that you try to keep your number of nominees near 10% of your program’s total enrollment.

2022 UAB Honor Band Nominations

Please click on this link below to nominate your students for the Middle School Honor Band Festival.

Submit a Nomination

Important Information

  • Upon notification of selection, there is a $85.00 non-refundable participation fee.
  • All students will receive a UAB Honor Band Medal as well as a UAB Honor Band T-shirt.
  • UAB Honor Band CDs, DVDs, and photos will be available for purchase at the festival.
  • Audition material will be:
    • 5 major scales and arpeggios of student’s choosing (minimum 1 octave, extra credit is given for 2 or 3 octaves) at a tempo of quarter note = 80 in eighth notes; preferred articulation is slurred ascending, and tongued descending
    • The technical exercise from the Alabama All-State requirements for 2023. Access a list of the exercises.
    • Sight-reading

**percussionists may audition on either snare, timpani, or keyboards, but more credit will be given to students who audition on 2 or more percussion instruments: The overall score will be a TOTAL of all three areas together; students who demonstrate skills in all areas will receive more credit than students who only prepare one (or two) areas.

  • Auditions will be Thursday, December 8th, 12:30 pm – 4:30 pm.
  • The first rehearsal will be held from 7:30 pm – 9:00 pm.
  • Directors, please contact Dr. Sean Murray, Dr. Gene Fambrough, or Dr. Cara Morantz if you can help with student auditions on either weekend.

Conductors

  • Land Band: Mary Land, Western Michigan University, Kalamazoo, MI
  • Dell Band: Kristy Dell, Gaither High School, Tampa, FL

Honor Band Tentative Instrumentation

  • 8 Flute
  • 3 Oboe
  • 1 Eb Clarinet
  • 12 Bb Clarinet
  • 4 Bb Bass Clarinet
  • 1 Contra Clarinet
  • 4 Eb Alto Saxophone
  • 2 Tenor Saxophone
  • 1 Baritone Saxophone
  • 3-4 Bassoon
  • 10 Trumpet
  • 6 Horn
  • 6 Trombone
  • 1 Bass Trombone
  • 2-3 Euphonium
  • 4 Tuba
  • 6 Percussion
76
Total Participants: 152