Brandon Harbin recalls hearing music all the time as he walked around Chicago, the city where he used to live. Now a senior at Meridian High School, Harbin expresses the fondness he’s harbored for music over the years through participation in the high school band.

“I come from a big city, so I hear music everywhere I go,” he said. “My whole family’s from (Chicago), and that’s why we all love music.”

That cherishing of music was celebrated at the last Meridian School District School Board meeting, as Antonio Altman, director of bands for Meridian High School, delivered a report chronicling the band’s recent accomplishments. Among a series of high ratings noted by Altman was a second-place finish in the AA class of the Hoover Invitational Marching Festival, in Alabama. Bands from Mississippi, Georgia, Louisiana and Alabama performed, Altman said.

“Every time we travel, we have a group of parents who support the kids,” he said at the school board meeting.

Later, on a recent afternoon, as Altman pondered the role band plays in students’ lives, he noted a way a new force contributes to the whole experience.

“The thing that has changed the most is technology,” said Altman, in his fifth year as head director. “We’re trying to go digital with a lot of the music and incorporate electronic or cell phone tuners, cell phone metronomes.”

Altman said students can send recordings they’re doing digitally. Technology also allows students, through Chromebooks, to get access to renditions of their own parts.

“If there’s a Trumpet 1 part, we can send that student just the Trumpet 1 part to practice at home,” he said.

But while technology plays a strong role, the physical presence of the students creates an age-old power.

“We teach that you are an individual, but when you come in here, you’re one,” he said.

James Prewitt, a Meridian High School junior, said he saw connections between band and other subjects.

“Playing sort of like writing,” he said. “You play in response to what you’ve read. In that sense it’s language arts.”

Prewitt noted the transformation in dramatic terms.

“You’re an individual when you walk into the band hall, but when you sit down in a row, you are a trumpet,” he said. “Your name is not James; it’s Trumpet 1.”

That large-group setting is something that Altman notices.

“This is one of the few group settings where they meet in large groups every day,” he said. “One of the advantages of that is that kids have to be disciplined, and they really learn to follow instructions and procedures.”

And there’s the academic component.

“Music helps with every tested area, if you ask me,” he said. “It takes a lot of mental focus to play the type of literature we play here. Just to be in an ensemble and interacting musically — it’s another language.”

It’s a language, he said, that can push on the boundaries of a student’s vocabulary.

“They’re reading music all the time,” he said, noting that they’re reading complex words in other languages, as well, such as “mezzoforte.”

As Altman described it, though, those language arts elements aren’t simply dry and academic. He said the performances can create a kind of story, a kind of narrative.

Last year, he said, a performance was shaped by the theme “Journey through the Jungle.”

“We started off with some African-type sounds, African-type instruments on the field,” he said. “We also had sound effects on the field and different safari animals. And the music went with that. One of your songs was ‘Welcome to the Jungle.’”

Altman acknowledged, too, that band might in some ways clash with many contemporary teaching modes that involve the teacher as a facilitator, moving among students working at their own place.

“We are a band organization, so everything has to be organized,” he said. “Everything has to be a unit.”

As for accommodating different teaching models, Altman said simply, and with a chuckle, “It’s expected.”

For Harbin, the difference isn’t all that stark. The band experience of working with other people, he said, resembles that of working in other classes.

“In a classroom when you’re in a group, you have to be compatible with other people,” he said. “In a band, you have to work with everybody, just as in a group you have to work with everybody. You feed off those other people in your group.”

Or as Ro’Quandrey McCaleb put it, “We play so we can all hear each other. Nobody’s overplaying anyone. We all play together.”

ABOUT MHS BAND

Some facts about the Meridian High School Band, from Director Antonio Altman:

Director of Bands:  Antonio Altman.

Assistant Directors: Randy Wayne, Damon Barnes, and Mark Hatch.

Color Guard Instructor: Ashley Burks.

Woodwind Instructor: Jamarius Redditte.

Drum Majors: Jhamir Adams, Kortnee Roberts, Destiny Little.

• In July, the MHS Band hosted both the Seattle Cascades from Seattle, Washington and the Madison Scouts from Madison, Wisconsin from Drum Corp International. Drum Corp International is the Marching Major League.

• On Oct. 7, the MHS Band scored All Superior Ratings in every category at the Copiah Band Competition. A Superior Rating is the highest rating that a band can receive and the band scored Superior Ratings from the Drum Major Judge, Color Guard Judge, Percussion (Drum) Judge, and 3 Band Judges.

• On Oct. 14, the MHS Band scored All Superior Ratings in every category at the MHSAA State Marching Evaluations. Percussion scored a 90 and Drum Majors scored a 93.

• On Oct. 21, the MHS Band competed nationally at the Hoover Invitational in Hoover, Alabama that included a higher point scale to score Superior. The MHS Band capped off with a high score of 92.5 and placed second overall in the competition class. The MHS Band scored Superior Ratings from all 5 Band Judges, Drum Major Judge, and Percussion Judge.

• On Oct. 28, the Meridian High School Wildcat Band performed at the Birmingham Magic City Classic Parade in Birmingham, Alabama as a featured high school band from Mississippi. The event is the largest HBCU (Historically Black Colleges and Universities) Classic in the United States.

• The overall production along with scores increased and growth was shown from the first marching competition to the last marching competition.