As I mentioned a while back, the athletic bands are getting a new director. That new director will be Dr. Lane Weaver, currently the director of bands at Fort Hays State University in Hays, Kansas.

I've met him on several occasions in the last few years and he's a great guy. He's a USU grad, so he's pretty familiar with the school and its traditions and he's extremely excited to come back and be an Aggie again (in contrast, when the guy who's leaving, Dr. Falvey, first started he tried to get rid of the Scotsman).

In the other thread I started about the band, many of you expressed concern that the band is small and it just doesn't seem like it's "cool" to be in the band. Most of that has been due to a lack of recruiting, but this guy managed to get the marching band to be around the same size or bigger than our band at a school with only 5,000 students. Not only does he go out to the schools and recruit kids to the program, but he designs his shows in such a way that they're geared toward an audience that came to watch a football game. He's all about entertainment and getting the crowd involved in what he does on the field. I'm hoping he can change people's perception of the band and make more people want to join.

Music selection has been a problem with the last two directors. Dr. Rohrer never had us play anything newer than 1990, plus he had everyone March around with the sheet music attached to the instruments, which doesn't lend well to looking or sounding good. Dr. Falvey, had the band memorize the music and worked hard to make it sound good, but we only ever played new pop music. It probably appealed to some of the students, but on top of them being terrible songs, they were crappy stock arrangements that were extremely boring to play, not to mention they cost a lot of money to buy. Dr. Weaver likes to mix up the old stuff with the new stuff and he writes his own arrangements so they're both fun to play and fun to listen to.

I hear he also does very well collaborating with athletic departments. When we called FHSU's AD for a reference, we were told we'd be crazy not to hire him.

I think we can all be excited about the future of the band. It's got me excited enough to rejoin the marching band. Although I'll be marching baritone rather than trombone, so that screws up my screen name... GFA actually once came and found me in the trombone section at a football game a few years back, so if any of you had the same idea of finding me based on my name it wouldn't work this time around... Anyway, if you have any other questions or suggestions, don't hesitate to ask

Great news, and great write-up of it. Nice to have your insights. Marching band can't make a bad football program good, but it can make a good program better. Hope you and your colleagues have a great season with the new boss.

Sounds great . . looking forward to the growth of the band's involvement with the game day experience. Thanks for the update.

Can he recruit bag pipers to join the band?

The proof is in the YouTube, er - ah - pudding

If these are a representation of what he'll start with, I think I can live with it.




Here's an interview with him

USUBlue wrote:Sounds great . . looking forward to the growth of the band's involvement with the game day experience. Thanks for the update.

The band getting better is really good news. I am jealous of almost every marching band I hear on TV and opposing venues. I hope we can get some more funding to the band to make it top notch too.

I hope he can get lots more brass players and less woodwinds. Seems like USU has had way too many woodwinds in the band and they just don't carry the sound in the stadium like brass instruments do. Most other bands have figured that out.

GUS wrote:I hope he can get lots more brass players and less woodwinds. Seems like USU has had way too many woodwinds in the band and they just don't carry the sound in the stadium like brass instruments do. Most other bands have figured that out.

This. And then keep the sousaphones from going Disney in the 4th.

Wild. I went to school with Lane - best trombonist in the program at the time, and one of Dr. Fallis' star pupils. He left for Notre Dame music school after graduation. I'm glad to hear the school is bringing him back. (Also probably in preparation for Fallis retiring, if he hasn't already.) I didn't have Falvey at all, but I can see where some people didn't like Rohrer. He's a bit prickly. I haven't talked to Lane since the mid 90s, but I have to think he'll be great for the school.

When I was in high school at Mountain Crest (around 5 years ago), there was a day where a bunch of the band kids went to the UofU and were "a part" of the band for a day. They toured all of the facilities, met the director and members of the band, and got to play in the Ute pep band during a football game. I think something like this could be super beneficial for our band to help recruiting. Doing something like that with at least the valley kids could certainly change some minds. Something to consider.

On an unrelated note, I can't think of many worse places in the country to live than Hayes, Kansas. I'm sure that guy is jumping with joy to get out of there and back to paradise.

bleu wrote:When I was in high school at Mountain Crest (around 5 years ago), there was a day where a bunch of the band kids went to the UofU and were "a part" of the band for a day. They toured all of the facilities, met the director and members of the band, and got to play in the Ute pep band during a football game. I think something like this could be super beneficial for our band to help recruiting. Doing something like that with at least the valley kids could certainly change some minds. Something to consider.

On an unrelated note, I can't think of many worse places in the country to live than Hayes, Kansas. I'm sure that guy is jumping with joy to get out of there and back to paradise.

Hyrum is a little closer.

Madmartigan wrote:

USUBlue wrote:Sounds great . . looking forward to the growth of the band's involvement with the game day experience. Thanks for the update.

The band getting better is really good news. I am jealous of almost every marching band I hear on TV and opposing venues. I hope we can get some more funding to the band to make it top notch too.

John Hartwell is on board with getting more funding for the band. I don't know if that means giving some of the athletic revenue to the band or finding donors or other kinds of fundraising, but I was really happy to hear that.

GUS wrote:I hope he can get lots more brass players and less woodwinds. Seems like USU has had way too many woodwinds in the band and they just don't carry the sound in the stadium like brass instruments do. Most other bands have figured that out.

He's a brass player, so that shouldn't be a problem. Our current low brass guy, Dr. Fallis (who Dr. Weaver will be replacing while Dr. Fallis is on sabbatical this next year and when he retires in the next few years) hasn't done a whole lot of recruiting to his studio. On the other hand, our new trumpet professor has been doing quite a bit of recruiting, and so our trumpet studio is better than it's been in years and should continue to improve

bleu wrote:When I was in high school at Mountain Crest (around 5 years ago), there was a day where a bunch of the band kids went to the UofU and were "a part" of the band for a day. They toured all of the facilities, met the director and members of the band, and got to play in the Ute pep band during a football game. I think something like this could be super beneficial for our band to help recruiting. Doing something like that with at least the valley kids could certainly change some minds. Something to consider.

The band did this at the game against New Mexico in 2014. I don't know why it didn't happen last year, but if it becomes an annual thing I'd be ecstatic. It absolutely would have to be further reaching than just the valley. At the very least we would need to reach along the whole wasatch front. That's where all the good music programs are, and that's where (thanks to the rotten, no good media) people only know about BYU and Utah) Utah State's music program is as good or better than those places, but those kids down there don't know that. That's where we gotta recruit.

The 2nd link was encouraging as is the comment that the new director can and will write his own orchestrations. With that in mind, I disagree that a marching band should sound like a drum and bugle corp. A well orchestrated and directed marching band can sound amazing with a good woodwind section and with the different instruments play more complex or at least diverse orchestrations. I also like their announcer. Is he coming too (LOL)?

To add to the comments about having local high school kids play with the band, I note that in 9th grade I got to play with USU's jazz band which was directed by Dr. Larry Smith at the time. It was an amazing experience and definitely made a good impression on me. USU also had every year an annual symphonic band competition that drew a lot of schools from Utah and Idaho. I don't know if they still do this but my impression is that USU's entire music department needs to interact more locally and throughout the state.

hipsterdoofus21 wrote:Can he recruit bag pipers to join the band?

Or at the minimum get them to come as guests. I would love that so much!
Perhaps at homecoming?

This is me, but can we just get rid of the damn bagpipes. Scotsman have NOTHING to do with Utah State, other than the first line of a song.

Cache Valley was not settled by a scotsman, it was officially settled my Peter Maughan, who was born at Milton, Cumberland, England, not Scotland. Logan was not named for some mythical scotsman, but for fur trapper Ephraim Logan, who while he had a name with scottish leanings, was an early fur trapper in the area along with Jim Bridger, Peter Skeen Ogden, Miles Goodyear and others.

Michel Bourdon actually discovered Cache Valley around 1818 during a MacKenzie fur expedition. William Gardner was actually the first settler in 1852, followed soon after by Maughan and the establishment of Maughans Fort, nee Wellsville in 1856. Soon thereafter, Brigham Young sent cattle to Cache Valley and the Elkorn Ranch was established in the area of Nibley. I grew up living about a mile from the geographical center of the ranch.

So, ultimately, Logan could have actually been something like Bourdonsville or Gardnerville, or Elkhorn Ranch or something like that. But it most definitely IS NOT SCOTTISH, no matter what some university administrators tried to get us to believe in the late 1960's. So enough with bagpipes as some official music instrument of USU. I mean, if somebody wants to play them, fine, but lets quit acting like they are a part of USU's heritage, because THEY're NOT1

"Behold, I make an end of my speaking on this matter."

It really is funny that we only focus on the Scotsman side in that song when the Englishman's role has the same claim of importance. The song is actually about the True Blooded Aggie from Utah loving the sagebrush as much as the Scotsman and Englishman love their national flowers.

AggiesForever wrote:This is me, but can we just get rid of the damn bagpipes. Scotsman have NOTHING to do with Utah State, other than the first line of a song.

Cache Valley was not settled by a scotsman, it was officiallally settled my Peter Maughan, who was born at Milton, Cumberland, England, not Scotland. Logan was not named for some mythical scotsman, but for fur trapper Ephraim Logan, who while he had a name with scottish leanings, was an early fur trapper in the area along with Jim Bridger, Peter Skeen Ogden, Miles Goodyear and others.

Michel Bourdon actually discovered Cache Valley around 1818 during a MacKenzie fur expedition. William Gardner was actually the first settler in 1852, followed soon after by Maughan and the establishment of Maughans Fort, nee Wellsville in 1856. Soon thereafter, Brigham Young sent cattle to Cache Valley and the Elkorn Ranch was established in the area of Nibley. I grew up living about a mile from the geographical center of the ranch.

So, ultimately, Logan could have actually been something like Bourdonsville or Gardnerville, or Elkhorn Ranch or something like that. But it most definitely IS NOT SCOTTISH, no matter what some university administrators tried to get us to believe in the late 1960's. So enough with bagpipes as some official music instrument of USU. I mean, if somebody wants to play them, fine, but lets quit acting like they are a part of USU's heritage, because THEY're NOT1

"Behold, I make an end of my speaking on this matter."

As my debater son used to say: Good Arg.

But I think you're missing the point. Nobody cares why our spirit song repertoire includes The Scotsman, or that it's not historically correct. I concede to you all arguments about the settlement of Cache Valley. But The Scotsman really isn't about Scotsmen or Englishmen or settlement. It's about love of place: True-blooded Aggies -- even those of us who didn't grow up there -- love USU/Cache Valley (the spot where the sagebrush grows) like Scots love the thistle or Englishmen love the rose. And the old cat who wrote it *, Ebenezer Kirkham, Class of '18, wrote the glissando in the intro to sound like the whine of the first note out of a bagpipe. It's there forever, it's indelibly associated with USU sporting events, and it's never going to change. Scotland might not be part of Cache Valley's heritage, but The Scotsman will always be part of USU's.

And bagpipes are just badass, done right. That's the challenge.

*Old Eb actually named it The Scotchman. Don't know when/how that got changed to Scotsman.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1_ug ... sp=sharing

AggiesForever wrote:This is me, but can we just get rid of the damn bagpipes. Scotsman have NOTHING to do with Utah State, other than the first line of a song.

Cache Valley was not settled by a scotsman, it was officiallally settled my Peter Maughan, who was born at Milton, Cumberland, England, not Scotland. Logan was not named for some mythical scotsman, but for fur trapper Ephraim Logan, who while he had a name with scottish leanings, was an early fur trapper in the area along with Jim Bridger, Peter Skeen Ogden, Miles Goodyear and others.

Michel Bourdon actually discovered Cache Valley around 1818 during a MacKenzie fur expedition. William Gardner was actually the first settler in 1852, followed soon after by Maughan and the establishment of Maughans Fort, nee Wellsville in 1856. Soon thereafter, Brigham Young sent cattle to Cache Valley and the Elkorn Ranch was established in the area of Nibley. I grew up living about a mile from the geographical center of the ranch.

So, ultimately, Logan could have actually been something like Bourdonsville or Gardnerville, or Elkhorn Ranch or something like that. But it most definitely IS NOT SCOTTISH, no matter what some university administrators tried to get us to believe in the late 1960's. So enough with bagpipes as some official music instrument of USU. I mean, if somebody wants to play them, fine, but lets quit acting like they are a part of USU's heritage, because THEY're NOT1

"Behold, I make an end of my speaking on this matter."

I find some similarities. My ancestors were included in the first group to settle Cache Valley and they were, in fact, from Scotland. I'm sure many other original settlers were Scots as well. The highlands in Scotland are to the north and are more mountainous terrain than in the south (thus the name highlands). I equate Logan the same way with the state of Utah. As Edinburgh is to the Highlands, Salt Lake City is to Logan.

But as others have mentioned, "The Scotsman" doesn't equate our school to the Scottish or a Scottish culture, it just happens to be the country in the first phrase of a song about loving a place and having pride in your homeland (or in our case school).

My great double grandfather A Scott who founded the first lds Sunday school actually ran 49 steers here. 2 years before ant other settlers came to cache valley He built a simple dugout. He gave beef and corn to the shoban Indians. They often touched his beard out of wonderment
Early October he droved them to east promontorty. It is accurate that the englishmen maughans established the first year round community
As far as the"Scottsman". It was intended to include all
Remember, Danes. My Norwegian Herity. Scott's English Dorigatti Italians. But they came together learned English established
Usu agricultureral college. The "AC"
Talk about melting pot. Don't forget German and French.
So we talk about the Scottsman song. It is just fine

Sap you are correct. Ballentine came well before the saints. He thought cache valley would be great until he saw the winters
Indeed that homestead still stands. The song respects all IMO

USUMAE wrote:

hipsterdoofus21 wrote:Can he recruit bag pipers to join the band?

Or at the minimum get them to come as guests. I would love that so much!
Perhaps at homecoming?

Ben lomand high always has bag pipers. Should start a direct feed to USU

OKAggie wrote:As my debater son used to say: Good Arg.

But I think you're missing the point. Nobody cares why our spirit song repertoire includes The Scotsman, or that it's not historically correct. I concede to you all arguments about the settlement of Cache Valley. But The Scotsman really isn't about Scotsmen or Englishmen or settlement. It's about love of place: True-blooded Aggies -- even those of us who didn't grow up there -- love USU/Cache Valley (the spot where the sagebrush grows) like Scots love the thistle or Englishmen love the rose. And the old cat who wrote it *, Ebenezer Kirkham, Class of '18, wrote the glissando in the intro to sound like the whine of the first note out of a bagpipe. It's there forever, it's indelibly associated with USU sporting events, and it's never going to change. Scotland might not be part of Cache Valley's heritage, but The Scotsman will always be part of USU's.

And bagpipes are just badass, done right. That's the challenge.

*Old Eb actually named it The Scotchman. Don't know when/how that got changed to Scotsman.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1_ug ... sp=sharing

You misunderstand me. My point is not about "The Scotsman" at all, other than its a fun song we sing.

My point is there is no precident for bagpipes being involved in any way historically at USU, except for the aborted attempt to change the university mascot to the "Highlanders" by USU VP-University Relations Gerald Sherratt in 1969-70. I had lived in Cache Valley all my life and had never heard a single mention of Scots in the valley up until that time. And after they were rowdly booed off the Romney Stadium turf, we have not heard mention of USU's ""Scottish heritage" in the timeline since.

So lets sing the Scotsman! Fun song! But lets give up the bagpipes as something USU has as part of its heritage. Just ain't so. They can perform all they want. Just don't trot them out there as something with a historical tie to USU. That's all I'm saying.

AggiesForever wrote:

OKAggie wrote:As my debater son used to say: Good Arg.

But I think you're missing the point. Nobody cares why our spirit song repertoire includes The Scotsman, or that it's not historically correct. I concede to you all arguments about the settlement of Cache Valley. But The Scotsman really isn't about Scotsmen or Englishmen or settlement. It's about love of place: True-blooded Aggies -- even those of us who didn't grow up there -- love USU/Cache Valley (the spot where the sagebrush grows) like Scots love the thistle or Englishmen love the rose. And the old cat who wrote it *, Ebenezer Kirkham, Class of '18, wrote the glissando in the intro to sound like the whine of the first note out of a bagpipe. It's there forever, it's indelibly associated with USU sporting events, and it's never going to change. Scotland might not be part of Cache Valley's heritage, but The Scotsman will always be part of USU's.

And bagpipes are just badass, done right. That's the challenge.

*Old Eb actually named it The Scotchman. Don't know when/how that got changed to Scotsman.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1_ug ... sp=sharing

You misunderstand me. My point is not about "The Scotsman" at all, other than its a fun song we sing.

My point is there is no precident for bagpipes being involved in any way historically at USU, except for the aborted attempt to change the university mascot to the "Highlanders" by USU VP-University Relations Gerald Sherratt in 1969-70. I had lived in Cache Valley all my life and had never heard a single mention of Scots in the valley up until that time. And after they were rowdly booed off the Romney Stadium turf, we have not heard mention of USU's ""Scottish heritage" in the timeline since.

So lets sing the Scotsman! Fun song! But lets give up the bagpipes as something USU has as part of its heritage. Just ain't so. They can perform all they want. Just don't trot them out there as something with a historical tie to USU. That's all I'm saying.

Utah State Aggies=Scotsman=Bagpipes....who cares under what pretense they are "trotted out there"? They add great spirit with a natural tie to our beloved song. Bring them on under any pretense.

AggiesForever wrote:

OKAggie wrote:As my debater son used to say: Good Arg.

But I think you're missing the point. Nobody cares why our spirit song repertoire includes The Scotsman, or that it's not historically correct. I concede to you all arguments about the settlement of Cache Valley. But The Scotsman really isn't about Scotsmen or Englishmen or settlement. It's about love of place: True-blooded Aggies -- even those of us who didn't grow up there -- love USU/Cache Valley (the spot where the sagebrush grows) like Scots love the thistle or Englishmen love the rose. And the old cat who wrote it *, Ebenezer Kirkham, Class of '18, wrote the glissando in the intro to sound like the whine of the first note out of a bagpipe. It's there forever, it's indelibly associated with USU sporting events, and it's never going to change. Scotland might not be part of Cache Valley's heritage, but The Scotsman will always be part of USU's.

And bagpipes are just badass, done right. That's the challenge.

*Old Eb actually named it The Scotchman. Don't know when/how that got changed to Scotsman.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1_ug ... sp=sharing

You misunderstand me. My point is not about "The Scotsman" at all, other than its a fun song we sing.

My point is there is no precident for bagpipes being involved in any way historically at USU, except for the aborted attempt to change the university mascot to the "Highlanders" by USU VP-University Relations Gerald Sherratt in 1969-70. I had lived in Cache Valley all my life and had never heard a single mention of Scots in the valley up until that time. And after they were rowdly booed off the Romney Stadium turf, we have not heard mention of USU's ""Scottish heritage" in the timeline since.

So lets sing the Scotsman! Fun song! But lets give up the bagpipes as something USU has as part of its heritage. Just ain't so. They can perform all they want. Just don't trot them out there as something with a historical tie to USU. That's all I'm saying.

I don't care that there isn't a historical tie to USU with bagpipes or Scots, nor did I claim there to be.
(Granted, I realize that you're comment wasn't directed at me, but I am on the pro-bagpipe side)

I'm personally a fan of them. I think when done right, they can be epic and it could become a tradition fairly unique to us.

hipsterdoofus21 wrote:It really is funny that we only focus on the Scotsman side in that song when the Englishman's role has the same claim of importance. The song is actually about the True Blooded Aggie from Utah loving the sagebrush as much as the Scotsman and Englishman love their national flowers.

Hearted. The lyrics say "hearted". I don't know who perverted this, or when, but the original lyrics say "hearted", and that's how we were singing it in 1982 when I graduated. Oh, and they also say "show me the Scotsman", show me the Englishman, and "show me the true hearted Aggie from Utah. "The", not "a".

LKGates wrote:

hipsterdoofus21 wrote:It really is funny that we only focus on the Scotsman side in that song when the Englishman's role has the same claim of importance. The song is actually about the True Blooded Aggie from Utah loving the sagebrush as much as the Scotsman and Englishman love their national flowers.

And sagebrush is a lot more descriptive as our "flower" than Sego Lily!

trombone_ninja wrote:

bleu wrote:When I was in high school at Mountain Crest (around 5 years ago), there was a day where a bunch of the band kids went to the UofU and were "a part" of the band for a day. They toured all of the facilities, met the director and members of the band, and got to play in the Ute pep band during a football game. I think something like this could be super beneficial for our band to help recruiting. Doing something like that with at least the valley kids could certainly change some minds. Something to consider.

The band did this at the game against New Mexico in 2014. I don't know why it didn't happen last year, but if it becomes an annual thing I'd be ecstatic. It absolutely would have to be further reaching than just the valley. At the very least we would need to reach along the whole wasatch front. That's where all the good music programs are, and that's where (thanks to the rotten, no good media) people only know about BYU and Utah) Utah State's music program is as good or better than those places, but those kids down there don't know that. That's where we gotta recruit.

The band did this back in '93 when I was a freshman. Before school started in September (on the quarter system), they always invited incoming freshmen and local high school kids to come play at early football games.

I went to school with Lane, too. He's a great guy, an incredibly talented musician and director, and he knows what a good band should be. I'm extremely excited that he's coming back to take over the athletic bands.

My great+ grandfather was Peter Maughan. I can check to see if he played the pipes if anyone wants? That being said, if done well, I think pipes can sound amazing. Back in the day, Payson High School had a pipe band that competed with their marching band. They sounded pretty dang good as I recall.

WasatchAggie wrote:My great+ grandfather was Peter Maughan. I can check to see if he played the pipes if anyone wants? That being said, if done well, I think pipes can sound amazing. Back in the day, Payson High School had a pipe band that competed with their marching band. They sounded pretty dang good as I recall.

Howdy cuz! His English blood runs through 3/4 of that valley. I guess the rose is probably more fitting than the thistle. Although Northumberland and Cumberland are awful close to Edinburgh.

^^^^^^^^^^^
Ha! How are you related? My genealogy is direct through my mom's line. Me, my mother, my grandfather, his mother Rachel Maughan (who graduated from USU with her BS in 1897), her dad and then her father Peter Maughan. Small world or valley perhaps.

WasatchAggie wrote:^^^^^^^^^^^
Ha! How are you related? My genealogy is direct through my mom's line. Me, my mother, my grandfather, his mother Rachel Maughan (who graduated from USU with her BS in 1897), her dad and then her father Peter Maughan. Small world or valley perhaps.

My Dad's side. Peter > William > Ruth (who ironically married a Scot....) In fact, there's so much Maughan blood in that valley that I've since learned my kids and my wife's sister's kids are both first and fifth cousins since my brother in law and myself are apparently 4th Maughan cousins.

I'm for anything that builds spirit and helps attendance, if bagpipes can do hat then more power to them. (Personally I think they tend to sound like someone torturing cats, but if they can bring in more fans then I'll happily plug my ears and grin and bear it.)