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Health & Fitness

A Viking In Louisville: I Promise We're Not That Bad

Did you hear about the Louisville Marching Band and UP native Carly Kaiser at the Kentucky Derby this month? If you didn't, don't worry. Not many people did.

It was truly a dream come true. I’ve truly been lucky with the people I’ve met out in Louisville, and the experience in the first year has been impeccable. Was able to sit in Millionaires Row for the Breeders’ Cup to see Zenyatta almost close out an undefeated career, got front row tickets to the Keeneland sales, walked on the main track prior and after the Kentucky Oaks, as well as a behind the scenes take on the Derby itself. The University of Arizona offers a very similar program that my UofL does, however Arizona is not in the heat of the racing world. While the degree may not have as much prestige, these experiences are something that the entire state of Arizona just cannot and will never offer.

For the Kentucky Derby, the band loaded our school buses outside of the School of Music at 8 a.m., and took that 10-minute drive to the Churchill Downs infield. We were to play before all the odd-races, (race 1, 3, 5, 7, 9 and 11). The Fort Knox Army band played all the even races. We played songs such as our Fight Song, I Love Rock and Roll, Bad Romance, a snippet from Troopers Battle Hymn, and of course My Old Kentucky Home. We unloaded into our designated section in the infield to set up and dress up in our uniforms. Thankfully, we were allowed free rein in the insane infield when we were not playing. As a crazy horse racing fan and gambler, this was the greatest news.

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Jump forward to the race, we all lined up and were waiting for the cue from Mark Johnson, the announcer, to begin playing. While I was caught up in the moment, I did take notice to the fact that he never mentioned the band itself. All he said was, “And now the playing of My Old Kentucky Home.” While it is a bit of a small detail, it would have been nice to have him say, “And now the University of Louisville Band will perform MOKH.” I didn’t care much for it at the time. I was sure that NBC would have mentioned who was playing it. I was wrong. Even NBC didn’t say anything.

It isn’t that big of a deal, but the fact that it is such a small thing and they didn’t do it sucks. I mean, it is not like we are THE Ohio State’s best damn band in the land, nor are we USC’s Trojan Marching Band, and we sure aren’t Notre Dame’s band. We don’t get national attention. With a solidly average football team that won the Beef O’ Brady’s Bowl (yeah, I never heard of it either) national coverage with us playing just isn’t a thing. But for the Derby, that is our thing. For the past 30-or-so years, it has been just us and no other band. While I didn’t hear Mark say it on track, I was sure they mentioned us on NBC and of course they didn’t.

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Having a small mention isn’t much to ask, I don’t think. All I would like is a few shots of the band (there was only one good shot of us shown on NBC) and a mention of who was playing. Not only that, but the audio was terrible. In a “I know a guy, who knows a guy,” type of situation, I got word that there was an audio malfunction so the band sounded pretty bad which was a relief. But from my point, we sounded amazing. It was disheartening to watch NBC show loud, belligerent, tone deaf people in the grandstand somehow manage to sing the song where the band and many more presentable people singing it with pride. The horses and jockeys themselves didn’t really get much attention during the song. As someone who loves horseracing history, I really appreciate the history and importance of the song. Watching NBC butcher it was very disappointing.

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