TBO.com - TBO is Tampa Bay Online

Passing On The Batons

ADVERTISEMENT

By RONNIE BLAIR, The Tampa Tribune

Published: February 2, 2008

LAND O' LAKES - Terri Dusek and Tina Gibbons didn't like what they heard.

The teacher who coached the majorettes at Pine View Middle School had transferred to Rushe Middle, and unless someone stepped forward, the majorettes would be no more.
Dusek and Gibbons are active volunteers at the school, but they are mothers of boys in the band. Neither had produced a majorette.

Technically, this was not their worry.

No matter. The majorettes would not disappear on their watch.

"Tina and I were both majorettes growing up, and I think it's something that needs to stay around," Dusek said.

Few middle schools have majorettes. Some high schools still do, but across the country, over the past couple of decades, many schools have opted instead for color guards.
Dusek knows this as well as anyone. She was a majorette at her high school in London, Ky., in the 1970s, but even then she represented a dwindling breed. Within a year or two of her 1978 graduation, her school eliminated the majorettes.
Gibbons is from England, where those who chose twirling took a different route. There was no football - at least not what Americans call football - and therefore no football halftime shows that required a marching band with high-stepping girls dressed in sequins and bearing batons.

Instead, girls formed twirling troupes and entered competitions.

Gibbons, who moved to the Tampa Bay area 17 years ago and became a U.S. citizen four years ago, said she never twirled accompanied by a marching band. Those British majorettes always used recorded music, which is predictable because it's the same every time you play it. Live music is not so constant. The musicians might play a song slightly faster or slightly slower from performance to performance.

Teaching twirling was nothing new for Gibbons. However, teaching twirling in synch with a middle school marching band took some getting used to.

The majorettes practice twice a week in the Pine View Middle cafeteria along with the school's color guard, which is coached by another parent, Becky Williams.

They make use of recorded music for those rehearsals. One recent afternoon, they went through their paces as "Mustang Sally" played.

"Big smiles; smiles, girls," Williams told them.

The majorettes are Abigail Lukacik, Andrea Sarabia, Ashley Nelson, Jessica Sass, Kiara Argueta, Stephanie Sanchez, Natalie Diaz and Brittany Kreps-Bullock. They also have a mascot, Brittney Salcedo, a third-grade student from Pine View Elementary.

Members of the color guard are Alix Williams, Jamie Giacinto, Alden Rodriguez, Krissey Perkins and Heather Frankenberg.

Newcomers Develop Skills

The year started with six majorettes. Then one day Ashley and Natalie asked to join.

A skeptical Dusek didn't see how bringing two new girls into a well-established group would work. Ashley and Natalie were allowed to become alternates, but the plan was they wouldn't participate in actual performances.

The two girls came to every practice.

Their skills improved.

"So they do everything with us now," Dusek said.

Steve Herring, the Pine View Middle band director, has made room for the majorettes, even though majorettes aren't something many marching bands include anymore.

"They are sort of a dying art," Herring said.

Barbara Biro of Hudson, who judges baton twirling competitions, has watched that trend for some time. She would like to see majorettes make a comeback in the high schools that eliminated them, and is optimistic a return to their once-favored status is inevitable.

"It will come back," Biro said.

In the meantime, many girls serious about baton twirling hone their techniques at private twirling academies and participate in local, regional, state, national and world competitions.

"It's just like ice skating," Biro said. "It's offered at the world level now."

Biro is the judges and coaches coordinator for the U.S. Twirling Association's Baton Council of Florida.

Some of her fondest memories are from her days as a majorette, performing with the high school band.

Later, she taught baton and competed. She owned a baton twirling studio in Ohio, and she has judged competitions for 37 years.

Biro said there are several reasons many high schools moved away from majorettes.

Fewer teachers were willing to take on the added responsibility, and many schools shifted to a drum corps style for their marching bands, with a line of girls twirling flags and rifles instead of batons. "Twirlers don't fit in with the drum corps style bands," Biro said.

Twirling A Demanding Feat

Another factor is that twirling a baton - at least twirling it with eye-catching style - is no easy task.

"It demands a lot of discipline," Biro said. "It demands a lot of your personal time. The kids want to play nowadays."

The girls of Pine View Middle are up to the challenge.

Take the aerial. Sanchez, 12, said that's one of the more difficult maneuvers. The girls toss their batons high overhead, spin around and snatch the falling batons out of the air. It's majorettes in a daring race against gravity. Sometimes gravity wins.

Kreps-Bullock, 14, remembers how she first became captivated by twirling. She was 5 and saw the movie "Miss Congeniality."

"There was a girl twirling fire batons," said Kreps-Bullock, who is co-captain of the team.

Now she twirls away. So far, she hasn't attempted fire batons. Gibbons said the middle school opts for less hazardous glow batons that work nicely at nighttime parades.

Sarabia, 13, the team captain, said she kept an eye on the majorettes when her older brother was in the band. When she arrived in middle school, she was ready to join.

As for those aerials, sure, they can be tough, but the trick is to grab a baton and go for it.

"A lot of things seem difficult until you practice," she said.

Meanwhile, Dusek reports what she considers excellent news.

Her old Kentucky high school revived the majorettes.

The twirlers rule again.

Reporter Ronnie Blair can be reached at (813) 948-4218 or rblair@tampatrib.com. Keyword: Major, to view a slide show of students twirling.

Share this:

Loading Comments...

Email Print

ADVERTISEMENT