Let's take a brief intermission from our Best Picture movie review to give a shout-out to some current Father Ryan students and alumni who have brought a great honor to our school.
As you know when we were attending Father Ryan back in the 1960s, there wasn't anything that even resembled a band program. I believe someone once took a big bass drum out of the student section and marched up and down the field making some noise with it at halftime. Normally, our football games were pretty quiet affairs musically, especially when we played M.B.A., which didn't have a band either (and still doesn't).
However, today (and for several years now) Father Ryan High School has had an award-winning, nationally recognized band program. The latest achievement came last month when the FRHS Winter Drumline took the silver medal at the World Championships in Dayton, Ohio.
Father Ryan has a tradition of doing well in this competition. But what made finishing second in the world this season an even greater accomplishment was the fact that just a few months ago, it appears the FRHS Drumline would have to be disbanded because of a lack of students to participate.
That's when several alumni members stepped up and came back to Nashville for several weekends to re-join the Drumline and prepare for the World competition.
And compete they did. Despite being placed in the Independent category, where they had to go up against drumlines from major universities like Penn State and George Mason, the Irish made it happen. Among those stepping up were a number of freshmen and sophomore members of the Drumline who refused to be intimidated while going up against college-age rivals in the World Championships.
Performing a very difficult program based on a professional wrestling theme, the Ryan Drumline proved once again to be a crowd favorite at the event. After placing 5th in the preliminaries, the team moved up to second place in the finals to earn the Silver Medal...
As they hold the World Championship Silver trophy, you can see the joy on the faces of these Ryan alumni who came back to help year's Drumline. They are the living proof of why alumni support is so vital to our school, and how if our alums support our current students at FRHS, there is no limit to what can be accomplished.
Perhaps that something we should keep in mind the next time an Annual Fund letter hits our mailboxes. (End of sermon)
To close this salute to the success of our Winterline Drumline, here's an excerpt from their 2009 routine, courtesy of YouTube....
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