“When I’m doing visuals during the show, I feel more powerful than just marching up and down the field,” junior Jon Long said. “It’s hard enough marching and playing at the same time, so when you add the visuals and can still play the music, I feel like I can put more of my heart and soul into the show.”

The marching band hired an outside arranger to assemble visuals for this year’s marching show and halftime performance.

Band director Barbara Streit, said KISD Fine Arts director Monte Mast recommended visual arranger J.C. Caseras.

“Mr. Mast is regularly involved with Drum Corps International and suggested Mr. Caseras to us,” Streit said. “Mr. Caseras is from Texas so he understands competitions in our area. He has also worked with several professional drum corps in several aspects.”

A visual arranger makes a more integrated sense of visuals in the marching show, Streit said.

“An arranger writes drill for the most part, which is where and how the band moves on the field,” she said. “He is also in charge of colorguard costumes, flag designs and anything that adds an element to the eye. He will help all the visuals work together to help the feeling and flow of our show.”

Caseras grew up in Texas but currently lives in Portland, Oregon.

“We wanted to hire someone with knowledge about our competitions,” Streit said. “Even though the long distance would be a difficulty, we wanted to work with him because of the impressive reviews we heard.”
The new visual aspects have been received well by other band members, according to Long.

“I can tell that other kids feel we are moving in the right direction,” Long said. “The show is very interesting this year, but also very challenging. People are interested by the new visuals and want to have a really good show, so they are inspired to work really hard.”

According to Long, there are multiple visuals going on at once during the show.

“In the past, the whole band has done the same visuals all at once,” Long said. “This year, different parts of the band are doing different visuals at different times. For example, at one part, there’s a curve of trumpets facing the end zone standing in a pose, while a trumpet quartet closer to the middle of the field is doing separate visuals of their own while playing music, while the rest of the band is doing a completely different combination of visuals. I feel that the audience will get a better overall effect from the show.”

Streit said she thinks Caseras adds a new flare to their routine.

“We have used visual arrangers in the past, from 2002 to 2007,” Streit said. “[Band director Jason] Nitsch has arranged the visuals since then to the present. He has done an exceptional job, but we feel that with a visual arranger we would be able to go above and beyond our toughest competition in the area.”

According to Streit, the band plans to hire a visual arranger again in the future.

“I think [the students] know that we are going from the fairly simple show we had last year to a much more complex show this year,” Streit said. “Almost all of the bands in our immediate area hire visual arrangers. We want to be one of the top band programs in the area and judging from the high-quality job Mr. Caseras has done, I think we can achieve that now and in the future.”