By Craig Morgan, thesundevils.com Writer
TEMPE, Ariz. -- Jim Hudson has been a part of many major halftime productions, including the Orange Bowl, the Sugar Bowl, the BCS National Championship Game and two Super Bowls. Nothing compares to this weekend's assignment.
"I never thought I'd write a drill for 850 people," Arizona State's Director of Athletic Bands said. "This is a once-in-a-lifetime kind of thing we're doing and we have one chance to do it right."
The Sun Devil Marching Band will celebrate its 100th anniversary at Saturday's football homecoming game against Washington at Sun Devil Stadium. Almost 500 band alumni are expected to attend with 410 of them marching (the others will be in the stands) with ASU's current 404 band members in a halftime performance that Hudson and others have been planning and scripting for years.
Alumni from 27 states, the District of Columbia and countries as far away as Japan will be on hand for the weekend celebration, which began with an informal gathering at a local restaurant on Thursday evening and concludes with a picnic at Tempe's Kiwanis Park on Sunday.
"I saw on our Facebook page the other day that there are at least 100 couples who met during band; I met my wife there," said Travis Breedlove, the Devil's Horns Alumni Club President. "We've got all these relationships that came about because of band, we've got second and third generations in band so this weekend is special. It's a celebration because we really are a big family."
Breedlove and Bridget Arneson, Associate Director for Sun Devil Club Events and a former Sun Devil Marching Band member, have been so consumed with the planning of the event that they haven't had time to take a step back and admire what they have pulled off.
"I'm trying to," Arneson said, laughing. "I really am excited that we’re doing this and have worked so hard at it because we're recognizing a monumental achievement.
"We had never broken 200 alumni in attendance for homecoming so when we started planning this, the goal was 400 and we were hoping to get 350. All of the sudden, it got to 500 and we were like, 'wow, now what do we do?'"
One of the biggest challenges for the planning staff is how to move such a large mass of people. It will begin when the alumni band moves from sections 246 and 247 to the stadium ramp near the start of the second quarter, in preparation for its march onto the field.
When the halftime show begins, however, Hudson's planning will take center stage.
"The limited real estate alone is hard to manage and perfect the movements, especially with so little rehearsal time," he said. "Making it efficient for everyone to get from Point A to Point B has been a challenge but it's doable.
"There's a lot of drop-2s and drop-4s, mostly simple movements with a couple of scatter drills to get them into the SDMB logo we'll form."
Movements are a celebrated part of a band's pageantry, and Hudson has another surprise he's keeping close to the vest until he's certain he can pull it off, but his greatest concern is that "wall of sound" the band will create.
Hudson organized a music committee with the help of Michael Thompson, the voice of the Sun Devil Marching Band. The idea was to include music from the various generations of bands, so the committee did plenty of research and also jumped on iTunes to discern the most downloaded songs from the Sun Devil Marching Band website.
The performance will begin with the start of Earth Wind & Fire's "In The Stone" and then move into the band's "Let's Groove."
The middle song will be Louis Prima's "Sing, Sing, Sing," a piece the band has consistently played throughout the years that will feature its behemoth drum line and all the winds.
"So Very Hard to Go" by Tower of Power and Stan Kenton's "Los Suerta De Los Tantos" will close the performance.
It's a historically correct program," said Hudson, who looked all the way back to original band director Lillian Williams (1915-17) for inspiration. "There will be at least two tunes that everyone has played, just maybe not in the same arrangements because I put my special sauce on it and wrote all the charts."
When it's all over the committee will breathe a collective sigh of relief and then celebrate with all of the attendees and their families at Kiwanis Park the next day.
"It will be sad when it's over because it's been five years in the planning," Breedlove said.
"I have always said the best thing I did in college was join the marching band," Arneson added. "I had a hard time finding a place to fit in at ASU and make my mark, but band always provided that group for me. It was a heart-warming way to feel small in such a huge school so it’s great to celebrate this.
"It's going to be a brouhaha!"