Art Avila and Eastwood High School

Well we got off to a busy start with the eve of percussion ensemble season rehearsals and of course jazz band 1, and newly acquired jazz 2, under the direction of John Oman. This year I had three competitive perc. ens's.: ENS III performed a piece by Nathan Daugherty called "Shock Factor", ENS II performed "Stratus" by Chris Crockarell, and my top ENS I performed "Stained Glass" by David R. Gillingham. Stained was a first for me to conduct and put together, WOW what a hard score! The kids did well: Both ENS I, and II received !st divisions at UIL and advanced to state level upon which ENS I brought home the !st Division at State! The groups went on to compete at the UTEP Percussion Festival judged by J.B. Smith, Fred Bugbee, and Mark Grimm. Ens I & II received !st divisions and ENS III a 2nd Division. Overall a GREAT percussion ensemble season, and I'm very proud of the kids.
JAZZ season was a blast, with the addition of JAZZ II, a first at EHS. I conduct the top group, and we pulled off a sweet program this year, one of my best programs in a while. We chose Azulito a Ray Santos, a HOT salsa chart made famous by Mario Bauza, we threw in elements of Son Montuno and Bomba for an intense rhythm section fueled by choreographed salsa dancing from the entire wind section, ending with the most powerfull fermatta ending you can imagine sealed by a dancing clave player tossing a clave up in the air and catching signaling the release of the note! ; a Gordon Goodwin chart called The Phat Pack, ooh what a greasy, phat blues, enough said!; and finally a trumpet suite entitled "Spanish Steps" by Steve Spiegl, featuring our 1st Chair All-State Jazz Trumpet, Steven Beatrice. The Jazz bands competed at the Hanks Jazz Festival on March 13th and 14th, bringing home 4th place out of 42 entries! Steven was awarded outstanding trumpet soloist.
As for myself, I was invited to play auxiliary percussion for El Paso's Eklectic Jazz Band under the direction of Dr. Willie Hill, from UMAS. We were fortunate enough to share the stage with Alto Saxophonist, Dave Pietro, and Al Herman, "world's fastest trombone player", who has played with the likes of Ella Fitzgerald, and Tony Bennet! A M A Z I N G experience! I am currently in the planning stages for the Second Annual, EHS/YISD Sun City Throwdown, tentatively to be held the first Saturday in November of 2009. I already have two judges confirmed, Mr. and Mrs. Matt and Amy Savage are coming down to our Sun City for a second round of the drum line battles.
On the immediate forefront, EHS Concert Bands and Jazz Band I will be traveling to San Antonio, Texas for Music Festivals in the Parks, tearing up parks like Six Flags over Texas, and Sea World from April 15-18; we are near UIL Band Contest to be held May 5 & 6, and beyond that to help close out the academic school year, we are heading towards our big percussion grand finale of the year, the 6th Annual Percussion Extravaganza, to be held on May 30th. Somewhere in the midst of all this activity, I have also begun the "7CAMPS" audition process for next year's drum line, including our upcoming freshman. Whew!
Uh...should have played flute!....uh...NOT!

Long live Maynard!
Art Avila, Jr.

Badassdrumming is giving away T-shirts, shoulder bags and CDs

Biggest Drumming Event to hit El Paso, TX and Badassdrumming is part of it. We will be giving away t-shirts, shoulder bags and CDs with the ebook Big Book of Scales and bonus material.

The 1st Annual Sun City Throw Down is scheduled for Saturday, November 1, 2008 at the El Paso County Coliseum located at 4100 East Paisano Street. This event is presented by the Ysleta IDS Fine Arts Department & Eastwood High School and sponsoring companies Promark Drumsticks, Mapex Drums and Badassdrumming.com.

This all day event starts at 9 AM and will feature schools in competition facing 3 top aujudicators in the drumming arena and master clinics by endorsed artists from Promark and other companies.

Be sure to hold to your tickets because there will be giveaways and prizes from several companies. Even if you don't win you can save money when you buy items from these companies at this event.

Tickets are $3.00 for Students and $5.00 for Adults for this all day event. For more information call (915) 434-4033.

This information is being brought to you courtesy of Badassdrumming.com.

Art Avila, Promark Sticks endorsed, brings a new drum lesson to Badassdrumming

August 2008

Art Avila, endorsed by Promark Sticks and Badassdrumming.com, has delivered a doozy of a workout to try called X-BOX Template. This is a workout everyone can benefit from. Click the name to see it.

This thing is just sick. Cheeses, flams, flam drags, flam 5's, diddles, pataflaflas, Swiss Army Triplets and more. This is a non-ending workout for any drummer out there.

Become a member of www.badassdrumming.com for free and get more of this from Art and our other endorsed drummers.