Military Musician

[smoothmoniker]

Ok, my head is just spinning here with how confusing this idea is, so let me tackle it a piece at a time:

1) The military bands are by audition, and they are damn hard to get into. As a bonus, you sign up for a tour of duty first, and then you get to audition to see if you make it into a band. If you don't, it's four years of mud and blood.

2) The military bands don't "play rock and roll", or at least not in any sort of sense you're thinking. They play covers, they play standards and big-band swing. They play some polite classic rock. I'd really suggest going to some of the recruiting rallies in your area to see the kind of bands that play, and to see if that's really what you want to do.

3) You're familiar with the term "Aiding and Abetting"? I don't see how you can justify pacifism with volunteering to join the military, in any capacity, even just playing your instrument at rallies to help them recruit new young grunts.

4) I don't know that military bands are really a bridge to anything. In other words, I don't know many (any, really) guys who played in military bands who then went on to have careers as musicians, either in their own projects or as sidemen.

So, think this through. Consider the worst case scenrarios. And consider the other options that are out there.

I'd rather go to community college half time (there are some in LA with unbelievable music programs - I'll gladly list some if you need a direction), rent a room for $100 from somebody, and work at a Denny's to pay my bills than risk the chance that I might end up holding a rifle, patrolling dusty roads looking for IEDs.

My information is from the old days, but back in the time, a military musician was a soldier first, a musician second. I grew up near the US Air Force Academy and used to take lessons from a member of the Air Force Band there. It was very tough for a musician to make the cut for the band, and my teacher told me that he had served for a long time as a member of the regular Air Force before finally getting into the band. The Air Force Band played stuff pretty much like SM described. I went to hear my teacher perform in it once, and they were very, very good and he did a great solo of "Flight of the Bumblebee" on the flute. The band clowned around a little on that one, and his solo ended with another band member coming up and hitting him with a fly swatter! But the music was all very mainstream - mostly big band stuff, a bit of classical, and marches just like SM said.

You will win no favor with your fellow soldiers by refusing to return enemy fire, and you may well be endangering both their lives and your own by such a refusal. If you are a Buddhist and a pacifist, working for the military will go against your soul every day that you do it.

When you say "get out of school" do you mean high school or college? If I were you, I'd study to be a music teacher. There is an absolutely wonderful local rock band here made up entirely of music teachers. They are the top band in the area and draw huge turnouts at every venue they play. It seems to me that doing something like that would be more in line with your beleifs and also allow you to have a "day job" with your music.