You're all in tune.
This one is on the card on the screen.
All right, and on the phone, and on.
How far are you?
I'm going to go back home.
Oh, what do you do with the shot?
It looks nice, right?
Yeah.
And if you touch it...
Oh, your dollar is not right here.
It's winning all off.
It's at 3,200, but...
Oh, it is.
Yeah.
But go to...
There's a white balance button on the top right,
those three buttons.
And then go to...
You click that, and then...
Yeah, I got it.
There should be one that says adjust or something.
No, you did.
But it was at 3,200?
No.
It looked like yellow.
Really?
I wonder where it was.
And if you touch it...
I don't know what it was.
Yeah, if you touch his face, that would be the focus.
No.
Okay.
You could...
Oh, yeah.
Yeah, there's...
I just figured I was just going to shoot it when they're not there,
and then...
Do a mask.
Yeah.
As long as it's just not, like, in a second with a chair,
you know what I'm saying?
Like, if there's things out, like, not in the way of the lighting,
then they'll leave you to mask it out.
Yeah.
All right.
Okay.
Uh...
Okay, I'll move on.
Yep.
I'm good.
All right.
Corey, give me a good little hand clap.
Hand clap.
Thank you, sir.
We'll use on B, too.
You know what I like about it.
Corey, pay.
Um, UW...
Let me start there.
I said your name wrong.
Hang on a second.
Let me just...
I'm hearing a little crack on.
Where is it?
Oh, it fell down?
Oh, okay.
I'm just hitting the black sweater.
I won't do it.
That's fine.
Oh, that's really tight.
Oh, no.
Oh, am I still on?
Oh, no, no.
Okay.
They might have to start wearing these clothes.
Oh, yeah.
I'm going to want those extra little moments.
I mean, I'm going to want it, but...
Okay.
I just want to make sure I'm maximizing it.
All right.
I don't want it.
All right.
We're all good now.
All right.
One more.
All right.
One more.
All right.
One more.
One more hand clap for it, Corey.
Thank you, sir.
Corey Pompey, UW Music.
What?
I said that wrong.
It's not funny, man.
It's PBS.
We don't laugh around here.
Another clap?
No.
Oh, okay.
Corey's like, what do I do now?
Corey Pompey, UW Music Director.
Band Director.
What's your name?
It's Band Director, right?
UW Band Director.
I am one of the band directors here.
Yes.
I know, man.
Corey Pompey, UW Band Director.
Welcome to Band Focus.
Glad to be here.
Thank you for having me.
I appreciate you making time.
You and I chatted a little bit online for one of my graduate school projects, and I just
thought, wow, that'd be a great guy to chat with.
Let me start here, man.
Music.
How do you follow the music?
Well, you know, I always loved it.
You know, growing up, listening to the radio with my mother's driving in the car and,
you know, music and church and different things like that.
So I always liked it and wanted to do it.
And because of the public school system that we had, there was an opportunity to get into
it, and it just kind of grew from there.
And what is it about music that made you say, wow, this is something I want to do kind
of for the rest of my life.
It's a passion, basically.
It is a passion.
I enjoy it.
It makes me happy.
It makes me feel good.
And, you know, it's mostly fun.
Not always fun, but mostly fun.
And so, over time, I thought, you know, this is something that I would like to do for a
living.
Yeah.
And as we sit in this beautiful space at the animal theater here, you get any vibes when
you walk into a place like this?
Oh, yeah.
I mean, you know, the ambiance of the place is just great.
And when I walk in here, I know that something good is about to happen.
And it's worth pointing out that we're sitting in, you know, the baby space.
Yes.
We're the recital hall.
Yes.
Yeah.
And I see we've got a piano set up here like you're going to do something.
I don't know what you got.
You don't want to hear me play piano.
Trust me.
What is your main instrument?
My main instrument was the saxophone.
Oh, I did too.
I played saxophone.
Okay.
Really.
Awesome.
And do you still pick it up?
No, no, no.
You've got to get out there and show those youngsters how we do it.
This is how we do it.
I don't have time, unfortunately.
Of course, you don't have time to get out there and high step and show them.
If I get up there and high step, I'll linger myself.
Now, one of the interesting things I thought that we've had a little bit about was this
was a job that you didn't really plan for.
It was something you kind of saw yourself falling into.
How was that?
Well, you know, my predecessor, Mike LeCrum, was here for 50 years.
Mike LeCrum, did they know him around here?
Oh, yeah.
Of course they know him.
You know, interestingly enough, I saw him the other night.
You know, he's done a lot for the band program and a lot for the university.
And so me not wanting to be here didn't have anything to do with him as a person or anything
like that, but just the fact that any time you're walking into a position where the person
before you has been there 50 years, at least I think most normal people would want to think
twice about doing that.
I mean, you're really talking about the Tom Brady of college bands.
Mm-hmm.
Absolutely.
I mean, how do you follow Tom Brady?
Bill Belichick couldn't answer that question, could he?
And I was afraid that I might not be able to answer that question.
So for those reasons, I did not initially seek out this opportunity.
What made you change, man?
Well, you know, I got a phone call.
And I don't want to make it seem like I was special because I got a phone call.
The reality of it is, dozens upon dozens of people, if not hundreds of people, got the
same phone call that I got, which was, will you consider applying for this position?
What I know to be true is if I had not gotten that phone call, I would not have applied
for the position because it's not like I didn't know it was open.
You know, as soon as Mike said he was retiring, words spread like wildfire in the profession.
So it's not like I didn't know that it was open.
I just wasn't interested in it.
And so, you know, that phone call kind of changed everything.
Yeah.
And where does a position directing the University of Wisconsin marching band fit in the realm
of marching band types of jobs?
Like, why did you want, once you kind of started looking, we're seriously at it?
Well, you know, when I think of the University of Wisconsin, we're talking about a very prestigious
University, both in terms of academics and what it does in terms of athletics.
And then I was very familiar with the band program here.
Not just the marching band, but the other bands too, and the history of the band program.
So there's a significant history here that even predates Mike LaChrome when we're talking about the band profession.
And then, of course, there's, you know, a reputable school of music.
And so all of those things played into my decision.
And when I got that phone call, I must confess that it wasn't an immediate, yes, I will apply there.
In fact, when I hung up the phone, I was fairly certain that I was not going to apply.
And so then, you know, over time you start to thinking, okay, it is the University of Wisconsin.
It's in the big 10.
And when we're talking about big 10 and marching bands, collegiate marching bands, this is the conference
where it all started.
So there's, you know, some great, for lack of a better term, prestige associated with being associated with a program like this
and having the opportunity to work with a program like this.
So over time, you start thinking about all of these things and eventually you get to a place where you say, okay, it would not hurt to apply.
And if they don't call me, they don't call me.
I've got a job.
I was happy.
I wasn't looking to leave, which is one of the good things.
It's always nice when you've got a job and you don't feel like you have to leave that job.
So that was the position I was in.
I didn't have anything to lose, so we tried it.
Yeah.
So, and how many strong are you marching these days?
How many do you have out there?
We're about 290.
Okay.
It's about where we are.
We give a take a few.
How do you manage all that musically?
Oh, it's tough.
It's very tough.
But, you know, we try to have systematic rehearsals throughout the week.
You know, we, during the pre-season process, we're working on our warm-ups.
We're building up our chops and different things like that.
So, the hope is that you've got a system in place that allows you to be able to learn a large volume of music quickly and hopefully at a high quality.
Now, I read that Dr. Macron was notorious for remembering names and cities where students came from.
Yes.
Corey, is this something that you've taken that on?
You know, all the band members by name and where they're from?
That's a dream that I have.
And every year, I say, I'm going to do better than I did the last year.
So, I know a lot of names.
I do not confess that I can name every single person if you ask me to.
Faces, I'm good.
Even in my, even in life outside of band.
That's an issue that I have.
What's my name?
Well, I know your name.
What did you say?
It was Merv.
But, but, you know, the thing is, there are people in my life that I've known.
Camera one?
What?
I get you.
James.
What was it?
You're getting it.
It was Elle.
Elle.
Good start.
Elle.
Okay.
What I'm saying is, you know, there are people that I've known for years and years and years.
I know the face.
I can tell you everything about them.
I can tell you conversations we had.
But, if you ask me the name, I'm going to struggle.
And then, when I'm not doing anything, not thinking about it, all of a sudden, it'll come to me.
I don't know why you seem like you have a chip on your shoulder about remembering that.
No chip.
But it is a gift that my cat, that, or has, that I wish I had.
Yeah.
And does he, does he have his hand at all in terms on things that you're doing musically?
No, he's great.
You know, he, he, he is one of our biggest cheerleaders and supporters.
But, but, but when he stepped aside, he stepped aside.
And he's available if I have questions or, or I want to know something or, or the something
historically that I'm trying to find out.
He's great about that.
But, but unless I ask.
What's the biggest thing that he's giving you as a chip?
You know, it's interesting.
When I first got the job, the band directors, Mike and I,
we had breakfast and this was my first time getting to know him and, and different things
like that.
And someone leaned over and said, Mike, do you have any advice for Corey?
Mike shook his head and said, no.
So as you can imagine, I'm sitting there thinking, oh goodness, what, what does this mean?
And then after dramatic pause, I would say, he said, no, do what you know how to do.
And that's been the, the best advice that I got from him.
Because if I tried to be him, I would, I would fail.
And I would fail miserably.
So I really appreciated him telling me that you do what you know how to do.
And he also mentioned in that breakfast that the previous director, or major director,
because there was some, some, a transition period.
But, but the previous major, major figure in the band program did the same for him.
Yeah.
I'm curious to know, in terms of the work that goes into preparing for a, you know, performance
on a halftime in front of 80,000 folks, just in person.
What kind of work you guys put into prepare for just one of those halftime shows?
How much time do I have?
You know, we start in the spring.
And so pretty soon, within the next few weeks, we're going to send a survey out to the students
in the band asking them what music they would like to play.
And then we'll get the survey, we'll go through it, and we'll find some ideas that way.
Did that matter to you?
Oh, it, it, it, it, we do listen to it.
Now, that's not to say every single thing that we played came from their ideas.
But if I look at the, the shows that we did in the fall, most of them were ideas that,
that students, I'm presented.
And often when, when it's really great is when I'm thinking about something or something
the staff member thinks about, is thinking about something.
And then you find out several students are also thinking about the same thing.
And so we can kind of be on the same, the same page.
And that way, for example, I was really interested in doing a Frank Sinatra show.
And a lot of the students were interested in doing the Frank Sinatra show.
So we did Frank Sinatra.
So those, those surveys are very, very important.
And, and we, we take them seriously.
We go through them and, and try to find ideas that we think will work.
Again, that's not to say every single suggestion in there makes this way into the field.
And, and that's not to say that we play things that were not in that survey.
But, but there's a, a, a healthy mix.
So that happens in the spring.
And then from there, we hear from the athletic department on such and such date,
you are going to have this much time for half time.
Well, it depends.
You know, for us, ten minutes is, is a good number.
Sometimes it can be as high as twelve or as low as six or seven.
Depending on what they've got going for that week or, or the theme that they're needing to push.
So once we have an idea of what the repertoire is going to be for the fall,
then we, we try to, to slot things in in various places.
And then this is just a matter of creating those arrangements and, and different things like that.
And we are doing this throughout the entire summer.
This is what's happening behind the scenes.
And we know it's called marching band.
Yes.
So which is more important, the music or the marching?
You're trying, you're trying to get me in trouble here.
I'll answer that question very shortly.
But just so that people have an idea of how much preparation goes into getting ready,
we rehearse nearly ten hours a week for game days.
And it takes that much time to get ready.
So if we've got a one-week preparation, we've put in nearly ten hours.
If we've got a two-week preparation meaning, a one-week preparation would be,
you had a game on Saturday, you come in on Tuesday, and you've got another game on Saturday.
And that's all the time you get.
If we've got a two-week preparation meaning there's a weekend between, that takes about twenty hours.
When you have 290 plus folks playing music like that, can you hear a wrong note from that one horn?
Yes.
Most of the time, I'm not going to confess that I can hear it all the time.
But often, often.
Is everything just shut down at that point?
No, it doesn't shut down.
You know, they'll hear it, and they can correct it on their own,
but if you hear it too many times at that point, you have to say, all right, we need to double check this.
Now you asked a question a few moments ago that I say, oh yes, I remember now.
In an ideal world, the marching and the music will have equal footing, and they will be both grand.
Why do you have that evil grin on your face right now?
Well, you know, I'm also a musician.
You know?
And so, you know, if you're asking my personal feeling, my personal feeling is that the music is the most important thing.
However, not everybody feels that way.
Not even within our organization.
And so, it's...
Well, I also read too that when Dr. LaCrona was here, when he first took over, he was known for creating this band that was more athletic than other bands that were out there.
Yes.
What does that involve?
It involves a lot of practice, and a lot of refinement.
So bands were doing a high step in and that kind of stuff.
Well, you know, bands were doing the high step.
You know, bands were doing the high step.
His innovation was how we do the high step.
Because if you look at the HBCUs, they all high step from the most part.
From the most southern university.
Yes, yes indeed.
The human jukebox.
Yes, the human jukebox.
But they don't high step in the same way that we do.
And no other big 10 high steps in the same way that we do.
So that was his innovation and contribution to the band, which is significant.
And we spend an inordinate amount of time perfecting that and making sure that we're
able to play the music and execute the step at the same time.
Is it hard to get on as a band member here at the UW?
It's challenging.
It really depends on the section.
That a student wants to be in.
For example, in our band, the trumpets and trombones are the largest section.
By far, there's not even close.
And so if I'm a trumpet player and I'm interested in getting in the UW band, that's not as
difficult as someone that is interested in playing clarinet.
You know, so for example, we've got a nearly 100 trumpet players, but clarinets, they're
in the low teens.
So it's much more difficult to get in the band as a clarinet player than it is to get in
the trump as a trumpet player, just because of the sheer numbers.
Having said that, you know, we try to take as many people as we can.
And if someone shows musical aptitude and we have space, we'll often train them on another
instrument.
Are they all in scholarships or how does that work?
That is a dream of mine.
Another dream.
That is a dream of mine.
No, they're not on scholarship.
And so the students in the band do it because they love it.
Now we have a handful of awards or so, but those aren't scholarships.
Those are just a donor, you know, wants to award someone for meritorious service, but
it's only a year.
That's not what I'm talking about.
I'm talking about where if you make the marching band, we're in a position to say you're going
to get this much money every year for four years.
We don't have that.
And that is a dream of mine to be able to do something like that.
I'd love to hear your perspective on what it feels like to be standing on a ten foot
ladder in front of all those people, you know, controlling all that music.
What's that feeling like for you?
I hope you couldn't hear that.
My stomach is growling.
It's almost lunchtime.
I hope it didn't make it into making it into making it.
You could hear it?
Okay, good.
There's growl that was going through here.
It's hard to describe.
Because it's what I do, and I don't think about it.
You know, I enjoy it.
You know, when we perform for thousands of thousands of people, it's an enjoyable experience.
And I love it when I feel like the band is kicking on all cylinders.
And so I'm very proud of the students at that point.
But I don't know how I would describe it beyond that.
Do you get that rock star sensation that you always hear people talk about?
No.
You feel like they're drilling?
Does that get into you?
I try not to let the adrenaline get into me.
I try as best I can to be even killed about what we're getting ready to do.
That's not to say I'm not excited.
Now, I'm not talking about the act of leading the music and conducting the music.
That's a totally different thing.
I'm just talking about getting ready to go and doing what we do.
And then the bands just perform.
We're done.
And now we've got to go to the next phase.
That's kind of what I'm talking about.
It's just, you know, what I do.
And it's interesting, too, that I'm having such a difficult time describing that.
Because, you know, I step on the football field every week.
And I know that it's a special place.
I know that it's a historic place.
I know these things.
But for me, I'm just stepping on the football field.
I'm getting ready to work.
But then you see someone that has the opportunity to step on the football field that has never been on the football field.
In that place.
In that time.
And it's a totally different experience for them.
And so that's kind of what I'm trying to get at when I say it's what I do.
And I do it every day.
And I don't think about it.
It's probably a much different experience for someone that doesn't do it as regularly.
And then has the opportunity to stand in front of those people and lead them.
That's not to say I'm ungrateful.
I'm very, very grateful and very fortunate to be in this position.
But it's a way of life more so than anything else.
It's just what we do.
And you brought up the HBCU's and the band tradition at some of those schools down there.
And you know, having gone to one, you know, a lot of times the band is a bigger deal than the football team.
Or the basketball teams that they played for.
So when I go to UW games, my friends literally make fun of me because I'm focused on that band.
And there's a certain level of tradition that comes with that.
But I'm wondering if the UW band is getting that kind of reputation for itself.
And I know it has been in a certain sense.
But is it getting to that level where the band is sometimes bigger than the sport?
Careful with that.
Yeah, I have to be very careful.
I don't dare say that the band is bigger than the sport.
However, I talk to a lot of people every week that for them, the band is bigger than the sport.
And now I've tried to decide if I'm going to say what I'm going to say.
So I'm going to say it.
You know, when everybody's winning, everybody's happy.
But when the team loses, the band wins.
And people are very appreciative of that.
I think I know what you mean by that because we've lost a lot in basketball when I was in college.
And we lost a lot in football when I was in college.
But man, when that band came on, we got all about the losing.
Because the music was so good.
So I understand what you're saying.
Well, you know, we want the band to be a point of pride for everybody in there.
And so we work very hard to be consistent from week to week.
Well, I shouldn't like that's a lie.
Because we don't want to be consistent for a week to week.
We always want to get better as the week progresses.
But the point I'm trying to make is we want to be the best that we can be.
And we want to put a product that makes people proud.
And sometimes when things are not going as well athletically,
as we all would like it to be, we're fortunate that for a lot of people,
they can still point to the band and be proud of it.
Yeah.
And we all know that the UW band has arms and a lot of different activities,
ball, basketball, hockey.
Give us a sense of all the different avenues you guys have in terms of how you support
some of the different sports around campus.
Yeah, it's quite tough.
We perform for six sports, football being the big one.
And then you've got men and women's basketball,
you've got women's volleyball, then men and women's hockey.
And so we try to do as much as we can for all of those sports.
And now occasionally, we're not occasionally often,
we're not able to do as much as we would like to do,
or as much as people would like to see us do.
And that's mainly because, you know, there are students.
There's a finite amount of things that we can do.
So we really have to be careful that we're not overextending the students.
How do you balance the playlists for those different sports?
How does that differ?
That's a good question.
And so we have a fairly lengthy list in terms of our repertoire.
And so whoever is on deck for a particular sport,
meaning whoever's leading, for example, I do a lot of men's basketball.
And so when I'm looking at the set list for men's basketball,
I'm looking at, well, what might people enjoy listening to?
And then I'm also looking at tried and true UW tunes.
And how do we mix that with newer repertoire that people might enjoy?
Because if I'm not careful, I can play an entire list of just tried and true UW tunes,
which people appreciate, but we'd also like to play some other things too.
And so, you know, did we play it at the last game?
If we did, maybe we don't play it at this game.
So it's different things like that that go into it.
But basically, for all of us, meaning the instructional staff and I,
when we go to an athletic event, we try to create a varied list.
Now, for some of our sports, there are some things you've got to play no matter what.
If we're playing a men's hockey game, they've got to have the theme for a mod.
They've got to have jumping at the wood side and things like that.
Because if they're not there, then it's not a men's hockey game,
or at least not from the standpoint of the band.
And so, there are things we have to do to balance that.
Or, you know, at the football game, we do the fifth quarter,
and we don't do swing town or something like that, you know.
We're going to hear it.
Yep.
How are you going to tell them guys?
I forgot to have somebody come down.
Oh.
Where are we at?
About 20.
Oh, that's a good question.
You're curious.
Oh, yeah.
I'm going to look at the number one, or the title.
Um.
First one.
Uh.
Oh, I think it's okay.
Well, that'd be, you know, you can't be at 30 already.
Maybe.
This is whatever you want.
I'm good.
You just started the game?
Yeah.
Change.
Yeah.
Yeah, that makes me worried.
Does it make you sure it's 30 and not 15?
No, it's definitely 30.
Okay.
Um.
It couldn't make us.
It's been a very natural conversation.
I'm sorry, Cory, that now I've got this off the lake.
That's fine.
This is poor guy.
We've made our mark.
Yeah, that's better.
It was all that feeler buster.
That's at least what he did.
Yeah.
I was, you bring up a good point talking about some of the
traditions that take place with the music here at the University of Wisconsin.
How do you balance the tradition, um, and also balance style and creating
style of the music?
Cause I know you have a certain song with varsity and things like that.
You have to play, you get the two.
And I remember being a kid going to basketball games and just, you know,
seeing, you know, the drum kits and things like that inside the arena,
which we don't see that when you're, you know, at a football game.
Mm-hmm.
But how do you balance the tradition with the style when it comes to playing the music?
I think you just do the best that you can, which I know is not a good answer.
But, but, but, you know, I, as long as the traditions are honored,
there is space to introduce new things.
And so it's much more difficult if you just throw all the tradition out and
come in with all the new stuff.
That, that, that doesn't work.
And so, you know, as long as everything's being honored,
then there is latitude to be able to, to, um, do some new things.
I think that's the best way I can describe it, really.
Yeah.
And I go back to something else representing Dr. McCrum.
When he came on board, one of the things he said he wanted to do is to create an
Ed Sullivan type of show experience in terms of, uh, how he created the music.
Any thoughts on what you're creating and what your legacy will be?
You know, interestingly enough, I don't think a whole lot about legacy.
I certainly hope that, that when my time is done here, that people will be proud of
the work that has taken place.
That they will recognize the UW band as being the UW band.
In other words, yes, there's a different director now.
But the band that they know and love is still playing music at a high level is
marching at a high level.
Um, and so those are the kinds of things that I think about.
I know there are things that I would like to do.
For example, I mentioned, yes, I would like to see our students get some kind of
scholarship for, for everything that they do.
But I don't consider that as part of a legacy that I left necessarily.
That's just something I would like the students to be able to have.
It's something that I think the students deserve.
Now, unfortunately, I'm not a millionaire there because if I was, I'd just make it happen.
But, you know, I hold out hope that at some point in the future, something like that
will happen.
And so, you know, I'll, I'll leave the legacy to other people.
But my hope is that we've done good work that people can be proud of.
I'm pretty sure that if you were able to pull that off while you're here, that 60 years
from now, people would be like, yeah, it's going to be a little Scottish.
2028.
Well, I'd love to be able to do that if we can.
Now, I know you guys got the big spring concert.
Yes.
What's the significance of the spring concert?
How big of a deal is that?
The spring concert is a very, very big deal.
For one thing, we've been doing it for nearly 50 years.
And this is an event that has just grown over time.
And I don't know of any other major band program that does an event quite like the way we do it.
Now, there are a lot of band programs that have indoor concerts.
But the way we do the indoor concert, that is unique to us.
And that's what makes it special because, you know, when we're at a football game, you know,
our goal is to entertain the crowd.
But on some level, well, I take that back.
We're there in service of the football team and the athletic program.
You know, we're in the stands.
We're being supportive.
No matter what the score is, our job is to bring the energy, keep the energy.
Now, when we go to halftime and different things like that, our goal is to perform for the people
and show them a good time.
But at the end of the day, they're there for a football game.
When we're at the spring concert, all of those people are there because they love the band.
And they're there to support the band.
And so everything that we are doing for that particular event is only in service of the music.
And it gives people an opportunity to hear the band in a different way.
Because when we're out on the field, we're in terms of the acoustic, we're outdoors.
And it's very difficult to fill up the stadium the way that we want to.
There's not much subtlety.
You know, we can't play very soft.
People don't want to, won't be able to hear us.
But if we get indoors, you know, that gives our palate increases.
And there are things that we're able to do musically, that as much as I wish, we could do them at the football games.
As much as I insist that we do do them at football games, there's a practicality to it.
If that makes sense, what I'm saying.
And so in that event, in that particular environment, you have a chance to hear the music in a different way.
And we also have the opportunity to bring in these other production elements to enhance what we're doing musically.
And so to me, that's what's really special.
That people are spending their hard-earned dollars to