Mark French For Congress issued the following announcement on Nov 13.
As anyone who has been in Butte on St. Patrick’s Day and the Fourth of July knows, the Mining City likes to throw a parade like nobody’s business.
On Thanksgiving, one Butte resident will be embodying that tradition as he picks up his mellophone and marches down the streets of New York City during Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade on Nov. 28.
Marching in the parade will be Butte High student Derek Bane-Parsons, who will join around 200 other students from across the U.S. to be part of Macy's Great American Marching Band.
Bane-Parsons, a 15-year-old sophomore, took time away from band class Tuesday to speak with The Montana Standard.
“Music has been basically my whole life,” said the 15-year-old, who plays 14 instruments, including his two main instruments, the French horn and the mellophone, along with the trumpet, several types of saxophones, the guitar and the euphonium.
“The official term is euphoniumist, but you can put euphonium player,” he said Tuesday.
In addition to playing in band, he also plays for Butte High’s jazz band, at football and basketball games, and in the Butte Community Band, among other musical pursuits. Recently, he had an opportunity to play in the University of Montana’s High School All-Star Band and Orchestra, which consists of select students from across the northwest United States and Canada.
On Nov. 28, Bane-Parsons will be playing the mellophone before millions of onlookers. The Thanksgiving parade typically has over 20 million viewers on NBC in addition to the throngs of spectators that show up to watch the parade in person.
“I best describe the mellophone as a cross between a French horn and trumpet, being tuned and sounding a lot like the marching version of a French horn while also using a trumpet mouthpiece,” said Bane-Parsons, describing the instrument he’ll play during the parade.
Bane-Parsons said his first instrument was guitar, which he started playing in first or second grade through the Young Musician's Club of Butte, a local nonprofit that provides inexpensive music lessons to children and adults.
From there, he went on to the violin and the ukulele. He started playing his first wind instrument around sixth grade, at which time he took up the alto saxophone. French horn came next, followed by forays into trumpet, cornet, euphonium, baritone sax and more. Today he also dabbles in percussion.
Bane-Parsons said he learned to play music through a combination of lessons and self-teaching. Some of the instruments he plays have similar fingering, but each instrument is unique.
“A lot of them have similarities, but none of them are exactly the same,” he said, adding that he can’t name a single instrument as his favorite.
“If I had one (favorite), I wouldn’t play 14.”
Bane-Parsons said playing in NYC is definitely something he’s looking forward to. He visited the city for the first time in eighth grade. “And I just fell in love with New York City and the lights and the buildings.”
Also looking forward to the 15-year-old’s performance are Bane-Parsons’ parents, Clay and Dana.
Clay described his son as a soft-spoken, down-to-earth kid.
“Music is a wonderful thing,” Clay said Tuesday when asked about the experience of watching his son immerse himself in music.
“He’s good at it and he loves it,” he added, praising Butte High for its music department and the enrichment it provides to students.
When his son isn’t playing music, Clay said he can be found helping out on the family ranch and with the family’s drilling business, running tractors and dump trucks during the summer. He said nothing seems to scare his son, including the messy business of ranching, and he’s willing to try just about anything.
Bane-Parson’s band teacher, Jean Perusich, nominated him to be part of Macy's Great American Marching Band. In order to play for the band, he had to send in a video documenting his playing and marching skills.
Perusich described her student as a hard worker, diligent student, and “fine musician.”
“He’s serious about his music,” Perusich said Tuesday.
Bane-Parsons hopes to study music composition after high school, and he says encountering different perspectives is one of the most intriguing and rewarding aspects of being part of the music world.
“Music is a language. And everybody speaks the language a little bit differently,” he said. “So no matter what musician you meet or what teacher you meet, or anybody who has any relation to music whatsoever, everybody’s going to be able to have a different take on it.”
Original source here.
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