The Kinard House Band
With the first few notes of the Beatles’ “Hard Day’s Night” underway, most of the heads in the cafeteria turned to look at the seven musicians up on the stage. Over the next half hour, the band impressed their audience with a clean medley of Beatles songs, the bluesy greatness of Sam and Dave’s “Soul Man,” the artful plucking of Lynyrd Skynyrd’s “Sweet Home Alabama” and of course everybody’s favorite request, “Freebird.”
But, the most impressive part was that these musicians are not seasoned veterans of the Fort Collins music scene as one might infer, but rather 6th, 7th and 8th graders from Kinard Middle School who just finished their debut performance in front of their peers as the Kinard House Band.
The Kinard House Band is a spearhead venture for a program called Kids Create the Music Foundation, which is designed to expand the musical opportunities available to kids at the middle school level.
“This program is a better outlet for super creative kids that don’t fit into traditional band or orchestra and need a different place to play,” said Chris Kelly, program director and DJ at KISS FM 96.1 and the foundation’s spokesperson and board member.
Though the idea has only come to fruition at Kinard, the foundation hopes to expand to four other middle schools by next fall, partnering with the existing band and orchestra programs to strengthen the musical programs all around. The options are limited in traditional band and orchestra for some students, and giving these students an alternate path will only leave more spots for other kids to be a part of the music program, Kelly said.
Though the program’s primary focus is to bring an alternate music program into Fort Collins’ middle schools that complements the existing programs, the experience the kids will recieve would be a good start for them to learn how to be in a real band later down the line, as there are not as many opportunities for band and orchestra students who wish to continue with music after high school.
“What a local music scene we’ll have in 10 years with all these kids learning these skills now,” Kelly said. “If there was something like this when I was in school I probably would still be messing around with instruments.”
The program is looking for students who already thrive on their instrument of choice and have played for much of their lives. The program will further that excellence by maintaining a high level of musicianship for all the members.
“The songs these kids are playing aren’t easy and they are very well put together,” said Jeffrey Swager, member of the foundation. “This adds a lot of musical structure for the future for them.”
“These kids are on pace with a lot of local bands already,” Kelly added. “After only two and a half months you could put any singer in town with them and they could function as a real band.”
One way the foundation is giving these kids an edge is providing quality equipment for them to play on. Each member’s instrument is electric, including the drum set and violin. This allows the kids to use inner ear sound buds during practices so they can hear each other but no one else in the school can hear them.
The Kinard House Band will shortly be playing more than just gigs for their peers at lunchtime. They will formally unveil the project and play at an Eagle’s hockey game on January 16th. The board members will be then be looking for more parent and student interest to see if they can continue with the program at other schools.
“I think it is the best thing the school has ever done. It gives people a chance to see what Kinard can do,” said Jonah Sroufe, the band’s rhythm guitarist.
“It gives us a chance to explore outside the traditional band, which I really like,” said Michelle Kramer, violinist for the band.
But it doesn’t come without hard work. The band members practice twice per week from 6:30 to 8:00 in the morning, in addition to the practices they have for the school’s band. “It was originally from 7:00 in the morning to 8:00, but the kids wanted to come earlier so they could practice more,” said Suna Thomas, who began the program at Kinard.
These kids are motivated and they have taken years and years of lessons, but where do they get to go from there, Thomas asks. “With this program, they get to perform.”
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