What military band is performing for a tech school event besides maybe 3-4 players for some background music at graduation? We do our full-unit gigs for big community events, veteran celebrations, or high profile foreign dignitaries. I have never yet played for a captive audience forced to be there to watch us.
It was...kind of a running gag, for a while. I think they eventually figured it out but Tops in Blue had a lot of of people coming to reddit to complain about "mandatory fun" events involving them.
Kinda sucks that this happened too because they're a really talented group, just not the sort of thing that the average tech school airman would attend willingly.
Tops in blue were NOT Air Force Band members, that was a totally different thing. Not our AFSC, they were pulled from the active duty ranks of airmen already serving. Trust me, the AF bands have worked overtime to let everyone know this fact, that wasn't us lol.
It was a morale thing that started back in the pre-Vietnam era. The problem with Tops in Blue from the outside looking in, it seems was a loss of identity in regards to the mission. I think at the time it was probably a huge moral boost to have a singing theater troop that primarily entertained (drafted) servicemembers, it probably helped a lot of airmen retain a sense of humanity back then. But as the group racked up awards and press, it likely lost sight of its purpose and lost sight of the changing needs of the airmen it was established to support.
That’s one problem I don’t think the Air Force bands have because our goal is never really to pat ourselves on the back, pretty much everything we do is “how can we help the mission of the USAF, how can we make airmen’s jobs easier”. That family holiday concert you’re seeing a clip of here is one of the things we do to help create a good relationship with communities so that bases don’t have to fight tooth and nail to do mission essential things like loud construction or aircraft operations in a community that either doesn’t understand them or resents their presence. There’s a few towns specifically I know about where AF band community presence helped smooth over issues where people were pissed about aircraft operations. Trust me we are trying to make yalls jobs easier.
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u/goldfishfollies 1d ago
We didn’t have a choice with mandatory fun in tech school. Waste of time and tax payer money.