Romeo Manoza

“There are many ways [being a drum major] has affected my life. I think if you take a step back and just look at music as a whole and band as a whole, music and band itself has affected my life so much. Yes, being drum major is one yea, but those first three years of being in band has affected me personally in a way that’s like whoa – there’s things I found out about myself I didn’t know. But in that one year of being drum major there are things I learned about others and I people that I didn’t know. The first three years of high school was “Okay how am I going to better myself?” Now, I’m like “How can I be the best leader I can be?”, “How can I be the most confident person I can be?”, “How can I be the most hardworking person I can be?” But I think drum major specifically it’s taught me how I can be the best person for others and how I can be the best servant leader in a sense. It’s taught me how to be selfless. It’s taught me to look past peoples different qualities and see them as they are, not for someone I want them to be. I feel like it’s made me more compassionate and caring. It has overall made me see people less how they are on the surface but how they are on the inside.”