The year is truly underway this week! Thanks to everyone who attended our ‘Meet the Band’ event on Wednesday night to see a preview of ‘The Flame Within!’ We’re looking forward to seeing the show come together over the coming weeks as we prepare for our competitive season! 

For HS students, beginning this week, we are adjusting our fall rehearsal schedule to Monday and Thursday evenings, 6:30 pm – 9:00 pm. We’re going to do that half hour later each of those nights in place of the Wednesday afternoon rehearsals. It leaves us a few hours for students to plan sectionals before/after school/during lunch and gives students a bit more time for homework/tutorials on Wednesdays. We do have one Tuesday planned for September 15^th to accommodate the schedule of someone coming to help adjust our sound system.

For HS students and 7^th/8^th Grade Students, we need their band fees in as soon as possible. We accept checks or money orders only in the band halls (no cash, please), but we can also now accept online payments via Debit/Credit Card. Please see the information below about setting up your Presto Account if you wish to pay with Debit/Credit Card. We’re finding it’s a bit of a process to get everyone onto the system, but it works well once we have all the steps in place!

This week is our first home football game; we ask the parents of our HS students to work one half of a game in the concession stand each season. We could also use help from our junior high parents! The Owl Band Boosters provide an enormous resource for fundraising for our program and help pay for items for all of our students in Grades 6-12 each year. The more help we have, the more they can support! This week’s students’ families are up: FIRST HALF – Von Barrera, Arin Magan, Nia Alaniz, Berta Jasso, Kamron Alaniz; SECOND HALF – Eva Garcia, Santiago Serrano, Mikaela Ramirez, Emily Bayardo, Olivia Serrano. Please have an adult there who can work the shift. If you can’t, please contact Mrs. Jesenia Ferguson, our president, so she is aware and can reschedule you for later in the season. Her email is: fergusonjesenia@gmail.com. The full chart of scheduled games may be found here: http://www.odembands.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/08/Concession-Stand-Assignments-2026-2027-3.pdf

Our full Fall and Spring Calendars are available for download here: https://tinyurl.com/OdemCal2627.

Beginning Band Instruments:

Beginning Band students will need to bring their instruments here by August 26^th if they are not on order with a company that will deliver them to us. If you missed the drive, a couple of options you have include online ordering from Music and Arts, who held the drive; South Texas Music Mart is in town and is a reliable company that provides quality instrument rentals. Hillje Music out of San Antonio also calls on us each week and can also be contacted. We do ask that parents please stick to the recommended brands listed in the welcome letter; the list will be included in the handbook students receive on Wednesday. It’s imperative that we have a good instrument in each student’s hands. 

If there is a financial concern, please contact Mr. Williams (williamsn@oeisd.org) so we can help! Our philosophy is that every student deserves the opportunity to be in band, and we will do all we can to help by connecting with former students and used instruments, or by providing a school instrument when possible!

Presto and Online Payments

We have used a system called Presto for a number of years now to send weekly emails, track our inventory, and track fees, etc. This year we have been able to link online payments for those fees. There is a video here with details on how to create accounts and use the system: https://support.presto-assistant.com/articles/getting-started-guide-students-and-parents/ You should have received a welcome email about 11 am on Sunday. If you don’t see it in your email, please check your spam folder and have your student log in to their OEISD email account, as it may have gone there. You can also join via our group/organization code, odemowls (it’s at the bottom of the page after you set up your Parent account). You may have an issue if we used your email address to create the student account; in that case, if you have a second email address, you should be able to join that way. 

If you have completed both of those steps and don’t see it, please email rashs@oeisd.org with your name, the student’s name, your relationship to the student, your email address, and the student’s grade. The login page is here: https://app.presto-assistant.com/ .

Alumni Band

We began spreading the world this past week, but please tell any older students, relatives, or – even yourselves if you are an alumnus of The Spirit of OHS, we’re looking to ‘put the band back together!’ This year, for the 2026 Odem HS Homecoming Game vs. Aransas Pass, on September 11th, the right dates have aligned for us to host an Alumni Band Night! We are looking for any alumni from Odem HS who have graduated from the band program (ANY YEAR!) to come join us for this special event! We plan to have a special performance of some of the ‘classic’ songs the band has played over the decades before the game, after the Homecoming Court Coronation, together with the current band students. You can find more information on this webpage: http://www.odembands.org/uncategorized/alumni-band-at-homecoming/Registration is available here: https://tinyurl.com/26SpiritAlumniBand We already have 31 sign-ups covering most of the years from 2008-2026! 

This Week’s Schedule

Monday:	HS Band Evening Rehearsal	6:30 pm-9:00 pm
Tuesday:	No Rehearsal (Sectionals?)	Band Hall Closes at 4:30 pm
Wednesday:	No Rehearsal (Sectionals?)	Band Hall Closes at 4:30 pm
Thursday:	HS Band Evening Rehearsal	6:30 pm-9:00 pm
Friday:	Odem vs. Banquete (Home)	5:45 pm Students at Band Hall 6:30 pm March to Stadium 7:30 pm Kick-Off ~10:00 pm Game Ends

Upcoming Events:

Day:	Event/Location:
Friday:	Odem vs Banquete (Owl Stadium)
September 4th:	Odem vs. Taft (Taft)
September 7th:	Labor Day (Evening Rehearsal 5:30 pm – 8:30 pm)
September 9th:	In Town Alumni Band Rehearsal 6:30 pm – 8:00 pm
September 10th:	Homecoming Parade and Burning of the ‘O’
September 11th:	Homecoming Game vs. Aransas Pass
September 12th:	All-Region Jazz Auditions
September 15th:	Tuesday Evening Rehearsal with Audio Team for HS
September 16th:	All-Area/State Jazz Recordings (If Students Advance)
September 17th:	Clinic with Mr. Santos at Thursday Rehearsal
September 18th:	Odem vs. Victoria St. Joe at Victoria Memorial Stadium
September 25th:	Odem vs. San Antonio Memorial (San Antonio)
September 26th:	5th Annual Owl Marching Invitational
October 2nd:	Afternoon Rehearsal/Pack Equipment for next Day
October 3rd:	Seguin Marching Contest (Seguin)

Thank you for your help and support of these amazing students! Please contact us if you have any questions!