This is a great question. I've said for years we need to stop complaining about why kids are willing to quit band to be a bench warmer. What makes that more attractive than band? When we figure that out we start to keep kids active. I've never wanted to fight with sports programs or coaches. Learn from them.

It's like asking the homeless guy how to become a millionaire. You wouldn't. So let's watch the athletics and see how they are doing it and then copy it.

As far as performances, I always tried to keep my kids performing as often as possible. In JH I would do performances monthly with different music, (September football, October Fall concert, November bled into December with several Christmas performances, January with the high school, February was usually short so it bled into Pre-UIL and such in March and April then Spring concert in May). Some of those were shared titles but I would do my absolute best to get 20 or more pieces of music in front of JH kids regularly. Throw in ensembles and a Jazz band and the title count doubles or more.

With HS every football game had different music, (most of it was the same but we always added 1 or 2 new songs every week). High schools also were constantly performing in the winter and spring with indoor season, Jazz ensembles, S/E, recruiting concerts, side-by-sides, spring trips, UIL, and spring concert. Again, I wanted 30 plus football tunes in the Fall plus another 18 concert titles sprinkled over the course of a year. I also started concert season on the 1st day of school along with Marching band because music is music. And my Jazz ensembles by Spring could do almost 2 hours worth of music, (we often spent the spring doing dinner music or music while crowds were arriving to events and such).

I didn't lose as many kids to athletics. We shared a lot but they wanted to do both instead of just athletics. I think the variety helped keep them interested and willing.