Tag Archives: DCWE

Initiation Rituals of Music Groups at Dartmouth College – The Dartmouth College Wind Ensemble

Title: Initiation Rituals of Music Groups at Dartmouth College – The Dartmouth College Wind Ensemble

General Information about Item:
Genre: Initiation Ritual
Language: English
Country of Origin: USA
Informant: Mike Wu, Male, 19 years old
Place Collected: Dartmouth College, Hop
Date Collected: 10-20-2018

Informant Data:
Mike Wu was born in Tallahassee, FL and raised in Bardonia, New York. He is a sophomore at Dartmouth College and has been playing the saxophone for 11 years. On campus, he was a member of the Dartmouth College Wind Ensemble. Mike joined the Dartmouth College Wind Ensemble his freshmen year because he wanted to keep playing the saxophone in college in a group setting.

Contextual Data:

Social Context: I collected this folklore from Mike Wu, a sophomore at Dartmouth College. He is a close friend of mine, and the only person I know who performed in DCWE. I asked him about initiation rituals in DCWE. Mike told me how he learned about the DCWE initiation ritual after experiencing it for the first time freshmen. The initiation rituals involve the conductor, upperclassmen of DCWE, and the newly accepted members. The initiation ritual helps the new members feel incorporated into the group faster.
Cultural Context: The Dartmouth College Wind Ensemble (DCWE) is an auditioned musical group of 45 members, performing a variety of music from different wind ensemble repertoire to all who welcome it. The initiation rituals of the DCWE is important because members of specific sections of the DCWE get to meet each other for the first time and build a support network for the rest of the year. New members will know who to rely on or receive advice when practicing for performances because the upperclassmen that they meet during initiation rituals play similar instruments.

Item:
Mike had to attend a standard audition where he plays a piece and the conductor judged his skills. When Mike got in, his conductor emailed him a few days later. Most freshmen did not know what “wake-up” were and were not expecting it a week after auditions. Since Mike got into the Dartmouth College Wind Ensemble, upperclassmen in the Wind Ensemble made him a poster to hang on his dorm’s door and woke him up. They separated Mike and the new members from the rest of the students at Dartmouth by gathering all the new members early in the morning before others wake up and forcing them to leave their dorms. After gathering all the members, they went to get Lou’s and got to know each other. This is the transition phase of the initiation ritual. The new members remained in their PJs. After getting Lou’s, new members went back to their dorm and resumed a normal day. Mike has officially been incorporated into the Dartmouth College Wind Ensemble.

Associated file:

Informant’s Comments:
According to Mike, the Initiation Ritual’s wakeup is a “wholesome experience”, where new members in the wind ensemble got to know each other and their upperclassmen.

Collector’s Comments:
Since I was living in the room next door to Mike, I was also woken up by the sounds of the members banging on Mike’s door and waking him up. It was actually pretty loud since the members were yelling Mike to get up. Although I was annoyed at first, I think the music group’s initiation ritual is a unique Dartmouth experience that is unforgettable. It brings a lot of energy to the music groups and is valuable in bringing all the members together and creating a strong team.

Comparison:

Comparison within the subgroup: Because the Dartmouth College Wind Ensemble is a more professional group than the acapella group and is guided by a conductor, new members of the DCWE are notified of their acceptance a week before wake-up. Since most of the new members of all the groups within the subgroups are mostly freshmen, they are surprised by the wakeups. All of the musical groups’ initiation rituals compose of wakeups and getting a meal together with their group. The purpose of the initiation ritual is to integrate the new members into the group more easily and for the group members to bond with each other.
Comparison with the rest of the subgroups: The subgroups differ dramatically across the board. Some of the subgroups focus on various ethnic groups while others focus on groups within Dartmouth. The initiation rituals of the groups within Dartmouth usually have the purpose of welcoming new members into their community and are symbolic. Ethnic-based group rituals have the purpose of testing the new members. Additionally, ethnic groups’ initiation rituals tend to be related to religious practices. Initiation rituals of Dartmouth groups are not religious in character. What all groups have in common though is the fact that the process of initiation creates closeness with the rest of the group and makes one feel completely immersed into the group.

Vanessa Chhoa; 20 years old
Hanover, NH 03755
Dartmouth College
Russian 13: Slavic Folklore
Fall 2018