Biographical Narrative Essay: My Drill Instructor Dan Adams

In just four exceptionally brief years, our school’s “beloved” marching band has been taught by several instructors whom all led us through the competitions, but only one has ever managed to bring the band to championships and obtain first in state. His name is Dan Adams. It was only his first year as head instructor and yet he was the toughest out of all of them. Never in my life have I been pushed so hard and inspired so deeply to practice harder in music and in marching. Dan possessed the experience required to get our band back in shape and he had the trophies to prove it. I admire Dan because he knew exactly how to inspire the band and me in order to unlock our full potential. At first, Dan’s method of teaching was questionable because of his harsh and intense exercises. His exercises associated with a term he liked to use called “ad nauseum” meaning we were to exercise till we threw up. In addition to his methods we had to train outside in the sweltering heat on the grass, which radiated humidity. As you can imagine, the members did not take kindly to this stranger “Dan Adams” but that’s when I realized he was different from the others. His expectations of our abilities exceeded the other head instructors immensely. He treated us like adults. This is when I discovered newfound respect for Dan. Dan Adams not only knew how to make a crowd work but he knew how to work a crowd. The weather had dropped a bone chilling average of forty degrees outside as the marching band season came closer to the end. On one faithful day it began to rain violently. The bands morale dropped to an all-time low and nobody wanted to practice. Dan stepped up to the top of the bleachers used his microphone to amplify his voice so that he was able to be heard over the competitive drumming of the rain. We expected him to give us a long lecture on how we were acting lazy and immature but instead all said were these nine words, “These are the days you are going to remember”. The band,