J: Can you tell me about Ninja?

T: Hahaha, Ninja, well that’s a game the students learned from you wasn’t it?

J: Well yeah, but you incorporated it into rehearsal.

T: Well, if I understand it correctly, and help me if I mess up, Ninja is a very active game where the players get into a circle and while pivoting on one foot, try to tag both hands of all the other players. But…what was the other part of it?

J: They can only move once per turn.

T: Yep, that’s it! After I saw you playing it with a few other students, I thought that it would be a fantastic way to warm up the body before rehearsal, so I started adding in time every rehearsal to ensure that everyone could play for about ten minutes.

J: I’d say it definitely helped us stay hyper and alert.

T: Exactly. That’s one of the reasons why I didn’t have any qualms about spending the time doing it.

J: Does the band still do it now?

T: Of course! I wasn’t going to let that little gem go to waste. Thank you for teaching it to them.

J: Happy to help, and thank you for helping me out with my project.

T: No problem, well, it’s getting late, so I’ll talk you later. Night.

J: Night!

While Ninja has become a widespread game across the world, I picked it up while attending drum major camp. The other drum majors were playing it, and I thought that it would be an amazing fun game to bring back and use in the band just for fun. I was pleasantly surprised when the band director wanted to incorporate it into our warm up routine. I was even more surprised to hear that the band is still playing Ninja as a warmup now that I’ve graduated. I’m happy to say that I added a little piece of tradition to the band that everyone will carry on, hopefully, for years to come!