MUKILTEO — Stuart Pitts is one of those people who found it hard to leave high school behind.
Pitts graduated from Kamiak High School in 2010 and enrolled in the University of Washington’s Foster School of Business.
But Pitts was back in his familiar environment that fall, teaching in the band room at Kamiak.
“It’s a band problem, yes. I got addicted and can’t get away,” said Pitts, who now volunteers his time at the school while working full time at Microsoft.
His volunteer work has turned into real money to support the band program: more than $13,000 so far.
The money comes from Microsoft’s Employee Giving Campaign, which donates money to nonprofits or other groups for every hour an employee does volunteer work with the group.
Pitts’ years in the band had a lasting affect on him, one that he wants to see continue with future band students.
He played trombone and rose to become drum major his senior year.
“You’re responsible for energizing, improving and holding accountable 150 to 200 people,” Pitts said. “It was a very transformative experience to have that kind of responsibility. I couldn’t get away and wanted to keep helping out.”
There are about 200 students in Kamiak’s marching band program, 150 of whom take the field during sporting events, band teacher Toby Bathurst said.
The band travels to regional competitions four times a year and has won numerous awards on the Northwest Association of the Performing Arts circuit.
Once every three years, the band travels to a large national or international event. In December, the band marched in the Citrus Bowl Parade in Orlando, Florida. In 2012, the group went on a performance tour in Paris.
That kind of schedule, coupled with regular rehearsals and playing at home games, is hard on the instruments, Bathurst said.
When he started working at Kamiak nine years ago, everything from uniforms to instruments was in poor shape.
The band program was launched when Kamiak High first opened its doors in 1993. All the equipment was bought new at the time and hadn’t been replaced, Bathurst said.
“The very first thing we had to do was replace all the uniforms. Their sleeves were literally falling off the kids,” he said.
Two years ago, Bathurst helped launch a “Build a Band” fundraiser with the help of boosters in the school community.
The drive brought in $70,000 to $80,000, which enabled the band to buy two new tubas, five baritone horns, 10 mellophones and a one-year-old drum line.
But it’s an uphill climb. Bathurst estimated that the band is still $100,000 away from replacing everything that needs replacing.
“Tubas alone cost about $5,000 each, and we needed eight of them,” Bathurst said.
Pitts recalled that one time, when he was marching in the band, the valve seals on one of the tubas broke off in the middle of a performance.
In the band room recently, Bathurst pulled out a heavily dented tuba. Students still play it on the field, he said.
“It’s really hard to give students the experience they need when the tools are literally falling apart,” he said.
Carter Grant, a 17-year-old senior in the band, pointed to the dented instrument.
“One of our tuba players was playing it and I heard a rattle,” Grant said.
While Pitts was in college, he kept coming back to help the band program, but he also started working in the Microsoft campus store. That’s when he heard about the company’s corporate giving program.
He quit teaching and started volunteering. Instead of the school paying him, he now pays the school.
Pitts now works as a marketing manager for Microsoft’s Surface product. He also still teaches in the Kamiak band program during the fall quarter. In the summer competition season, he takes time off work to spend three weeks pulling 12-hour days at band camp.
The hours Pitts has put into the program — more than 750 so far — have been a financial boon.
“I spend it as soon as it comes in,” Bathurst said. “One hundred percent of it’s spent on instruments.”
Senior Luke Dahlberg, 18, a trombonist and drum major, said the new instruments make a huge difference.
“Just the sound with 10 new mellophones was amazing,” Dahlberg said.
Pitts’ work will continue, as will the larger Build a Band fundraiser, because the band will continue to need money.
And because he wants the band to keep succeeding. “Imagine what we could do with this group, with just a little more in donations,” Pitts said.
Chris Winters: 425-374-4165; cwinters@heraldnet.com. Twitter: @Chris_At_Herald.
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