By NEAL WAGNER / Managing Editor

ALABASTER – The Thompson High School and Thompson Middle School band programs soon will see some new equipment after the city’s Board of Education agreed to seek companies interested in selling instruments to the programs.

School Board members voted unanimously during a Jan. 29 special-called meeting to issue a request for proposals for companies interested in selling new instruments to the band programs.

Alabaster School Superintendent Dr. Wayne Vickers and THS Director of Bands John Bubbett said the THS and TMS band programs are looking to purchase large instruments typically cost-prohibitive for students and their families.

“We are looking to purchase some instruments for the symphonic and marching bands that are beyond the means of students to be able to purchase them,” Vickers said during an interview before the meeting. “We are trying to take care of the programs’ instrument needs and help any way we can.”

Bubbett said the school system is looking to purchase large instruments such as tubas, euphoniums and marimbas, which can carry price tags in the thousands of dollars.

The purchases will include eight new instruments for TMS and 11 new instruments for the high school. The new instruments will expand the inventory of school-owned instruments, and will help replace some instruments in use for multiple decades.

“We’ve got a large list of instrument needs between the middle school and high school. We are mostly looking at some of our largest instruments,” Bubbett said. “The most expensive instrument on the list is a Yamaha tuba, and it costs $9,000.”

Bubbett said the school band booster club has worked over the past few decades to ensure the band programs’ instrument needs have been met, but said the school system’s help will allow the programs to remain “top-notch.”

“Our booster club has done a very good job helping us with instruments and other needs,” Bubbett said. “I used to say everything in this band room was purchased by students or parents, but that is not going to be the case anymore.

“We have been very careful to consider the needs of the whole band program: Middle school and high school,” Bubbett said. “The middle school program is our lifeblood, so we want to be sure we take care of them as well as the high school.”