By NEAL WAGNER / Managing Editor

ALABASTER – Thompson High School and Thompson Middle School soon will get a plethora of new band equipment after the Alabaster Board of Education voted to approve a pair of bids to purchase the equipment during a July 19 meeting.

School Board members voted unanimously during the meeting to award a $52,085 bid to Art’s Music Shop and an $18,337 bid to the Gadsden Music Company to purchase everything from audio equipment and euphoniums to percussion.

The vote marked the second time in two years the School Board has made large-scale instrument and equipment purchases for the two band programs. In March 2016, the School Board approved a pair of bids totaling more than $55,000 to purchase eight new instruments for TMS and 11 new instruments for THS.

“We are beyond excited. This will get the middle school and high school all kinds of equipment,” said THS Band Director Jon Bubbett. “This is really close to putting us over the top of where we should have been for the past 25 years. The Alabaster School Board has done that in three (years).

“I’m so thankful and appreciative for what they have done,” Bubbett said.

Alabaster School Superintendent Dr. Wayne Vickers and School Board member Dr. John Myrick said the purchases will support the system’s growing band programs.

“We want to support the band program extensively. It’s an outstanding program with outstanding leaders, outstanding students and outstanding parent support,” Vickers said.

Myrick, who comes from a musical background, praised Bubbett and the schools’ other band leaders for building a successful program.

“I appreciate the excellent job Mr. Bubbett and the rest of the band personnel does, and all of the hard work the children put in,” Myrick said. “For a program to reach the heights this one has, it takes leadership as well as support from the superintendent.”