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Cedar Shoals student sees success on a different note

National competition winner

By Alisa Marie DeMao   |   alisa.demao@onlineathens.com   |  
Story updated at 11:07 PM on Sunday, April 9, 2006


The tuba is a misunderstood instrument.

That's Ibanda Ruhumbika's impression, and if there's anyone who knows the tuba, it's this Cedar Shoals High School sophomore, who won a national competition to become the top young brass player in the United States.

"People have this idea of tuba playing, that it's loud and ... " Ibanda breaks off and makes blaring motions with his hands. "It's more flexible than most instruments - it's just not perceived that way."

Ibanda's deep notes ground the brass rehearsal during a first-block music class at Cedar Shoals. Arms wrapped around the 25-pound instrument, he pulls in deep breaths and puffs into the mouthpiece to draw out the sounds as the music rises to a crescendo.

After class, he leaves a jazzy tune in his wake as he plays solo on his way to an adjacent room to put the instrument away. He plays with the Cedar Shoals jazz band, as well as participates in the school's marching band and in advanced band.

Ibanda was concerned that judges at the Music Teachers National Association Senior Performance Competition in Austin, Texas, would favor the trumpets or the French horns. He was one of only a couple of competitors playing the tuba at the March competition, and at 16, one of the youngest in the 13- to 19-year-old category.

But he wasn't actually nervous; he doesn't get into the "whole nervous thing," not since a performance in middle school that fell flat.

"That's when I realized there was no point being nervous," he said.

Instead, Ibanda sets himself to give the best performance he can - an attitude he brings to everything he does, every day, said Cedar Shoals band director Chris Camp. Camp calls Ibanda one of the most talented musicians he's ever worked with, at a school where the band has won both national and international recognition, including a performance in London's New Year's Day parade in 2004.

"He's unbelievable," Camp said. "He has a lot of talent, he really does. This recent competition - it's usually won by people who are college-aged."

Ibanda also has been accepted into the Georgia Governor's Honors program this summer. Participants in the program more often are rising seniors than rising juniors.

He spends as many as 20 hours a week practicing - in class, after school, in private lessons - a couple of hours each weekday and as many as four or five hours on a weekend day. He's also a member of the Athens Youth Symphony.

Ibanda's still trying to decide whether to attempt a career in music, juggling the idea of music or pre-med in college and wondering if it's possible to do both.

But despite his current love for the instrument, the tuba wasn't his initial choice when he auditioned for the band at Hilsman Middle School four years ago. Hilsman band director Laurie Camp suggested he try it after an unsuccessful attempt at another instrument.

"I didn't want to play the tuba, originally," he said. "I don't know where I got the idea, but in fifth grade, I wanted to play the saxophone."

He shakes his head and grins.

"When I got to middle school and auditioned, I couldn't play a single note on it."

Published in the Athens Banner-Herald on 041006