{"id":129307,"date":"2026-05-16T13:55:01","date_gmt":"2026-05-16T19:55:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/dolores-school-district-bands-earn-top-honors-at-denver-music-in-the-parks-festival\/"},"modified":"2026-05-16T13:55:01","modified_gmt":"2026-05-16T19:55:01","slug":"dolores-school-district-bands-earn-top-honors-at-denver-music-in-the-parks-festival","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/dolores-school-district-bands-earn-top-honors-at-denver-music-in-the-parks-festival\/","title":{"rendered":"Dolores School District bands earn top honors at Denver Music in the Parks Festival"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"The
The Dolores School District RE-4A\u2019s jazz band and choir recently placed first at the Music in the Parks Festival in Denver. The group also took home the Esprit de Corps award. (Photo courtesy of Bentley Monk)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>\n

The Dolores RE-4A high school jazz band and choir earned first-place at the Music in the Parks Festival in Denver in April, with the groups also taking home the prestigious Esprit de Corps award for the groups character, demeanor and spirit.<\/p>\n

Though the festival took place over multiple days, the Dolores ensembles competed on April 24. Following their time performing, the group enjoyed the roller coasters and other activities offered by Elitch Gardens before the awards ceremony.<\/p>\n

There, they not only learned about their first place finishes, but also that they were named recipients of the Esprit de Corps award.<\/p>\n

Music and band teacher Bentley Monk said the Esprit de Corps award was particularly meaningful, and quite the surprise, saying the award highlighted how the students represented their school and the community.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe also got the Esprit de Corps award based on the demeanor of the group and the way they held themselves in public,\u201d Monk told The Journal<\/em>. \u201cIt\u2019s an award that you would get typically within the armed forces, because you\u2019re not just following directions, you\u2019re exemplifying what your organization is at the core. And that, to me personally, was probably more important than the first place trophies.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Esprit de Corps trophy is also the biggest trophy in the Dolores Music Department, beating out all other trophies won by the program since the 1980s.<\/p>\n

The jazz band performed Duke Ellington\u2019s \u201cPerdido\u201d and a blues piano piece called \u201cKiller on the Keys.\u201d The choir delivered a traditional Latin piece titled \u201cAgnus Dei\u201d and the gospel song \u201cGlory, Glory!\u201d<\/p>\n

The music department also participated in other events this year. The school\u2019s modern rock band served as the closing act at the West Slope Jam Fest. Monk said the band is one of the only high school modern band programs on the Western Slope.<\/p>\n

At Jamfest, the groups performed \u201cMy Own Worst Enemy,\u201d Chris Isaak\u2019s \u201cWicked Game\u201d and Sublime\u2019s \u201cSanteria.\u201d The 21-member band was divided into three groups of seven for the performances.<\/p>\n

\"The
The Dolores School District RE-4A\u2019s modern rock band performed three songs in three units of seven at this year\u2019s West Slope Jam Fest. (Courtesy of Bentley Monk)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Monk noted that he\u2019s seen significant growth across the Dolores music program this year in choir, jazz band, modern band and other ensembles. He shared some goals for the program as well.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere has been a tremendous amount of growth within the Dolores Music Department this year, whether it\u2019s in choir, in modern band, in jazz band, any of the ensembles \u2026 Those kids have really worked their tails off, and we\u2019ve created a new standard of excellence within the Dolores music program,\u201d Monk said. \u201cAnd going forward, our goals are to get further and further away from home, to go and perform at competitions to make a name for ourselves.\u201d<\/p>\n

bduran@the-journal.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Students also performed at West Slope Jam Fest<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":129308,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5794,5735],"tags":[1060,44,103,28,60,559,29,6419],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-129307","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-education","category-news","tag-arts-entertainment","tag-dolores","tag-dolores-schools-re-4a","tag-headlines","tag-montezuma-county","tag-music","tag-newsletter","tag-tj-trueanthem"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/129307","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=129307"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/129307\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/129308"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=129307"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=129307"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=129307"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=129307"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}