This post was updated Nov. 13 at 9:38 p.m.
Joan Wiener joined the UCLA Alumni Band for her love of music and UCLA sports.
She also met the love of her life.
The Alumni Band has sparked relationships – couples, friendships and mentorships – for 50 years.
Wiener, a co-coordinator of festivities for the Alumni Band who graduated in 1978, said she met her husband through the band when he happened to sit behind her at a football game and offered her his jacket. After Wiener’s husband proposed, they planned their wedding around the UCLA football schedule, she added.
The band celebrated its 50th anniversary Oct. 18 during the halftime show at UCLA football’s game against Maryland. The band, which was founded in 1976, is comprised of alumni who play gigs at UCLA Athletics events, including football, gymnastics, water polo and volleyball.
Joel Fierberg, the band’s president and music director, said he enjoys being a member of the Alumni Band because he can continue doing what he loved as a student – representing the university with his friends.
“We’re grateful for the opportunity to participate, and we work really hard at making sure we continue to add value,” said Fierberg, who graduated from UCLA in 1982. “It’s a win-win, and it’s been for 50 years, and we’re hoping to make it another 50.”
Ryan Barnoya, who plays marching tenors in the Alumni Band, said the 50th anniversary celebration felt special because of the love from fans and the camaraderie within the Alumni Band. The band has expanded in size and scope since its founding – with the band now having as many as 120 members and performing for both sporting and nonsporting events, Wiener said.
“I remember when we were so small – we were just a very small group of people who loved music, and we loved UCLA, and we wanted to play,” said Carmen Rexach, a co-coordinator of festivities. “As somebody who started way back in the ‘70s, … I would never have imagined when we were 12 or 14 or 15 people that we would be standing on the field with 122 people.”
Barnoya, who graduated from UCLA in 2017, said he joined the Alumni Band last year at the suggestion of his friend – an Alumni Band member – who saw Barnoya post videos of himself practicing drums. He added that he had missed the environment of playing with fellow band members.
“The memories, the things I got to do because of it (the student band) – I honestly could not replace those things,” Barnoya said. “I got more in tune with what it meant to be a part of the UCLA family.”
Rexach, a class of 1975 alumnus, said one of her favorite memories as a member of the Alumni Band was playing in the band with her daughter and son, who played trumpet and clarinet, respectively. She added that she enjoys being around people who love UCLA sports as much as she does.
Beyond UCLA sporting events, the Alumni Band also performs at weddings, memorial services, private parties and events such as the dedication of the La Kretz Botany Building, Fierberg said.
Fierberg often talks with current members of the student band about their similar experiences, he added.
“The easiest conversation I probably have is sitting down with these guys who are 40 years younger than me and … having the same kind of experience for the same reasons,” he said.
Fierberg said he had great memories of attending sports games while playing with the student band – from the first time UCLA football beat the University of Southern California under coach Terry Donahue in 1980, to playing the pregame performance at game two of the 1978 World Series at Dodger Stadium.
“People primarily come for those same three reasons,” Fierberg said. “They want to play, they want to be with their friends and they want to be at sporting events.”
Fierberg added that he appreciates that he can make an impact – and stay involved with the UCLA community – through the Alumni Band.
“Come rain or shine, come 56-6 or us beating somebody else,” Wiener said, “we bleed Bruin blue.”
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