An undetected light in the Aggie Marching Band

Athletic band director Lane Weaver’s voice boomed over the loudspeaker, instructing students in Utah State University’s Aggie Marching Band to get in formation for the first of many numbers. 

It was a crisp Autumn day, and the nearly 200 musicians hurried to their places and chattered amongst themselves on the football field, wearing puffy coats, beanies and hoodies. One brave student wore shorts. 

Matthew Bascom was there, too — less conspicuous even than that kid in the shorts. 

Earlier this year, the visually impaired student came to Utah State University to play in the marching band. Although Bascom had played for Uintah High School’s marching band, Weaver wasn’t sure how teaching a visually impaired student would work. 

How would Bascom learn his music? How would he learn each drill? Would he be able to keep up with the band?

“All of my concerns melted away when we were out there a week before classes started,” Weaver said. “I think we had just come off a break and were getting working again. And I saw Matt, not walking, but running across the parking lot to get to where the mellophones were. When I saw Matt running across the parking lot I thought, ‘OK, he can take care of himself.’”

Bascom has been proving himself to the rest of the band ever since. 

At rehearsals and performances, band members have flip folders with sheet music attached to their instruments while Bascom is armed with nothing but his mellophone. I expected to be able to find him quickly, but it took me 30 minutes to pick him out of the crowd.

Bascom blended in with the other students. He was always where he needed to be — he never looked lost. 

But to him, this is no feat. 

“I grew up trying a bunch of stuff,” Bascom said. “I learned from a young age that failing at something is OK and knowing that you can just find something else that you’re good at and pursuing that kind of helps you develop positivity.”

Bascom was born with low vision — something that cannot be corrected with contacts, glasses or eye surgery. His optic nerve didn’t develop completely, so he can’t see anything other than vague shapes and colors. To read his music, Bascom holds pages close to his eyes, nearly touching the tip of his nose. 

The marching band learns new music every week or two, with only a few rehearsals planned out to learn choreography. 

Bascom memorizes every performance piece, not only in marching band but in the USU Symphonic Band and Horn Choir. 

“In college, since we’re learning so much so fast, it’s not really realistic to expect everyone to memorize everything,” said Ella Devey, one of the mellophone section leaders. 

To memorize his music, Bascom wakes up early in the morning. At 4 o’clock he’s up, practicing the mellophone and French horn. 

French horn players learn the mellophone, a sort of big trumpet, to play in marching band. 

“I’ve kind of just gotten used to using my ear to listen to the music and hear how it’s supposed to sound,” Bascom said. “It’s a really long process.”

A long process, but a successful one. Bascom has time to go to the gym six times a week and cooks all of his own meals — something even college students with 20/20 vision have a hard time doing. 

Those artificial barriers certainly don’t need to be there for Bascom. 

But as he began his degree in music performance at Utah State, Bascom ran into some problems. 

“A lot of the curriculum and the way they teach is so sight-based,” Bascom said. “I don’t blame them because that’s just the way that society is built. It’s taught based off of vision because everyone — most people — can see.”

It’s not just one university program’s problem — this is a universal struggle for people with visual impairments. 

Hailey Timm, a freshman in the mellophone section, recalls when Bascom decided to change his major. On one particularly stressful day, Timm saw Bascom on campus and stopped to talk to him. After she told him about some of her stressful class work, Timm found out Bascom was dealing with some stress, too.

“He had just gone through this huge process of changing his major because playing his horn was really hard for him to keep up with music and everything,” Timm said. “He was hoping for some time in the future that the college of the arts would be able to figure out how to work with someone with a visual impairment. But until then, he just had to switch his major. And he just had such a good attitude about it. It was a humbling experience.”

Some programs limit Bascom. 

“Why assume the worst,” Weaver said, “when you’re just seeing things from a pretty superficial perspective?” 

This year, Devey is always by Bascom in drills, just in case he needs help getting to his spots. 

“I’ve gotten kind of a new perspective on life, spending time around him,” Devey said.

Among his peers, Bascom is known for hilarious stories and jokes. 

“We were waiting for Symphonic Band to start and I was kind of standing next to Matt,” said Reagan Thomas, the other mellophone section leader. “He just was laughing to himself, and I was like, ‘What are you laughing about, Matt?’ He was like, ‘I just got asked to race across the sidewalk by this guy. I was just standing there on my own and this guy walked by and was like, ‘I’ll race you.’” 

Naturally, Matt agreed and raced the stranger down the sidewalk. 

“Matt was very happy about that,” Thomas said. “He was laughing the whole rest of the day. He was like, ‘I don’t know if I won or not.’”

“He always has a good blind joke,” Devey said. “The other day when we were driving, one of the girls was talking about a date she went on and we were like, ‘Oh, how did you meet the guy,’ and she was like, ‘Oh, I got set up it was a blind date,’ and Matt was like, ‘I’m all too familiar with that.’”

“He’s a really good source of comic relief,” Timm said. 

Jokes aside, Bascom is focused on showing music majors everywhere something needs to change. Coming to Utah State as a music major, Bascom was prepared to put in all the time necessary to succeed. But that dedication wasn’t enough.

“I don’t expect people to understand,” Bascom said. “How are you supposed to understand something if you haven’t lived it?”  

Still, he refuses to throw himself a pity party. When he graduates, Bascom is committed to improving upon a strictly visual world. 

“I have ideas of starting a bunch of businesses and music happens to be a part of a bunch of them,” Bascom said. “One of my big ideas is the idea of starting a couple of orchestras here in the state for disabilities.”

He spent this football season performing in halftime shows undetected. He changed his major without a thought of outrage or annoyance. This fall he got certified as a professional trainer and told a lot of jokes.

“If you didn’t know you wouldn’t know,” Weaver said. “I don’t think he’s seeking any undue extra attention or any undue special accommodations that I’ve seen other than what we can do for him, you know. But he’s out there working hard trying to pull his weight like everybody else.” 

Bascom said everyone has their own struggles. 

“We all have that challenge in our lives,” he said. “So, it’s best just to acknowledge your own and not expect everyone else to understand it.”