When I became Commandant in 2010, the Corps had NO Class A coat. All cadets had been issued "Midnights," and that was the "dress uniform" at the time. Class A coats were NOT part of the cadet uniform inventory at the time.

Thanks to financial support from the VPSA's office, we hired a company (Fechheimer) to design a new Class A Coat for the cadets, modeled after the Classic WWII coat the Corps had worn for decades as part of the "Pinks and Browns" uniform. Part of that design included creating a female coat, just like the military does, instead of taking a male coat and putting it on a female.

By 2012 we got the Class A coats and issued them to the entire Corps - including the female coat. We also made the midnights a white belt uniform option only - just as it was when I was a cadet.

The overwhelming response to the Class A coat has been very positive - including the female coat. Yeah, the female coat is a little shorter and a different cut, but so are female Class A coats in the military. At least we have a female coat for females, and not a male coat that we put on females.

I can't speak for the white leather "Sam Brown" belts that have been worn off and on by the Aggie Band over the years. During my time in the Aggie Band (75-79) we never wore white belts - we wore the brown ones. The Drum and Bugle Corps wore white belts, but the Aggie Band as a whole wore the brown belts. I know the white belts came back after I left for a while, but once again, when I returned as Commandant, there were no white leather belts worn in the Aggie Band.

Hope this answers your concerns about the Class A coat, Hollywood. Please feel free to contact me directly if you have any further questions. For me, I am very happy to have the Class A uniform back in the Corps again. Its a good looking uniform, and its truly a "throwback" to "Ol' Army!" The US Army even took some of our uniforms as they began looking at the design for the new Class A uniform for the Army, that may be a return to the classic WWII "Pinks and Browns" - VERY similar to what our cadets wear in the Corps today!

Thanks for your love and support of our Corps! Gig 'em!

Commandant - thanks for the explanation. I do remember seeing the band in midnights and remembering that it did not look as good as I had expected it would when I was a cadet and me and some buddies were wargaming scenarios like - "What if the whole band wore midnights? Yeah, that would be awesome, good idea. Yeah, we should totally do that".

I've been away from Texas for a while and haven't had any family members in the A&M Corps of Cadets for 20+ years so, I didn't know all the machinations behind the uniform changes. I knew they were wearing midnights sometime in the 2000s but I didn't realize that the Class A jacket had completely gone away during that time period. Also, I think many of my College Station trips, or away games during the past 15+ years must have been while the band was in the summer uniform.

A funny aside about the summer uniforms. In my era, everybody hated the pink pants and bider. The Corps Staff was in charge of deciding when we switched from summers to winters and back. The Class of 1993 hated the pink pants so much that they stayed in summers the entire year. Also, doing a little research on what I'm about to share, I found the Aggie Band performance from the 2006 Holiday Bowl in San Diego (another game that I shouldn't have attended because we got blown out by Cal) and they're in summers so I guess that year they must have hated the winter uniform too.

In the late 90s when I was working in Austin, I spent a year on a two person team working very closely together on a work project. My teammate was a hard core man hating lesbian in her 50s. She explained to me the importance of different clothing for different genders and the importance of daughters having a strong father figure present in their lives. I've never forgotten either of those lessons. After that experience, I've also never forgotten that I'm a maaaaaaaannnnnn (in a derogatory context). Anyway, her complaint about the clothing stemmed from the fact that our employer would issue us corporate logo golf shirts that they expected us to wear and they were always men's cut shirts. I'd get an earful every time they gave us a new shirt.

So, I understand the need for different uniforms for different genders. As a regular course of uniform wear, that's fine. It's good that the Corps mirrors what the regular military does. What I'm specifically focused on in this context is the attire for an Aggie Band performance.

The Corps of Cadets example that is the closest parallel I can think of is the fact that Parson's Mounted Cavalry doesn't have a separate female uniform that they wear for march-ins, parades, etc. They just wear old timey midnights and everybody looks the same (uniform).



There seems to be some confusion about Sam Brown belts versus the White Belts that we wore around the Class A jacket in the 1980s-2000s. Here is a picture that I found which appears to be from the 2006 t.u. game which shows the Aggie Band in the Class A jacket with the white cotton belt (which was a hassle to keep clean BTW).



I also found this video of the 1990 Holiday Bowl which has several clips of the Aggie Band wearing the white cotton belts with their class A uniform. The first one is just after the 20 second mark. There is a close up of the woodwind section in the stands at the 6:35 mark including the late Todd Thoele '91. And just after the 11:45 mark, there's a shot that includes Sherri Reid '94 (the first female to make it through B-Company). Anyway, the point is that these uniforms all look consistently the same.



So, that was background just to explain what the Class A jacket with white belt looked like.

I was curious to see what the US Army does with their bands. It looks like they have one consistent look for marching and then one slight variation for concerts. For concerts where the band is seated, it looks like females have the option to wear a floor length skirt and heels. But when they're marching, they wear a female cut uniform that looks exactly like the male uniform.

Here's the Army Band marching uniform. I took these pictures from the US Army Band Flickr account.



In formation, you have to look really closely at the hair length on the back of the head to distinguish between the genders.





Here's the floor length skirt for concerts which frankly I think looks pretty sharp.



Anyway, I'm not saying that we need to have a performance uniform and look like the Show Band of the Southwest down from that little orange school in Austin. I'm just saying that we should consider having a special Game Day or Parade - Band uniform where everybody in the band wears a uniform that looks the same. I figure given present day enrollment numbers, we're probably talking about a need for maybe 150 more male jackets to be issued to female cadets exclusively for the purpose of performances where the Aggie Band marches in formation.

If cost is a concern, I'm sure we can raise the money for it. To quote Coach Jackie Sherrill when he spoke at the 2010 Muster in Long Beach, "Why, when I found out the Band wasn't goin' to all the games, it didn't take no time to raise the money".

I'll be in College Station this Friday night/Saturday morning (Polo Grounds). I'll give you a call then (I just looked at my phone to make sure I had your number. I've got you listed with the first name of BG). If we can work it out, I would like you to meet some of my family and a couple other families some of whom you've probably already met.

Gig 'Em

And whatever we do to emulate the US Army, let's don't have hats like this for our Drum Majors.

There's already enough of a gap between the Band and the rest of the Corps (e.g. the planned off-Quad Band dorm) without creating separate uniforms as well.