Internship Spotlight: Hunter Gross – Arts Management and Entrepreneurship

AME students may opt to take on an internship for their graduate certificate. Hunter Gross is in his fourth year at the University of Oklahoma pursuing a Bachelor of Music with a Percussion emphasis.

Where did you intern?

During Summer 2019, I was a Tour Administration Intern at the Blue Knights Drum and Bugle Corps. The Blue Knights are a professional organization that is focused on the professional marching arts, they are based in Denver, Colorado.

Why did you decide to pursue this specific internship?

I have previously been involved in a different drum and bugle corps. After being a member of a corps I thought it would be a great experience for me to see the other side and operations of a traveling professional drum corps.

What was your day-to-day experience like?

Typically, I from the time we woke up, around 8-9 AM, until around 3 PM, I would help run the operations such as planning routes for our buses, doing runs in and out of the cities for supplies, assigning staff with their duties, and most of all making sure members of the drum and bugle corps were provided with the best housing and food available every day.

What has been your favorite part of this internship experience?

My favorite part of the internship was the relationships I made, and the traveling I did. I jumped on tour in Denver, Colorado, and throughout the month of July, I traveled south to Texas, across the Southeast through Mississippi and Alabama, through Georgia to New York and from New York to Indiana. This experience was very memorable – Seeing the resemblances and differences between the states of this country was very interesting.

What skills have you gained?

I gained priceless time management skills, most of the time we were assigned multiple tasks a day with little time to complete them. With this, I had to plan accordingly to my day along with planning what the other staff was going to do.

Any advice for students interested in internships?

I think we tend to push ourselves towards certain internships and paths, but it’s really important to branch out to related internships and keep your options open! For example, I was looking at internships with different chamber ensembles. Through that, I discovered opportunities with interning at Drum and Bugle Corps. It definitely opened up my eyes to that world and allowed me to learn how to deal with massive logistic operations.

For more information on internships, click here.

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