So there you are, facing a classroom full of eager high school students who want to play in marching band. Everyone plays pretty well, but the flute section needs help. You're a trumpet player, a very good one, but your flute skills aren't what they need to be to help your floundering students.

Enter The American Band College Master's Degree Program at Southern Oregon University, brainchild of Max McKee, professor emeritus of SOU's Music Department who retired after 30 years at the university. There is no other master's degree program like it in the United States. Since 1989, high school and college band directors have come to SOU ready to work on three areas of weakness, identified through an entrance examination. The test lasts three hours, says McKee's son who helps run the program. An SOU grad himself who taught band for six to seven years, Scott McKee is happy to be working alongside his father helping people hone their music playing and teaching skills.

"We want band directors to be the best band directors on the podium," the younger McKee says. "If they know their flute fingering as well as they know their trumpet, they will be good band directors."

The test covers fingering, embouchure, listening to music, music literature, bad sounds and how to fix them, and teaching. The test identifies areas of weakness. Master's degree candidates attend more than 70 sessions taught by 24 of the world's finest conductors, composers and clinicians each summer for three years. This year's classes run from June 20 to July 5.

"Then they go home and work on thesis projects in their weakness area during the school year," McKee says.

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And if you want to hear what bands can sound like under such tutelage, you'll have three opportunities this summer. The American Band College will present its 18th annual concert this Monday at the Craterian. The concert will feature an international group of conductors and soloists performing with two 110-member ABC Directors' Bands made up of school band conductors from more than 40 states. The band will also play as part of Ashland's Fourth of July parade, seated on three flatbed trucks. At 8 p.m. that night, the band will perform a two-hour concert in the Ashland High School football stadium, preceded by 30 minutes of pre-show jazz music. Following the concert, the band will play 20 minutes of patriotic music to accompany the fireworks display.

Guest conductors this year are Johan de Meij from the Netherlands and Kanat Akhmetov from Kazakhstan. Guest soloist is trumpeter Yeh Shu-Han from Taiwan. The music on the program is comparable to the finest orchestral or symphonic music out there. The difference is the music is performed on brass and wind instruments as opposed to stringed instruments. For fans of John Sousa marches, there will be some of those as well.

The first half of the evening's concert concludes with the world premiere of a 15-minute suite of music from the upcoming Shakespeare film "Henry V." Composed by Patrick Doyle, who also has composed music for the Harry Potter movies, the piece will be conducted by arranger de Meij. With the first 110-member ABC band performing on their instruments, the second 110-member ABC band joins them on vocals. Charles Cassey, Hollywood composer and conductor, is the vocal soloist.

The grand finale of the second half features all 220 band members performing the "Voice of Asia" under the baton of Akhmetov. Included in the number are several soloists performing on the 6-foot-long karnai, an instrument native to Kazakhstan.

Guest soloist Shu-Han performs Alfred Reed's "Trumpet Concerto," especially written for him by the composer, and the Arutunian Concerto. In addition, Shu-Han performs as part of the "Voice of Asia" grand finale.

Shu-Han is associate professor at the National Taiwan Normal University, has his own quintet, is president of the Asia and Pacific Band Directors Association, Taiwan Band Association and board member of the International Trumpet Guild.

De Meij's Symphony no. 1, "The Lord of the Rings," based on Tolkien's bestseller novels of the same name, was his first substantial composition for symphonic band and received the Sudler Composition Award in 1989. Besides composing, de Meij serves as trombonist with the Orchestra "De Volharding" (The Perseverance), The Amsterdam Wind Orchestra and as a regular substitute with the Radio Chamber Orchestra.

Akhmetov is the conductor of the Kazakhstan Wind Orchestra. He teaches at the Music Conservatory of Almaty and is director of the Karaganda Symphony Orchestra.

"We rekindle that passion for playing an instrument," McKee says. "They play with the best players and conductors in the business."

If this were sports, McKee explained, it would be like having Brett Favre as your quarterback coach.