About Us
The Thunderbird Marching Band and Symphonic Ensembles are one of only ten high school bands in the world to have received both the Sudler Flag of Honor (For Consistent High Excellence in Concert events) and the Sudler Shield (For Consistent High Excellence in Marching events)- the two most prestigious honors bestowed upon a high school band ensemble. The other 9 Bands who have received them are from: Marian Catholic High School, Sumter High School, L.D. Bell High School, Duncanville High School, The Woodlands High School, Lassiter High School, Westfield High School, Owasso High School, North Hardin High School, and Langham Creek High School.
The Coronado High School Marching Band has won the "Grand Champion" ranking at the New Mexico Tournament of Bands competition more times than any other organization in the history of the 30+ year competition.
The Coronado High School band has also competed numerous times at the Texas UIL State Marching Contest, nationally at many Bands of America regional and super-regional marching contests, and internationally at various concert events. Some of the visited sites the band has gone to include Moscow, Hawaii, Dallas,Toronto, San Antonio, Houston, San Diego, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Las Vegas, Albuquerque, Orlando, and New York City.
The Coronado Wind Ensemble is the only high school wind ensemble in El Paso and West Texas to ever advance to state as a 5A Texas Honor Band.
The Coronado High School Marching Band has won the "Grand Champion" ranking at the New Mexico Tournament of Bands competition more times than any other organization in the history of the 30+ year competition.
The Coronado High School band has also competed numerous times at the Texas UIL State Marching Contest, nationally at many Bands of America regional and super-regional marching contests, and internationally at various concert events. Some of the visited sites the band has gone to include Moscow, Hawaii, Dallas,Toronto, San Antonio, Houston, San Diego, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Las Vegas, Albuquerque, Orlando, and New York City.
The Coronado Wind Ensemble is the only high school wind ensemble in El Paso and West Texas to ever advance to state as a 5A Texas Honor Band.
Previous and Honorary Directors
Kenneth Capshaw
Kenneth Capshaw a native El Pasoan, is a thirty-year veteran with the El Paso Symphony Orchestra, and is one of the most highly sought trumpeters in the region. He started his college education at the University of Texas at El Paso, and concluded his bachelors degree at the University of New Mexico. He is the recipient of the Legion of Honor Award from the John Phillip Sousa Foundation and was recently awarded the Meritorious Award from Texas Bandmasters Association. He has over twenty highly successful years in Music Education and is a performing member of El Paso Symphony Orchestra, El Paso Brass and the El Paso Opera Orchestra.
Richard Lambrecht
Richard Lambrecht joined the music faculty of the University of Texas at El Paso in 1996. He has been playing Principal Horn in the El Paso Symphony Orchestra since his student days at UTEP (forty plus years). During his tenure with the orchestra he has also toured Germany and Turkey, as well as performing in the neighboring country of Mexico.
Rick is also a founding member of El Paso Brass, a quintet that has been performing together since 1972. In Brass in Class weekly performances for elementary and middle schools in the metropolitan El Paso area, he has performed for more than half a million students. El Paso Brass has also been featured performer with many symphony orchestras, and has played in New York City and at the Midwest Band and Orchestra Clinic.
Playing Principal Horn in the Roswell Symphony Orchestra, the Orchestra de UAJC (Juarez, Mexico) and the El Paso Opera as well as being Instructor of Horn at the University of Texas at El Paso (UTEP) round out his current activity as a hornist in the El Paso southwest area.
In addition to his career on the horn, Richard Lambrecht has had a long and successful career as a Texas Bandmaster. He began his teaching career at Coronado High School in El Paso and served as the band director there for thirty years. During his tenure as director, the Coronado Band garnered many awards, including both the Sousa Foundation’s Sudler Flag Of Honor for concert band and the Sudler Shield of Excellence for high school marching band. Coronado’s band gained fame across the southwest and eventually the nation as it won numerous competitions, performed on national television, and toured Mexico and Europe. Perhaps the highlight of his career at Coronado was the invitation from the Russian Ministry of Culture to perform as the only North American unit in the 1996 May Day celebrations in Moscow. During that trip, the band played a concert in the famed Tchaikovsky Hall, at Poklana Gora (World War 2 Memorial) and in Red Square for then-president Boris Yeltsin.
After Rick retired from Texas bands, he crossed the border to teach in Las Cruces, New Mexico, reviving an ailing program at Onate High School and raising it to State Champions in Concert Band the first year he was there.
Rick is an adjudicator, clinician and mentor for all levels of music. Marching bands, concert bands, and orchestras all clamor for his assistance as they prepare for performances and competitions. Rick has served on the Board of Directors of El Paso Symphony, is a former President of Texas Bandmasters Association, served as TMEA Band Chairman of Region 22 for twenty-five years and is the author of several articles for national music magazine, The Instrumentalist.
Rick’s family is important to him, and supportive of his many musical activities. His wife Barbara is a renowned band director, adjudicator, composer and clinician of national recognition. His two children: Richard, Jr., a teacher at El Paso Community College who also plays the Horn, and Chris, a band director in Klien, Texas at Klien High School, and Stepson Chris Prentice, an actor presently with the Stratford Shakespeare Festival, bring him much pride and joy. Rick also has three grandsons: Ryan, Collin and Mason, who live much too far away.
Rick and Barbara enjoy being outdoors and rode a tandem bicycle across the US in 1998 covering 4,200 miles. They left on the last day of school and made it coast to coast just in time for the first day of school. In between concert performances, judging contests, mentoring young teachers, and teaching private lessons, they currently enjoy traveling in their Airstream trailer and hanging out at their mountain house in Cloudcroft, New Mexico.
Rick is also a founding member of El Paso Brass, a quintet that has been performing together since 1972. In Brass in Class weekly performances for elementary and middle schools in the metropolitan El Paso area, he has performed for more than half a million students. El Paso Brass has also been featured performer with many symphony orchestras, and has played in New York City and at the Midwest Band and Orchestra Clinic.
Playing Principal Horn in the Roswell Symphony Orchestra, the Orchestra de UAJC (Juarez, Mexico) and the El Paso Opera as well as being Instructor of Horn at the University of Texas at El Paso (UTEP) round out his current activity as a hornist in the El Paso southwest area.
In addition to his career on the horn, Richard Lambrecht has had a long and successful career as a Texas Bandmaster. He began his teaching career at Coronado High School in El Paso and served as the band director there for thirty years. During his tenure as director, the Coronado Band garnered many awards, including both the Sousa Foundation’s Sudler Flag Of Honor for concert band and the Sudler Shield of Excellence for high school marching band. Coronado’s band gained fame across the southwest and eventually the nation as it won numerous competitions, performed on national television, and toured Mexico and Europe. Perhaps the highlight of his career at Coronado was the invitation from the Russian Ministry of Culture to perform as the only North American unit in the 1996 May Day celebrations in Moscow. During that trip, the band played a concert in the famed Tchaikovsky Hall, at Poklana Gora (World War 2 Memorial) and in Red Square for then-president Boris Yeltsin.
After Rick retired from Texas bands, he crossed the border to teach in Las Cruces, New Mexico, reviving an ailing program at Onate High School and raising it to State Champions in Concert Band the first year he was there.
Rick is an adjudicator, clinician and mentor for all levels of music. Marching bands, concert bands, and orchestras all clamor for his assistance as they prepare for performances and competitions. Rick has served on the Board of Directors of El Paso Symphony, is a former President of Texas Bandmasters Association, served as TMEA Band Chairman of Region 22 for twenty-five years and is the author of several articles for national music magazine, The Instrumentalist.
Rick’s family is important to him, and supportive of his many musical activities. His wife Barbara is a renowned band director, adjudicator, composer and clinician of national recognition. His two children: Richard, Jr., a teacher at El Paso Community College who also plays the Horn, and Chris, a band director in Klien, Texas at Klien High School, and Stepson Chris Prentice, an actor presently with the Stratford Shakespeare Festival, bring him much pride and joy. Rick also has three grandsons: Ryan, Collin and Mason, who live much too far away.
Rick and Barbara enjoy being outdoors and rode a tandem bicycle across the US in 1998 covering 4,200 miles. They left on the last day of school and made it coast to coast just in time for the first day of school. In between concert performances, judging contests, mentoring young teachers, and teaching private lessons, they currently enjoy traveling in their Airstream trailer and hanging out at their mountain house in Cloudcroft, New Mexico.