The University of Wyoming recently put together its first-ever high school honor band and tabbed one Powell High School musician for the selective event.

PHS saxophone player Memphis Solberg was among 50 students chosen across Wyoming and Colorado. The junior — who also participated in the Wyoming All-State Band — was the only musician from the Big Horn Basin.

After Solberg auditioned in February, he said organizers at UW followed up to explain that he’d done well, but that there had been “a ton” of submissions from fellow alto saxophone players. However, they believed if Solberg had the skills to handle a different instrument, and asked if he would be willing to play the tenor sax instead.

“I took like three days to think over, just because I didn’t know how good I would be at the tenor,” Solberg recalled, but in the end, he decided to take on the challenge.

“I thought that’d be fun,” he said.

Solberg borrowed one of PHS’s tenor saxophones and practiced roughly 10 minutes a night for months. It wound up being a relatively smooth transition: Although the tenor is larger and carries a deeper sound, Solberg said the musical notes have the same fingerings on both saxes and the sheet music looked exactly the same. 

“It ended up going pretty good,” he said.

By the time the UWYO Band Summit arrived on April 30-May 2, Solberg “felt really comfortable” on the tenor, he said. 

While attending the Laramie summit, Solberg got to spend a couple days on the UW campus, take a tour and receive some specialized saxophone instruction on improving his embouchure.

“When I came back home, … I felt like I was doing a lot better than normal,” Solberg said.

The summit culminated in a five-song UWYO Honor Band concert on the evening of May 2, conducted by University of Wisconsin–Madison band director Scott Teeple.

Solberg enjoyed the experience and might audition for the UW band in the future, but he’ll be sticking with the alto sax as he heads into his senior year at PHS.