My Way

Introduced by George N. Parks in 1978, My Way quickly became more than a warm-up exercise. Originally used to help band members develop intonation by singing their parts, the song came to embody Parks’ philosophy of pursuing excellence with purpose, character, and conviction. Its enduring refrain—“I did it my way”—captured the confidence and individuality he sought to instill in every student. Before long, it became the Minuteman Band’s traditional closer—and, over time, simply the UMass band song.

Nearly every performance ends the same way: the band plays, then sings, then plays My Way in a ritual shared by generations of members and alumni. At every home football game, hundreds of fans remain in the stands after the final whistle for the unofficial “Fifth Quarter,” where the Minuteman Band reprises its halftime show before closing, as it always has, with My Way. The tradition reaches one of its most theatrical expressions during the University’s annual Multibands Pops Concert. Just as the audience assumes the Minuteman Band has exited to make way for a UMass Drumline feature, the musicians unexpectedly reappear throughout the theater—lining aisles, filling balconies, and standing between rows of seats—to surround thousands of concertgoers with My Way.

Perhaps nowhere is the song’s enduring power more evident than at Homecoming. Over the years, alumni organically transformed the traditional Homecoming alumni band. Rather than returning solely to perform as a separate ensemble of roughly one hundred musicians, increasing numbers chose instead to gather on the field after the game, where today more than 300 alumni routinely stand shoulder to shoulder with the current Minuteman Band to sing My Way. The evolution was never organized—it simply happened, a tradition reshaped by those who lived it. More than a closing number, My Way has become the band’s collective statement of identity, binding generations of bandos in a shared expression of purpose, pride, and belonging.

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