I sat on the outside deck of a coffee shop, overlooking the Chattahoochee river near Atlanta on a perfect day in June. I was sipping probably the best frappuccino I’d ever had, and my girlfriend (now wife!) sat across from me. This was one of our favorite date spots when we were in college, and this summer afternoon was the perfect moment to drink coffee to the sounds of a river. But then I received a text that instantly reversed the carefree mood.

My wife and I were both in music school together, and our university was launching a marching band the coming fall. I had opted to stay out of marching band for a few reasons: Number one, it was a huge time commitment on weekends, and I was already a gigging drumset player at the time. I didn’t want to sacrifice my paying drumset gigs to go play in marching band. Number two, I’d never even been in marching band before. Never in high school, and I literally had zero interest. Number three, I was entering my junior year of...