As the football season was announced to begin on just the third day of school, the stomachs of the 330+ member Spartan Marching Band dropped. With this announcement, the band would now have to perform their first show with the least amount of prep they’d ever had: two full days with everyone in the band.
As the school year approached, the members present said they worked tirelessly every evening at marching band camp to work out the show. With the little time to prep, “Returning students had to focus and push themselves”, quoted Tara Daurer, one of the band’s four directors. On top of the little time to prep, returning members had to work out how to manage another significant change – the lack of freshmen marching with them. This year, due to the large number of ninth grade band students, they were all given their own place in the back of the field, away from the upperclassmen, as well as a separate class period. This caused some worry and resulted in “fewer moves to help [them],” said Daurer, but “the students all did an amazing job for the circumstances.”
As if those complications weren’t enough, the directors were also faced with a new rule stating the football team must be on the field for the playing of the national anthem; this resulted in a change in the band’s pregame show. “The change was awkward, but in the end it was handled very well”, commented Rob Medd, another of the band’s directors.
The night of the show was upon them before they knew it. At halftime, the band marched onto the field and proceeded to play the “Disney show,” consisting of the songs “How Far I’ll Go” from Moana; “Fantasmic,” a princess compilation; and “Reflections of Earth”, the soundtrack to the Epcot fireworks display. “The band was playing quite well for three-ish days of work. Overall, the show went well” said Medd. It was “good for a music-focused program” and achieved the goal of “sounding as good as any other time we’d be playing”, commented Medd. As the band closed out their first show of the year and first show ever prepared that quickly, they breathed a sigh of relief and looked toward their next show on September 8, The Super Bowl Halftime Show.
