With hundreds of spectators watching, hundreds of students performed and competed at the Marshall University Tristate Marching Band competition.
This 54-year-old competition was held at the Joan C Edwards Stadium Saturday, Oct. 26. Nearly 30 bands from West Virginia, Ohio and Kentucky performed at the competition this year with the first band, Sissonville High School, performing at noon.
The competition was split up into three different classes, “1A” for the smaller bands, “2A” for medium sized bands and “3A” for the largest sized bands performing at the competition.
After a mistake in calculations, South Point High School took home the gold while also winning best 3A band with their show “Discovery.” Greenbrier East High School took home the silver while also winning best 2A band with their show “Sparta.” Hurricane High School won bronze and won best 1A band with their show “Pixels.” Greenbrier East also received the “Best West Virginia Band” award; South Point High School received the “Best Ohio Band” award and Johnson Central High School received the “Best Kentucky Band” award.
The competition also gave out the following awards in each class: music, visual, effect, color guard, percussion and drum major. They also gave awards for best overall featured twirler and best overall majorette line.
Many students use this competition as a way to meet current Marshall students and faculty and be exposed to being involved with music performances in college.
“Marshall is a lot more casual than other colleges while also being a decent sized university with good opportunities, and I think Marshall’s music program is one of those opportunities,” high school senior Jackson Gaton said.
“As a senior planning to go into computer science, I’m excited to be a part of the Marching Thunder next year and hopefully be able to use it as a destresser,” another high school senior said.
The competition is also used as a recruiter for Marshall’s School of Music.
“Anyone on campus is welcome to participate in any of our ensembles, including the Marching Thunder,” said Christopher Schletter, the director of Athletic Bands. “We are also inclusive regardless of your background or your musical ability. We want everyone to participate in music.”
The Marching Thunder performed an exhibition show of their pregame and half-time show at the end of the competition.
Other high schools that performed at the competition were Point Pleasant, Symms Valley, Nicholas County, Lincoln County, Hannan, Portsmouth, Magnolia, Wahama, Saint Albans, Oak Hill, Wayne, South Charleston, Riverside, Williamstown, Fairland (exhibition performance), Richwood, Scott, Parkersburg South, Huntington and Spring Valley. This competition happened the same day as the West Virginia Marching Band Invitational at Laidley Field in Charleston.
Many bands performed at both competitions, with Hurricane winning the “Blue Division” and Cabell Midland winning the “Old Gold Division” and winning the competition overall becoming the
West Virginia state champion and extending their marching band state champion streak to 13 years in a row.
Nate Harrah can be contacted at [email protected].
Correction: The headline of this story originally misnamed the winner of the competition. South Point High School is the correct winner.
