Band Members

Fun Facts About Marching Band Members

• Marching band members achieve perfect, synchronized movement without looking at their feet through intense training in peripheral vision and muscle memory. It is much harder than it looks.
• Band members often have better posture than the average person, as they train to maintain a vertical line connecting the ears, shoulders, hips, knees and ankles.
• Marching band members sometimes get overly attached to their instruments. Naming them is not unusual. "Pickles" is pretty popular for the piccolo.
• Band members are surprisingly competitive, especially during half-time shows and competitions. There are high school and collegiate marching band championships held each year on the national level.
• Band kids are used to performing under pressure, often in front of thousands of people. Successfully doing so requires spending hundreds of hours together during rehearsals. So it is no wonder they stay close friends for years.
• Marching band members can hear tiny mistakes non-members would overlook, and can instantly spot when someone is off-step or out-of-form — even in a massive block of marchers.
• Band members are experts at counting to eight. This count provides the fundamental structure for musical time signatures, for movement phasing, and for coordinating large groups of performers.
• Viewers of the comedy American Pie (1999) will remember the recurring gag in the movie that began with the line "One time, at band camp..." However, band camp is a very real and very serious thing. It's often mandatory for high school and college marching bands to learn music and drill routines before the season begins.