Marching Band Keeps the Beat Drumming

Every home football game, the Lowell marching band continues a long tradition of music at football games.

Justin Scott - Sports and School News Reporter

9/9/2024

For nearly 100 years, the Lowell High School Marching Band has taken the field during football games, entertaining fans, and adding to the atmosphere we’ve all known and loved for as long as we can remember.

The first marching band to perform at LHS was in the fall of 1936. Even then, formations were formed of letters and themed halftime shows were commonplace. This year of course is no different, as the marching band plays popular recent hits including "Shake It Off" by Taylor Swift, "Rolling In The Deep", by Adele, as well as "Someone Like You" and "Rumour Has It", which are also Adele tunes. There’s also one particular song we’re all familiar with, the LHS fight song “Go Arrows” which was written and scored in 1972.

This year’s band is directed by Tim Haan, assisted by Kate Bredwell. Dale Latva has announced the marching band’s halftime performance for years in the press box as well.

“We are lead by our excellent leadership team which includes our Drum Majors, Anderson Stoner and Lily Collins, as well as our Section Leaders; Molly Landgren, Brooke Shellenbarger, Gabs Stodola, Natalie Saylor, Layla Wilk, Toby Bergeron, Carter Ray, Jake Mitchell, and Brylee Craycraft,” Haan told the Ledger.

This year’s setlist came down between the contemporary Taylor Swift and Adele hits, or a show based on Billy Joel tunes. Lowell has gone between classics and contemporary often, including full set lists from bands like Queen and the Beatles. They’ll spend the last week of school sight-reading the songs, and then band camp in the summer.

“During the summer I write the "drill" to the halftime show and Kate Bredwell writes the drill to the pregame show.  We have two weeks of rehearsals as we get closer to school starting; what we call Pre-Camp where new students learn how to march, and everyone rehearses to learn the music. Then there's the actual Band Camp where we learn the drill for our halftime and pregame shows and put things together,” Haan added.

The band will march down the hill pregame before playing prior to the team’s taking the field, lining the field to make a tunnel for the football team to run through. After that, they’ll play the Star Spangled Banner, march off with the fight song, and take their spot next to the student section to cheer the team on. At times the band will also play from their spot at the south end of the stadium. At halftime band students take the field for their performance, before marching up the hill to put instruments away, many returning to the field to finish watching the game.

In year’s past the band has done fun initiatives including going to notable away games and an upside down drumline performance in between quarters. At its core of course though is the ability to give kids a chance to master an instrument, play music in front of a crowd, and contribute to the atmosphere that makes high school football games so exciting.

Senior Anderson Stoner came from the tennis courts earlier in the afternoon to helping lead the marching band as a drum major.

Things of course don’t always go to plan during shows. In 2013, an Illinois eighth grader went viral for having his cymbal break during a performance. Initially standing confused as his bandmates continued the Star Spangled Banner, he opted to go for a salute. Quick thinking turned into a viral moment. Last week, one LHS freshman had her drum break before halftime and had to march without it last week during the opening halftime show of the season. The good news? When you’re part of a band, one thing goes wrong, the show goes on, and it’s a successful performance.

Those successful performances are thanks to the collective work of the students, parents, and staff involved.

“As a band we all collectively work very hard to make performances happen each football game. Two weeks before school starts we all meet at the school, Monday-Thursday from 9am to 5pm, and the entire time we are solely working on learning our performance. Every Monday night from 7pm to 9pm we are out on the football field perfecting every little detail, and every day during the third hour we are out in the parking lot marching. As a drum major it is my responsibility to help the band in any way, whether they need help marching, playing, or with the drill. We put in a lot of effort to make every performance happen and we hope that all the fans love it,” drum major Anderson Stoner told the Ledger.

Marching band members are especially eager for new uniforms next year. During warmer games, marching band members won’t wear the full uniform, opting for the cooler black marching band shirts and shorts. The classic red uniforms that we think of the marching band wearing have been a longtime goal for the band program to upgrade.

“The kids, administration, music boosters, and parents have all worked hard at raising funds to make this happen. We can't wait for the community to see the new uniforms!  Watch for us at parades too.  We perform at the homecoming, Santa, and Memorial Day parades each year,” Haan concluded.

Thanks to a favorable schedule this year with six home games, you have plenty of opportunities to catch the band at a Lowell football game soon.

Below - Photos of the Lowell Marching Band from the Lowell-Mattawan game on September 6th, 2024