The Marching Highlanders finished a strong marching season this quarter. On Friday, August 4th the Marching Highlanders competed in the Indiana State Fair Band Day. They took 4th place in the day show and 5th place in the night show. The students practiced hard throughout the summer with practices anywhere up to 12 hours. Band director Richard Geisler pushed the kids to work hard during the long hours of the summer.

Geisler knows how challenging marching band can be so he is very proud of all his students. “I thought okay, this is going to be a challenging season to get this to where we would normally get it,” Geisler said. “That being said, where we wound up at the end of the season was, I think, as good as we could have expected, given how young and inexperienced we were. I was extremely proud and impressed at what our kids were able to do.” Our 2023 marching season had a lot of 7th and 8th graders that weren’t very experienced with their instrument or haven’t even tried color guard. All the kids felt rewarded and excited about their placement after performing so well at Band Day.
Geisler says that being in a marching band can teach you a lot of skills. “It teaches you so much. Even simple basic things like being on time and preparing before you have to get to something, to be ready.” With how much time and effort students put into marching band, being on time is important, so learning how to be on time and be prepared is something really important to have a successful season.
Geisler agrees that there are definitely some difficult parts to marching band. “The most challenging part or the part of marching band that I lose sleep over just from stress is putting everything together and making sure everything is running on time,” he said. Being the band director comes with a lot of stress, but he is passionate about his job and loves seeing the show come together at the end of the summer. All the lost sleep was worth it to see the outcome of what the students and staff all worked hard for.