The 2022 Elkins High School marching band season has officially come to a close. As a spectator, this year’s marching performances have been astounding, but to truly understand the experience, some of the band’s members have been asked how they feel their season went.

“Since it was my first marching season, I don’t have many experiences to compare it to,” Ava, a freshman member of the marching band told us, “but all the work we put in during the summer band camp paid off.” Her favorite part of marching season was “getting to see the crowd and getting to see all the support from the community.” When asked to compare it to middle school band, she claimed “it’s drastically different…but has the same spirit. It’s very different from band director to band director so the music style changes, which affects the field show.”

To get a different perspective, senior Jon gave his thoughts on his last marching season. “This season was different because we were fully able to experience the forest festival band season again,” he said.

“Our freshman class was the only one in the current band that hadn’t done it before this year. It was cool to show the rest of the band what a day was like going through forest fest as a band.”

He said that he thought the season’s Elvis theme “was quite interesting because it was interesting to bring some old songs into a more mainstream environment and introduce Elvis to people that may have never heard of him.” He told us what he would miss most about marching band was “the atmosphere of it all”.

This marching band season has been extremely enjoyable for the town of Elkins to see, but it is clear to see it meant the most to the band members. It has been an amazing new experience for the freshmen and an extraordinary farewell to marching band for the seniors.