The Manville High School Marching Band consists of a wide range of students from 7th to 12th grade who perform a show. The MHS Marching Band has 32 members for the 2022 season, most of them being new members! Each show is unique and a new theme and story are selected each season. They travel around the state of New Jersey and compete against a variety of different schools.

Here are the three sections students can consider while joining the marching band program:

Wind Ensemble: The wind ensemble is the largest section of the band. This includes both woodwind and brass instruments. Wind instruments that are common in the Manville marching band include piccolos, flutes, clarinets, and saxophones. Brass instruments commonly found in the program are trumpets, trombones, sousaphones, and baritones.

Percussion Section: The percussion section or more formally known as the pit, is a section that involves instruments such as the drum set, bass drum, cymbals, marimba, synth, and many more. If the band is lucky enough to get 7 members or more to join the pit then they can create a drumline that consists of snares, bass drums, and quads.

Color Guard: The color guard is the artistic and decorative part of the marching band. They perform through choreographed dance which involves a variety of equipment to enhance and interpret the music and show to paint a picture.

The Manville marching band has a dedicated expectation even from the start of it! Mini-camp is the start of the marching band season! The band hosts both a mini-camp and a full week of band camp during the last two weeks of August. This is where the band learns the basic techniques necessary to cultivate a strong competitive band. Some of these techniques include marching, reading and achieving drills, playing instruments while moving, and Colorguard warmups and choreography. Instrumentalists also continue to grow their musical vocabulary and skill level as the season progresses. Band camp is important for several reasons, but especially because it is the time in which the band members learn their show for the upcoming competitive season. Band camp consists of 12-hour long days with a break for dinner for a whole week straight. Although it may be challenging, it is necessary to learn everything for the performance in these two weeks. 

Their competitive season is only a month, typically October, with a total of 5 competitions and 9 rehearsals. After band camp, practices became more intense in preparation for the season. While attending practices and football games on top of participating in competitions, the band continues their hard work and determination in anticipation of each competition. Given this, the band practices a total of 12 hours each competition week in the season. Although this may not seem to be a lot, there are many more hours spent outside of scheduled practices that are spent on working to achieve the best show possible.

The MHS Marching Band’s 2022 show is titled, “Breath of Fire.” The show is based on a dragon that comes to life and faces off against the marching band in a dangerous battle. The show rises to the climax through a story the band portrays between good and evil. Between the music that is being played, the feelings it brings, and the moves the ensemble makes to visually portray the emotion and desire for their show, it is clear that there is a devious battle approaching. Once the vicious dragon named Judy makes her appearance, it is breathtaking and absolutely jaw-dropping for the crowd. As Judy makes her final blow, the audience can finally put the entirety of the show together and see the purpose of the whole performance put on the field. Who do you root for? The humans or Judy the dragon?

The start of the Marching Band’s competition season was at JP Stevens High school on October 1, 2022. To truly understand the dedication and effort members give, below is a typical outline of the timely competition schedule. 

• 11:00 am Report, Rehearse
• 1:00 pm Eat/Pack/Load
• 2:00 pm Depart MHS
• 2:45 pm Arrive JPSHS, Unload
• 3:30 pm Move to Warm-up
• 3:45 pm Visual Warm-up
• 4:15 pm Music Warm-up
• 4:45 pm Move to Gate
• 5:00 pm Gate
• 5:15 pm Performance
• 5:30 pm Load Truck
• 6:15 pm Move to Stands with Chaperones
• 6:30 pm in Stands, watching bands
• 8:45 pm Awards
• 9:15 pm Load Bus, Depart JPSHS
• 10:00 pm Arrive MHS, Clean-up
• 10:30 pm Dismissed

At the band’s first competition, they placed first with a score of 71.5, along with winning best effects and best music.

Continuing on in the season, on October 8, 2022, the Manville High School Marching Band suited up to rush into another battle. They headed to Woodbridge High School to perform their show once again but this time against more schools. Now competing against 7 different schools, nerves were high but this didn’t stop the band from performing their very best. They placed first once again with a score of 71 and were awarded with best music as well. These next upcoming three weeks will be filled with anticipation and hard work as the band all continues to fight with all they have to make this show the best performance MHS has ever seen. 

UPCOMING EVENTS:

• 10/15/22 Competition at Monroe High School

• Performance at 7 p.m.

• 10/22/22 Competition at East Brunswick High School

• Performance time to be determined

• 10/30/22 States at The College of New Jersey 

• Performance time to be determined

Staff: Joseph Espineira, Kayla Eckert, Lucas Waitkus, Leigh Huber, Mackenzie Brown

Band:

• Allison Derrick
• Micaela Lopez Quinonez
• Allyson Flores
• CJ Mitchell
• Ryleigh Benson
• Amy Fields
• Maddox Brown
• Derick Vasquez
• Samuel Kuria
• Summer Luna
• Paul- David Tavara
• Alejandro Aguilera
• Yavier Alvarez
• Rian Sanders
• Constantine Gorbatuk
• Jessica Luna
• Alex Herskovitz
• Thomas Smith
• Jamie Gavilanes-Diaz
• Matthew Grzywacz
• Justin Gavilanes-Diaz
• Sophia Gosk

Pit:

• Elaeny Batista
• Emely Batista
• Jake Whitenight
• Allan Ambrose Cator
• Deanna Slayton

Guard:

• Madison Ponce
• Brandon Granberg
• Emma Marshall
• Julia Lalkisoon
• Sophia Marshall