Ovid-Elsie High School marching band performed at the annual MSBOA Marching Band Festival Monday, at Saint John’s High School. The band, under the direction of Jeanine Ignash, earned a 1st division, or superior overall rating on their performance. Led by drum major Bo Hammond, the marching Marauders kicked off their “Shuffle Play” show with Crazy Little Thing Called Love, Queen’s 1979 hit, arranged by Richard Saucedo. Next up, they performed Viva la Vida originally recorded by Coldplay and arranged by Michael Brown, followed by Cars, a mashup of the soundtrack from the popular 2006 Pixar film, arranged by Paul Lavender and Will Rapp.
OE band director Jeanine Ignash shared some information about this event. Going into the performance, she was really just hoping that her students remembered how to do everything that they needed to do. To prepare for this event, Jeanine held many rehearsals from the end of July all the way to present day. In total, there was a week-long band camp during the last week of July, six other summer rehearsals. There were also weekly Monday night rehearsals for five weeks, and the band practiced every day during class from the first day of school until now. In comparison to other performances from this marching season, Ignash thinks that this was her band’s best show yet. The thing Ignash will miss most about this show is the eight seniors in the class: Amber Ingraham, Gracelynne McClung, Alexis Hart-Butcher, Heath Puckett, Morgan Douglass, Wyatt Wilcox, Oliver Ackles, and Bo Hammond.
Senior Morgan Douglass was asked about her thoughts on her final festival performance. When asked what she felt going into the performance, she said, “I was nervous about how we would do, but also kind of sad because it was our last festival.” Morgan believes that the band deserved the rating that they received, but was still shocked when she heard about the band’s superior rating. In comparison to the band’s previous performances from this marching season, Douglass believes that this was not the best, but also not the worst that the musicians have done this Fall. The only thing that Douglass would have wanted to go differently is that she wishes the band would have done better in a musical aspect on their second song, Viva la Vida.
Freshman Nick Kremer shared his thoughts on the event, too. Going into the performance, he did not feel very confident. He did not think that the band would get the rating that they received. This is because, according to him, the marching band has not put in as much effort as they should have. Also, he was surprised by the rating because the OE marching band only consists of 31 members, which is much less than what the school has had in previous years. In comparison to previous shows this season, Nick says that this one was “better than all of them.” The one thing that Nick wishes would have been different about Monday night’s event was that he believes if the band members hadn’t been as stressed as they were, they could have performed even better.
