After decades, Eastbrook marching band performing again

By Sara Barker

Band director Joel Walters leads the Eastbrook High School Marching Band in its last rehearsal of the season.

Cowbells have been around Eastbrook High School football games in Marion for a long time.

But now, another tradition is being revived after 25 years.

This school year, Eastbrook had a marching band for the first time in decades. Some students in the band have parents who performed in it years ago.

For junior trumpet player Simon Manwell, his dad was beyond excited to hear his son would be in the new band.

“Maybe more excited than me, to be honest,” Manwell said.

Band director Joel Walters is responsible for starting to get the band back together. After hurdling initial costs and enrolling just 18 marchers, the band was ready to go.

But the students who had never marched before weren’t all in at first, Walters said.

“I think they were cautiously excited because most of them had never participated in marching band anywhere before,” Walters said.

When the band played at the Indiana State Fair Band Day, those fears melted away. Senior saxophonist Peyton Riddle said nobody in the band was expecting them to place third out of the nineteen bands in their class.

“All the parents were like, ‘You guys are so good,’ and we didn’t believe it, and when we got third at State Fair, me and two other seniors who were standing up on the podium receiving awards, we just froze because we thought they made a mistake,” Riddle said.

At the same time as the band was proving itself in competition, its community back home was waiting eagerly to hear it perform.

Underclassman Audrey West said she never would have guessed the crowd’s reaction to the marching band’s first performance at a home football game.

“I remember the first day we did marching band actually at a home game, the amount of applause we got just shocked me. I didn’t realize that they liked us so much, but then they did, and it made me really, really proud and like, hey, maybe we can actually make it,” West said.

Walters said the band still has a lot of growing to do before next season. One big hope for next year is to have actual band uniforms instead of this season’s t shirts and khaki shorts.

Walters said more marchers for next year couldn’t hurt, either.