Point Pleasant Boro High School's State Champion Marching Band 7th At National Competition

For the first time in 10 years, the Point Pleasant Boro High School Competition Marching Band is a state champion.
And the Panthers finished a strong season with a seventh place finish last weekend at nationals, according to band director Scott Visco.
The band took first place in the US Bands New Jersey State competition on Oct. 18, beating 12 other marching bands in the 4A group with a score of 84.238 (out of 100). The band also won Best Overall Effect in the competition at HighPoint Solutions Stadium at Rutgers University. wholesale nfl jerseys It was the band’s first state title since 2004, he said.
On Sunday, they finished seventh out of 17 bands at the USBands National Championship held at J. Birney Crum Stadium in Allentown, Pa. Competing against bands from Pennsylvania, Connecticut, Maryland and New Jersey, they scored 93.350.
“The students started learning and memorizing their music back in July,” Visco said. “They also had a two week long band camp to learn their spots on the field and continued making their show better all season long.”
“We didn’t put the final touches on the show until the last practice,” he said.
The music performed was from a marching band show with two potential names: “The Piano Lesson,” or “Phantom of the Piano Studio,” Visco said.
“Our staff changed the title of the show to fit what we felt we could do with the music on the field,” he said. “We called it ‘Classic Variations.’ The first selection entitled ‘Ludwig Wolfgang’ takes the very familiar ‘Fur Elise’ by Ludwig Van Beethoven and Mozart’s ‘Piano Sonata No. 16 in C Major (Sonata Facile)’ and gives them a circus/Latin jazz makeover.”
“The next selection entitled ‘Knuckle Concerto’ takes a smooth Jazz approach to ‘In the hall of the Mountain King’ from Edvard Grieg’s Peer Gynt Suite, followed by a zany percussion interlude and finishing with Brahm’s Hungarian Dance No. 5,” Visco said. “We added a brief transition of Hoagy Carmichael’s ‘Heart Soul’ to bring us to Claude Debussy’s “Clare de Lune. The final selection is “Chopsticks,” again done in a Latin Jazz style, which also throws in a homage to the theme from the “My three Sons” tv show complete with a harmonica solo by our drum major/classical composer wig wearing conductor Matt Drew.”
The color guard captains were Olivia Ferdon, Miranda Gale, Olivia Toner and Nicole Toms. The section leaders were: Madelyn Joel, Emily O’Connor, Joshua Battaglia, Matthew Diglio, Christopher Elwell, William Elwell, Dylan Broussard and Nicholas Gattuso III.
Bands are scored by various Judges critiquing different aspects of their performance, Visco said. An on field music judge to listen to individual players; an overall music judge who listens to the ensemble as a whole; a visual judge who judges the marching style, movement, technique and the shapes the bands form on the field and how they interact with the color guard; an individual percussion and color guard judge, and an Overall Effect judge who looks at the entire package. At championship events, it is common to have a double panel in order to have a consensus and not let one judges opinion determine champions, he said.
“The students now have a great DVD of the show and can look back with pride in their efforts,” Visco said. “The lessons learned in working together as a team and being a part of something bigger than themselves is more important than any trophy or banner. But it sure is nice to be recognized and to have your hard work validated every once in a while.”