Parkland's Marching Band Is Largest in Years

Parkland High School's new marching band, with its 140 members, at the pre-game and half-time shows of the Parkland/Emmaus football game.

And while Parkland fans were likely disappointed by the outcome of the game – The Trojans – they were treated to the sights and sounds of the marching band, which is more than double in size of last year's. 

"This is our largest, by far," said band Director Jason Lerew, who has led the band the past 21 years. As a result, there is a bigger impact, both visually and musically, he said.

Band members wear a military-style uniform, with white jacket and black pants and short red cape. The jacket has a red sequins sash with silver inlay. The West-Point-style hat is black with a white fountain plume.

For the pre-game show, the band performed music from the University of Southern California's Trojan Band. For the seven-minute half-time show, the band performed Michael Jackson's "Thriller" and Journey's "Don't Stop Believin'."

With assistance from the band directors at the district's two middle schools, students starting learning the music for this year's show last spring. However, students began three weeks ago, just before the start of school.

"They've really stepped up to the plate," Lerew said, complimenting both the upper classmen who showed leadership and the freshmen joining the band.

Lerew said he will be adding more movements and music to the half-time performance.

"It's still a work in progress," he said. "We're still learning new work each week." 

Until this year, the number of marching band members had been slowly dropping off over past years; last year the high school marching band had 57 members. 

Starting with this year's incoming freshmen, those who want to be in the high school's concert band must now also participate in the marching band as well. Lerew said some incoming freshman left concert band because they didn't want to march, and older students can still opt for concert band alone. 

But the freshmen numbers are high. Of the 140 marching band members, more than 70 this year are freshmen, compared to 10 freshman last year, he said. The marching band is expected to grow significantly in size with each new freshman class.  

"There's a lot of potential right now," said Lerew, who is helped by six elementary and middle school band directors. "I really think the sky's the limit."

With the growth will likely come new challenges, he said.

For example, as the band programs grew at the middle schools, the bands outgrew the stages; there also was not enough auditorium seats for family members to view shows. So the middle schools began hosting their concerts at the high school, with its larger auditorium. 

This year, the high school marching band worked out a new system for distributing the band's uniforms because of the larger group.

The band will perform at all the football games and the Allentown Halloween parade.