Westminster College's Titan Marching Band is ready for a busy fall season.

"I am very fortunate to have such a great group of students who work so hard to represent our music department and Westminster," said Dr. R. Tad Greig, Westminster College director of bands. "I am extremely proud not only about the numbers and diversity of our program, but, more importantly, the quality that we have achieved."

The Marching Band's first performance will be in a parade at Kennywood Park in Pittsburgh on Thursday, Aug. 24, at 8 p.m. For the past seven years, it has been custom for the first performance to be at Kennywood. Admission is reduced after 5 p.m. for those interested in seeing the Titan Marching Band in the parade.

"As has been our tradition, we like to give our audiences a wide variety of music for their entertainment," Greig said. "Variety allows us to demonstrate our ability to perform various styles. Plus it's more enjoyable."

For their primary show, they are opening with a selection that was originally composed
for concert bands by Richard Saucedo entitled "Awakening Hills." However, Greig saw it more as a marching band piece, so he rearranged it for the Titan Marching Band. The percussion parts were written by Ryan Kirk, a sophomore economics and percussion double-major from Pittsburgh. This piece is followed by "Sunrise Lady," a great Latin-Jazz chart which features the danceline.

The band's third piece features the guardline and celebrates this fall's all-campus musical "Guys and Dolls" with one of its most popular pieces "Luck Be a Lady." To close, they will pay tribute to the "fab five" Beatles with an outstanding and challenging arrangement of "Eleanor Rigby." The band also has practiced some other tunes they plan to plug in at various home football games, including the hit "In the Stone" from Earth, Wind, and Fire, as well as the classic "Land of Make Believe" from jazz flugelhornist Chuck Mangione.

"We have a great incoming freshman class," continued Greig. "Right now we have 38 freshmen from areas as far away as Michigan and Texas. As we get more exposure off our campus, more people have become aware of the band program we have here. I'm glad to see
that we are getting more talented applicants interested in Westminster."

Westminster is usually asked by at least ten schools each year to come in as a guest performance band for their marching band festivals and competitions. This year they will make several guest performances, including one at the Lawrence County Marching Band Festival on Wednesday, Sept. 20, at 7 p.m. in Taggart Stadium in New Castle.

The band will be playing at all the football games. The first home game is Westminster against Allegheny College on Saturday, Sept. 2, at 1:30 p.m. They will also play at the Meadville Marching Band Classic on Saturday, Oct. 7, at 6 p.m.

Contact Greig at 724-946-7279 or by e-mail at greigrt@westminster.edu for more information.

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