GHS News

The Marching Duke’s Show and Leadership Has Been Decided for the 2019-2020 Season

Reporter Kaylee Walls

The Gloucester High School’s marching dukes band banquet took off Tuesday night at 6:00pm. The banquet started with a potluck and concluded with an awards ceremony and leadership announcements.

Each year differents grades receive different momentums for their marching season. Freshman receive their letter, sophomores, juniors, and seniors receive different pins for their letters. Each student is called up individually to receive their pin or letter.

This year the seniors were called up to receive individual gifts from the band boosters. The gifts included framed pictures from their last marching season, a personalized embroidered “Dukes bear” and some “Dukes Mix” popcorn from Northern Neck Popcorn. The seniors also receive to roses, a red one and a white one. The students are supposed to give the red one to someone who has inspired them academically or musically throughout high school. The white one is given to a younger student or individual to inspire them.

Every year it is a tradition among seniors in the band to get gifts for Mr. Venable at the end of the year. The gifts are typically a funny memory or moment they had with Mr. V and something to remind him of them whenever they are gone.

After the gifts were given and the door prizes were raffled Mr. Venable announced the marching show for the 2019-2020 season. The show is called LOVE: A Juliet Story. It is a spinoff of Romeo and Juliet and includes the following movements: “East of Eden: Finale” by Lee Holdridge for part 1, “Lacrimosa” by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart for part 2, ‘A Time for Us” by Nino Rota for part 3, “Romeo and Juliet, Op. 64” by Prokofiev, and the show concludes with “Elsa’s procession to the Cathedral” by Richard Wagner.

The leadership for the upcoming season was announced afterwards. The drum majors for the 2019-2020 season include Saleemah Gregory, Charles McKeller, and Taylor West. Daniel Hook is low brass captain, Aaron VanVranken in brass captain, Colin Goetz is woodwind captain, and Hailey Williams and Kaylin Amaral are color guard captains. The leaderships includes Caroline Moore as Trombone section leader, Cassidy Taggart and Kayle Hogge as Clarinet section leaders, Cole Stevens and Maia Isberner as saxophone section leaders, Kaylee Walls as mellophone section leader, Kameryn Altizer and Keanu Sheppard as flute section leaders, Rachel Swain as pit section leader, and Savannah Rose as drumline section leader.

The Marching Dukes have planned a trip to Disney for the week of March 22, 2020. The Marching Dukes will also be holding their first ever competition at Gloucester High school on October 12th 2019. The show is expected to be a profitable sort of fundraiser for the band and proceeds will go to the band program.