Cooper Marching Band To Put On Show Fit For A ‘King’
The Cooper High School marching band puts on a special rendition of their field show Saturday night. But its indoors so you don’t have to brave the elements to enjoy it.
“This year the marching band is traveling to Memphis. We’ll be taking a bus out there, seeing some of the sights and sounds, going to see Graceland. We’ll be participating in the Liberty Bowl halftime show with the Isley Brothers, is their headlining act and we’ll be doing a parade down Beale Street,” said Markus Hahn, band director at Cooper High.
To help offset the cost of this trip the band is putting on this special event called “King of Rock,” featuring the music of Elvis, complete with Elvis impersonator Jeff Merrill, and a special appearance with the Maverick Machine Drumline from Minnesota State University Mankato.
Marching euphonium player Isaiah Wallace said, “It’s a great thing to help us raise money for the band and stuff like that. It’s a great thing for the community so they can see what we’re doing really instead of just doing the stuff at the half time shows.”
And not every song is an Elvis song.
I really like “‘Sweet Caroline.’ I have a really cool part at the start of the song,” said Wallace.
“Just being able to show the community like, what we’ve been working on all year, because they only see like certain parts of it during the football games,” said drummer Anastasia Sikkila. “Not everybody comes to those, but now its open to the whole community and they can just see what we’ve been working on.”
“We are still marching on the stage and it’s going to be a lot more cramped, but we’ve actually designed a completely new show surrounding just the smaller area we get to work with,” said trumpet player Samuel Thomas. “I think it’ll be cool to compress our show down to a small area and still keep the crowd engaged with what we’re doing.”
These Cooper students are proud of their product and they should be. They have put a lot of work into their routines this year and if you’re in the auditorium Saturday night you will be entertained.
“King of Rock” will be performed at the Cooper High School Auditorium Saturday at 7 p.m. Tickets are $15 at the door and all proceeds benefit the band’s trip to the Liberty Bowl in Memphis.
Cooper High School
