24 high school marching bands perform at Bridgerland Band Invitational

Sky View’s marching band takes the field at 6:30 and Mountain Crest at 7:00 Saturday night at the Bridgerland Band Invitational at Romney Stadium, the first event of a competitive season of band competitions in Utah.

The field Saturday includes two dozen high school marching bands ranging in size from 25 to 250 members. The day of performances begins at noon with the smaller bands and concludes with the larger bands.

The event runs noon to 8 p.m.

Utah’s competitive classification of marching bands does not always coincide with the system used for high school athletics according to Mountain Crest Band Director Jason Petrovich.

“Bands with 45 students are in the 1A class, 2A is up to 60 students, 3A is 60-75 students, 4A is 75-90 students and anything above that is 5A. Because we (Mountain Crest) have 115 students in our band we are in the 5A class for marching bands even though we are a 4A school.”

A six-judge panel, five from California and one from Colorado, will determine the order of finish in each classification.

“Their scoring is based on music, visual, percussion and color guard,” said Petrovich.

Each band is given 15 minutes to enter the field, perform and exit.

“Each band has seven to 11 minutes for their actual performance and any band not off the field 15 minutes after it entered will be penalized.”

This Bridgerland Invitational begins a season of about 10 competitions leading up to the state championship November 2 in St. George.

“We had an exhibition earlier with Sky View, they’re doing really well. But typically in these competitions if they get third we’ve gotten fourth and vice versa. We’re usually neck-and-neck.”

The national anthem Saturday is at 11:55 a.m. and the competition follows.

Admissions prices include adults $5, students $3 and a family of six is $20. Tickets are valid all day.

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