
8th Grade Student Journalists
--GOBLES--From beginning to end, it was another award-winning marching season for The Gobles High School Marching Band.
The band opened the season of competition in Otsego and took first place, with awards for Best Percussion, Music, Color Guard, and Marching. The band concluded the season in Jenison and again won first place overall, with several more caption awards. The band also won awards in Hastings and Lakeshore, and at the Marching Festival held in Paw Paw.
This year Gobles is performing Carmina Burana, music composed by Carl Orff. According to Gobles Band Director Emily Cox the piece is powerful and harder to march than any other piece that the band in has performed in some time, and she is proud of what she saw from her students this year.
“I am really excited and proud of our band,” Cox said. “We were bigger than ever and we had to work harder to improve than in other years because of the difficulty of our marching show.”
Senior band member and co-leader of the percussion section, Tucker Harbaugh, said the success they’ve had comes from a combination of hard work, tradition, and leadership.
According to Harbaugh, the drum line has a reputation to uphold.
“When I started in drum line in 8th grade, the band took almost every award in every competition,” Harbaugh said. “After the seniors left that year, we had to rebuild to where we are today. We have strong leaders and a great music teacher in Ms. Cox. She is funny, sets high standards, and cares about our success as musicians.”
“The drum line hasn’t taken anything but first place my entire time in the band,” Harbaugh said. “We practice a lot. I was born into being a percussionist because my dad was a percussionist, too. It was fantastic to go through my band years undefeated as a drum line. We leave a proud tradition behind us, and everyone has high expectations for what we put on the field.”
Once again the band features students in grades eight through twelve, and the 8th graders now take up the tradition of excellence established over the years by the Gobles band.