By Aidan Mortensen | KOAL News

The back-to-back state championship-winning Carbon High Marching Band has been selected to represent not just the Castle Country but the state of Utah as performers at the National Veterans Day Ceremony in Washington, D.C. Band Director Adam Cunningham joined the KOAL newsroom to discuss this trip and reflect on the band’s journey to this point.

Cunningham opened our conversation by explaining what ran through his head when he first received the initiation to perform in the U.S. Capitol. “I got the invitation, and I thought,’ Well, this is kind of a neat little thing.’ I showed it to some administrators and didn’t think too much about it. And then, a couple of our administrators – Mr. Hardy and Mr. Sweeney – have some history and civics backgrounds. And I thought this is something maybe we should look into a little bit more and see if it’s possible to accept.”

Walking through the trip’s details, Cunningham stated,” So it’s an invitation to perform for the 80th anniversary of the end of World War II. So we’ll have two performances. We’ll perform on our own as just the Carbon High Band the day before Veterans Day. Then, on Veterans Day, that ceremony will start at the Lincoln Memorial. And a procession will go to the World War II Memorial to honor those veterans. So it’s a special veteran ceremony beyond their normal veterans event.”

The Marching Band’s success didn’t happen overnight. Starting in 2016, the Carbon High marching band program has had a slow climb to the top, but one that Cunningham is grateful for.

“It’s been a progression, even going back to the kids who helped us start Marching Band about nine years ago and a slow evolution as the band gets bigger. The students have created a culture where they try to make the next generation better than they were. They do a lot of training for their replacements.” Cunningham continued,” We have a great student leadership team. And every year, we just kept getting a little bit better, and we got into third place. Then, the next year, we leaped bands ahead of us in the rankings and took second. That led to the last two years of being state champions. And so it’s been a progression, and a shout out to all those students for the previous nine years since we’ve started the Marching Band program again.”

Cunningham spoke on the dedication of the band students, saying,” They perform 11 months out of 12 months. So we have performances from July through May. And so they’re working year-round and performing year-round at community events … Hopefully, this is something that, 40 years later, these kids will remember and talk about, and how they got to honor our veterans on a national stage.”

Like all major trips, there is a cost associated with this event. To help offset this price, the band has launched a SchoolFundr campaign to ensure every band member can travel.” The expected cost is about $1,300 for a student to go. The nice thing about SchoolFundr is that 100% of the donations come to us. They don’t take a cut. They don’t take a percentage. They ask for tips and you get to choose the tip amount … You can go in and donate and you can give a shoutout of support.”

To help prepare for this journey, the Marching Band is embarking on the “Washington D.C. or Bust” tour of six events. In addition to this, several opportunities are rapidly approaching to see the band in action,” on March 25, we will have what’s called our festival concert at the high school at 7 p.m. And that’s us getting ready for our assessment festival season. For the marching band, the first thing they’ll have performance-wise will be the Pleasant Valley Days Parade.”

In closing, Cunningham shared,” We appreciate our community. We are honored to represent our community. And again, if there’s anyone who would like to support us in representing our community and help these students, we’d appreciate the donations to help make this affordable for as many kids as possible to be part of the experience.”

The march to Washington D.C. begins on July 4 at Scofield’s Pleasant Valley Days. Donations to this trip to the Capitol can be made through SchoolFundr.