By Kate Schroeder

This past weekend, the Prospect Marching Knights (PMK) had a lot on their to-do list.

After performing with the Lincoln Middle School band at the Friday night football game against Hersey, PMK rehearsed for three hours on Saturday, September 25, before heading to the Chicagoland Marching Band Festival at Wheeling High School. Straight after, they traveled to NIU to compete for the remainder of the day.

PMK came out victorious after that long day, taking Grand Champions at both competitions along with: best color guard, best percussion, best music, best general effect at the Wheeling competition and best music, best general effect and best percussion at NIU.

“The way that the kids were able to keep their attention and focus through two performances was probably the thing I was happiest about,” band director, Chris Barnum said.

Besides the reward of collecting the best scores at each competition, the PMK were able to prepare for the more intense competitions heading into the end of their season. Barnum hopes that each new performance of the show out does the previous one.

However, the PMK face a challenge of two weeks of no competition, leading up to their major competitions of the season: Illini Marching Band Championships, Bands of America Super Regional and State of Illinois Invitational High School Marching Band Championship. This Saturday, October 2, PMK will be hosting their annual band competition, Knight of Champions (KOC). The competition starts at 2:30 and the awards ceremony will begin at 8:15. Although PMK will perform their routine at the end of the competition they do not compete at their own show.

“[We need to] keep the forward momentum without having the allure of competition. We never want to move backward,” Barnum said.

The idea of pushing forward is especially important due to the level of difficulty that this year’s show posses. According to senior Lucas Sykes, trombone section leader, the show‘s movement is difficult due to new styles of movement, such as jazz runs and flutter runs. Also, each of the three movements (songs) in the show are very different than in previous years. PMK have one rhythmic movement, one piano movement, and an “epic” (intense) music.

“We have a large variety of things we ask the kids to do. This year’s band has really handled that well,” Barnum said.

During the remainder of the season, PMK hopes to be “performing the show at a level that [the band] knows it intended it to be.”

“Grand Champion means a lot, but what means more is the quality of the show,” Sykes said.