By Matthew Chan | Editor-in-Chief

Irvington’s marching band attended its last band review of the year in Stockton, California on Nov. 21.  At the Lincoln band review, the marching band won the competition sweepstakes, an award given to bands that win in every single sub-division of the competition.

“The competition had a lot of tough bands,” band director Mr. Rodda said.  “However, we have been performing better and better so winning sweepstakes wasn’t something unexpected.”

The band review lasted all day, with band members getting up at 5 a.m. for a bus ride to Central California.  The competition ended in the evening with the team winning multiple awards for their performances throughout the day.

For the last event of the year, marching band also tried to add in new routines to impress the judges.

“We spent two weeks perfecting backwards marching,” said senior Nina Chang.  “Unfortunately at the end, only one of the five judges saw it.”

Despite the lack of attention to one of the techniques that marching band spent the most time on, Irvington still won in that category.

After the long day of performing and viewing other bands’ performances, the marching band returned to Irvington at 6:30 with its season finished.

“Amazing,” senior Edward Chen, the drum major of marching band, said of his predictions for next year’s marching band performance.  ” If we were able to accomplish backwards marching and sweep and entire competition this year, we only have new heights and records to shoot for next year.”

In addition to being the last band review of the year for Irvington’s marching band, this review also marked the last performance with Irvington for many of marching band’s seniors.

“We feel sad that all the seniors will be leaving next year,” said Mr. Rodda, “but in the end we’re all ready to be done with the long season we’ve had.”