Competition will help pay for band uniforms

The Grovetown High School Band of Warriors has organized a special event for those who enjoy halftime shows during high school football games.

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The band is holding the inaugural Grovetown Warrior Invitational marching band competition Saturday.

"These are all school marching bands," Grovetown band director Brian Toney said. "This is all the halftime shows."

The performing bands will include ones from Greenbrier, Lakeside, Burke County and Thomson high schools. Other performers include the Claxton, South Effingham and Warren County high school bands, Toney said.

"It is a good time," Toney said of marching band competitions. "It is a good event. We're hoping to have a good experience for the students and the directors and are looking forward to continuing it in the future."

The Grovetown Band of Warriors will perform but not compete.

The competition is organized through the Georgia Marching Band Series. Bands will perform within the same classifications that their schools compete in athletically, Toney said. Each band will be scored based on the Georgia Performance Standards, which music educators must follow.

"The series is based upon giving kids a great experience and giving them solid, educationally sound feedback through the way that the judges' sheets are laid out," Toney said. "It is kind of like the band world's version of a standardized test."

The eight top-scoring bands will move on to the finals, where they will perform without class distinctions.

"Then bands will go head-to-head with each other, but based on the scores derived from the scoring system and the judges' sheets," Toney said. "In that manner, it should be a level playing field, because if somebody who has a 20-member band can do all the things well that the state says we're supposed to do well, they have just as good a chance of scoring high or scoring low as a AAAA band."

Proceeds go toward the purchase of new band uniforms for Grovetown High, which will cost $50,000 to $70,000, Toney said.

"We're still in the point of fundraising to get our new uniforms," Toney said. "We are currently using uniforms that have been previously used. They are certainly adequate, but we are certainly looking forward to getting some new ones in the future."