Ash Grove Marching Pirates in tune with winning season

The year 2024 has been great so far for the Ash Grove Marching Pirates. The band has taken top honors in their class at every competition to which they have been. They won first place and the Combined Junior High/High School category and took the Overall Best Music Award in the Marionville Applefest Parade Competition on Sept. 21, and a week later, won first place at the Black Walnut Festival Parade in Stockton. They carried away several awards at the Pirate Power Classic in Pleasant Hope on Oct. 5, where they won first place in the Class 2 Division, tied for Outstanding Percussion, and earned the Triple Crown Trophy for the second year in a row.
The Marching Pirates struck gold again in Mt. Vernon on Oct. 12, where they won first place for their performance in the Apple Butter Makin’ Days parade, and again in Carthage on Oct. 19, where they took first place at the Maple Leaf Parade. It was their first time performing at Maple Leaf in seven years.
Michelle Carter, band instructor at Ash Grove High School, said the students who make up the Marching Pirates have worked very hard on their routines.
“August is when we start our summer band,” she said, “and that is when we first come back together after being off for the summer and working on marching fundamentals and getting our music set up for the year. We play a lot of music for the season all year long, over 50 pieces of music, and we work on our parade competition pieces.”
Carter said they drew on songs by Lady Gaga for their competition pieces.
 This year was … “Poker Face” and “Bad Romance,” she said. “We added “Bloody Mary” for Pleasant Hope’s Battle of the Bands, so that was our competition piece for that. And we just work daily fundamentals, playing marching. We go out and do our parade blocks of our Friday Night field show. We did a little more of that this year, learning more moves. We’re not a field show competition band, but the kids do enjoy doing that on Friday nights, rather than just staying in our parade block.”
The students who are in the marching band commit a lot of time to rehearsal, Carter said.
“It’s during the school day, every day,” she said. “Occasionally, we might have to meet early at this time. Instead of 5:50 p.m. on a Friday before a game, we might meet at 5 p.m. just to review, go over some things we might have missed.”
Carter said the band was glad to win their victories this year, but there is more to their performances than coming in first at parade competitions.
“I think they do enjoy winning,” she said. “I know it’s not all about the trophy, but I do see a large sense of pride in what they have accomplished every time we have won our division. (They also like) that I incorporate a large variety of music from all different decades. I try to grab a little bit for everyone to enjoy, and I think they enjoy that music that they may not have ever heard from the 60s, 70s. They enjoy playing just a large variety of music.”