According to some members, EHS marching band’s performance at the Metro East Marching Band Contest was characteristically out of the box, and it was also “Out of the Bachs.”

The band finished third overall and won both best visual and color guard performances in its class. EHS fell to Belleville East, which won first place, and to Francis Howell, which took second.

Junior French horn player Hannah Almos said that Belleville East proved to be tough competition for EHS, as it has been in previous years.

“Belleville East did an overall great job on their music performance,” Almos said. “It was (tough competition) last year when all of the bands got even better, and competition got even  harder than before.”

Almos said that the band anticipated success.

“I was expecting that we would do well, as we have many awesome yet hard visuals and our color guard is great,” Almos said.

Junior color guard member Gayathri Kondepati said that color guard contributes to the marching band by representing the music.

“We translate sound into motion,” Kondepati said.

According to junior saxophone player Nathan Greenland, the show tests the boundaries of traditional marching band performances.

“What I like about our show this year is how different it is. Our show’s title this year is Out of the Bachs, and that’s not just for the pun,” Greenland said.

One of the eccentricities included in the show is the color guard’s human staircase creation.

“A guard member is on top of the staircase and holds up the jacket that we took off earlier in the movement. As we take off our jackets, our costumes become more modern which represents he change in the style of music to a more modern style,” Kondepati said.

Greenland said that the first half of the show is similar to a standard marching band performance, but later introduces peculiarity.

“The second half stretches the ideas of what a marching band can do. We are doing more choreography and dancing…I like how it forces me to get out of my comfort zone,” Greenland said.

Almos said that the band met its goals at the competition.

“Our goals as a team were to perform the music well with the drum majors and march in time…we did spectacularly on the visuals,” Almos said.

Ultimately, the band’s goal is to make the show entertaining for the audience.

“Above anything else, our goal while performing is to make sure the audience is excited about our show and wants to see it again,” Greenland said. “Getting a good score from the judges is definitely important, but it doesn’t mean anything if no one else likes it.”