GFPS marching band combines GFH, CMR students for first time
This year’s marching band for Great Falls High and C.M. Russell homecoming parades and football games will look a bit different.
For the first time, the band will be a mix of students from both high schools who spent the last week at band camp and will be rehearsing throughout the fall to prepare,
“I think it will be cool to see students of both schools doing cooler things than they’ve seen in a long time,” Jonas Hibbs, a rising CMR senior, said of those coming to see the events.
He’s one of the drum majors for the combined marching band with Ella Woldtvedt, a rising GFH junior.
The combined marching band program’s startup funding is through the new permanent arts fund within the Great Falls Public Schools Foundation, according to Dusty Molyneaux, GFPS fine arts supervisor.
GFPS celebrating student art, music, theater for March
The fund was established earlier this year with a $1 million gift the foundation received previously and is intended to support student programming for performing and visual arts into perpetuity.
Molyneaux said he’s using the funds to purchase uniforms and any needed equipment to start the marching band and pay for any buses needed to get students to their performances.
For the first year, Molyneaux said they’re using a marching band windshirt uniform.
On Aug. 12, about 50 students were in the parking lot at Paris Gibson Education Center since lines were being painted on the football field.
CMR auditorium renovation underway
Andrew Kilpatrick, a band teacher at North Middle, said that previously, each school had their own marching band for homecoming.
He said the schools put their programs together with six hours of rehearsal, three hours on a Saturday and three hours the Wednesday before homecoming.
The new combined format with a four-day band camp this past week, and rehearsals two days a week through Oct. 22, gives students more time and a better marching band experience, Kilpatrick said.
The marching band will also perform for the Crosstown game on Oct. 23, where they will host eighth-grade band students and show them what marching band is all about.
The summer band camp, Aug. 10-13 covered fundamentals like marching forward and backward, sliding, show music and more.
GFPS music students performing for the holidays [2025]
Kilpatrick said this year it’s an extracurricular activity so it doesn’t conflict with sports and something the students had wanted for a “crosstown collaboration.”
To participate, students must be in good standing in their school band programs.
They’re hoping the program grows and they could potentially add color guard.
In some places, marching band is a competitive activity.
For Great Falls students, it’s a “marching band that’s for the love of the game,” Kilpatrick said.
This year’s show doesn’t really have a theme, he said, but they’ll be playing “I Wanna Dance with Somebody” by Whitney Houston and “Walk This Way” by Aerosmith.
GFPS celebrating arts, music, theater in schools [2025]
Kilpatrick and Sydney Eastwood, the orchestra teacher at North, both did marching band at Montana State University.
Chris Kloker, CMR band director, said they’d been losing interest among students for marching band and didn’t want to compete with sports or other activities, so they’ve adjusted their approach to ensure it remained an option for students who wanted to participate.
It’s a “complete change,” he said, modeled somewhat after the Billings program, with Kilpatrick spearheading the effort.
He said the students had “great attitudes” during band camp, which ended on Thursday since many participants started sports practices on Friday.
“We believe kids should be doing everything that they can,” Kloker said of their effort not to conflict with sports and other activities.
GFPS doesn’t have the bright, shiny lights for all sporting events and the public doesn’t often see the marching bands playing during football games that are aired on television, Kloker said. Those in the stands often leave their seats for the halftime show, which is sad, he said, because band kids are often the biggest sports supporters who don’t get that love back from the sports fans.
Kloker said Billings combined three schools and invited smaller schools in neighboring communities to participate in marching band.
He was getting nervous when Billings only drew 65 students, but so far, the GFH/CMR band has drawn 50 students.
GFPS approves new scoreboard purchase for Memorial Stadium
“It’s great to try new things. The hope for me is that it would bring so many kids into the fold that we’d have to go back to separate schools,” for marching band, he said. “We want to give them an experience.”
Kloker said they also hope it helps students realize their opportunities in college or later in life through marching band and music since students can get scholarships or, in some cases, be paid to march in college bands.
Ella Woldtvedt, a rising GFH junior, and Jonas Hibbs, a rising CMR senior, said they’ve enjoyed the combined band so far.
Both are drum majors this year.
Jonas said that in the past, marching band was required of band students and many complained or didn’t want to participate.
Ella said the combined band was “awesome” and the students participating were there because they wanted to be.
Great Falls Symphony selects new music director
She said she hadn’t heard anyone complain three days into the four-day band camp.
As drum majors, they are part of band leadership, help answer questions, conduct and keep time for the musicians.
In their school bands, Ella plays the alto saxophone.
Jonas plays the clarinet in concert band and bass guitar in jazz band.
Conducting for marching band is different than for concert band. For the most part, they’re counting beats per measure and keeping time for those marching.
Ella said they can also conduct the big musical moments.
Follow the Yellow Brick Road to Oz with the Great Falls Theatre Company
Each school has its own selection process for the drum major slots, similar to that for section leaders within their concert bands, the students said.
Jonas said that they liked the band camp format since they were able to get more accomplished and with more time, they can do “cooler and better” things.
The marching band includes flutes, clarinets, saxophones, trumpets, mellophones, tubas, drum line and the front ensemble, which doesn’t move, among others.
Molyneaux said many students own their instruments.
Western Art Week a chance to see people creating art “with their own two hands”
The district owns the bigger and more specialized instruments, such as sousaphones, percussion stuff, big saxes, and marching horns, for the students to rent or pay a fee to help support. Percussion has a yearly fee to help support all of the instruments in the section, Molyneaux said.
If a student is using an instrument just for marching band but normally rents a school instrument, they aren’t charged for the second instrument, Molyneaux said.
ArtsFest muralists win national awards
Ella, the GFH drum major, said she thinks audiences will enjoy their shows this year.
“I’d like to think people think the marching band is super cool,” she said. “I think marching band is super cool.”
*Photo by Dusty Molyneaux, GFPS fine arts supervisor
