Mineola will host 16 high school marching bands Saturday, Oct. 3, for the school’s annual marching competition at Mineola’s football stadium.
Bands from Class 2A through 6A will take the field throughout the day to perform their competition shows.
The Tyler Junior College Apache Band will also perform an exhibition show, continuing what has become an annual tradition at the Mineola competition.
For Mineola’s own marching band, known as The Sound of the Swarm, the home contest comes during a busy stretch of the season commonly known as “Bandtober,” when bands compete nearly every weekend while also preparing for University Interscholastic League competition.
This year, The Sound of the Swarm is performing “What Lies Beneath,” a show that uses oil derricks, barrels and other oil-field imagery to tell a story about hard work and perseverance.
“The theme of the show this year is called ‘What Lies Beneath,’” Mineola High School Assistant Band Director Carrie Gonzalez said. “It is a show about oil on the surface. It depicts themes of oil derricks, oil barrels, etc. But the underlying theme is about digging deep to reach what is underneath the hard ground.”
Gonzalez said that idea carries through the show as the band explores what it takes to keep working toward a goal.
“Hard work, perseverance, consistent work are often what is required to reach below the surface,” Gonzalez said.
The show’s designers describe the production as a story about work, ambition and the consequences that can come with pursuing something at any cost. As the show progresses, the search beneath the surface becomes more difficult, eventually raising the question of whether what was found was worth what it took to get there.
The Sound of the Swarm opened its competition season at Pleasant Grove in Texarkana Sept. 26, bringing home first place and earning Outstanding Percussion honors.
Following its home competition, the band will compete at the Royse City Marching Classic Oct. 10 before heading to the UIL Region 26 Marching Contest Oct. 13 at Pine Tree.
Mineola will compete at Winnsboro’s Battle for the Spear Oct. 17.
If the band advances through UIL competition, the Area C Marching Contest will be held Oct. 24 in Whitehouse, followed by the UIL State Marching Band Contest Nov. 4 in San Antonio.