HBCU Marching Band National Championships Announced
ATLANTA — The first-ever marching band national championships will kick off during Celebration Bowl weekend. T John T. Grant, executive director of the Cricket MEAC/SWAC Challenge and Celebration Bowl, announced the band championships will be in partnership with ESPN Events. "Not only with the road consists of football and the crowning of a national champion at the Cricket Celebration Bowl, HBCU marching bands from Division I and Division II will compete through the season to earn the right to showcase their talent in Atlanta and vie for the coveted title, 'Band of the Year.'"
Marching bands are the only entity that HBCU fans value more than black college football and the pageantry of homecomings. A few recognizable HBCU marching bands' names are the "Mighty Marching Hornets" of Alabama State, the "Human Jukebox" of Southern University, "The Aristocrats" of Tennessee State, FAMU's "Incomparable Marching 100," Grambling's "World Famed Tiger Marching Band" and Jackson State's "Sonic Boom of the South." These HBCU marching bands have worldwide reputations for high-stepping performances and arrangements on the field and in the stands.
The bands' evaluation and ranking process may be the first questions on fans' minds. Grant detailed the process with the media after Wednesday's MEAC/SWAC Challenge kickoff press conference. "Starting at the top of the season, bands will be evaluated by a committee of band experts, similar to the College Football Playoff model," Grant said. "Each week, there is an evaluation of their performances. A ranking will come out twice a month."
HBCU Marching Bands
The committee will evaluate each band's field shows throughout the season, with specific factors contributing to the scoring. The rankings list will be on ESPN, and the four top-ranked bands, the top two from each division, will compete in Atlanta, where a national champion will be crowned. It's also important to note that the band championships are conference neutral.
"We're going to be looking at things like precision, musicality, originality, your drumline, drum majors, and dance lines, and points will be assigned by the judges," Grant said. "There will also be some crossover. So you'll have some Division II band directors evaluating Division I and some Division I band directors evaluating Division II." Grant also stated that the stands' battles will not be included in the committee's evaluation, as he exclaimed, "This is why you call them marching bands!"
The judging process will be spearheaded by Don Roberts, a former drum major of the Florida A&M "Marching 100" and a longtime band director of Southwest DeKalb High School in metro Atlanta. Additionally, Roberts was the executive band consultant during the hit movie "Drumline" and the sequel "Drumline: A New Beat" and served as band consultant for Beyonce's HBCU-themed Coachella performance in 2018.
"There's never been a competition for college HBCU bands on an annual basis, so this is cutting edge," Roberts said.
Roberts went on to say it's a "win-win" regardless of who wins because the videos of the bands posted on ESPN's website will garner the eyes of a national audience.
Moreso, Grant wanted to maximize the potential of the Celebration Bowl weekend, and marching bands were the latest element to do so.
"How do we enhance the fan experience? How do we create content that our fans are excited to consume and that they will, in turn, regurgitate after the experiences are over? Hence, the announcement of the band of the year," Grant said. "We know that in the HBCU culture is a three-legged stool. One is football, which includes tailgating, socialization, homecomings, and everything around that. The other are Greek organizations and the role that they have. And we just added the final layer.
"This is going to be a nuclear weekend. When you think about the championship, this doesn't happen around any other game. Any other bowl game anywhere in the country. And we think that Atlanta is the right place for it."
The belief is that the national championships will trickle down, motivating the college program to seek out the best musicians and elevating high school and even middle school band programs.
This December, two HBCU bands will have earned the right to call themselves national marching band champions.