Fall 2023 Edition
Alumni & Friends Magazine
Marching 110 Alumni & Other Bands
The Marching 110 isn't the only band around
Jessie Balmert, BSJ ā09 | October 2, 2023
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The Full Ensemble
While the Marching 110 is the most visible of 51ĀŅĀ×ās bands, it certainly isnāt the only one. OHIO boasts several concert and athletic bands comprising more than 500 musicians each year, from novices trying out a new instrument to skilled students pursuing advanced music degrees.
Athletic bands include the Marching 110, as well as the Varsity Basketball Band and Alumni Volleyball Band.
Communiversity Band is a band of community members, students and alumni. It performs the āUnder the Elmsā summer concert series and a holiday concert each year.
Symphonic Bands practice three times a week and requires an audition. The bands, made up exclusively of students (most of whom are music majors), perform a mix of standard and contemporary band repertoire, with about multiple concerts per year.
University Concert Band practices once a week, holds no auditions and includes members of the community or music majors practicing a second instrument. āItās good to have a place for people to play when they just want to play,ā says Dr. William Talley, Director of Bands at OHIO.
Wind Symphony is OHIOās premier concert band, is composed of the finest wind and percussion performers in the University. The Wind Symphony frequently commissions new works and performed at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C., in 1973 and 2008 and in New York Cityās Carnegie Hall in February 2017.
The Marching 110 Alumni Band performs during Homecoming 2017. Photo by Rich Joseph Facun
Back in Action
Every homecoming, about 400 members of the most exciting alumni band in the land march down Athensā brick streets to thrill the crowds, one more time.
Every homecoming, about 400 members of the most exciting alumni band in the land march down Athensā brick streets to thrill the crowds once more.
The tradition of former 110 members assembling for Homecoming started in 1973 and has continued, largely uninterrupted, ever since. The alumni group became an official organization in 1999, 26 years after that first performance, when OHIOās Alumni Association Board of Directors approved the official 51ĀŅĀ× Marching Band Society of Alumni and Friends. In fall 2020, the organization was renamed as the Marching 110 Alumni Network.
Homecomingāknown among band members as āChristmas,ā because itās the most wonderful time of the yearāis a time for alumni to reconnect with one another, meet the current students and relive their status as campus rock stars.
āItās an energy that you canāt replicate anywhere else in your life,ā says Mike āIcaā Eubanks, who played snare drum from 1996 to 2001 and is the president of the Marching 110 Alumni Network. (Eubanks, BTAS ā21, MED ā23, left OHIO in 2001 and later returned to complete his degrees.) āItās that one day where you get to do that again for a couple of hours,ā he explains. āMan, itās worth it, to be sore on Sunday.ā The
Marching 110 Alumni Network also holds an annual fundraiser in Columbus called āHalfway Home.ā The group contributes financially to the band, purchasing senior mugs and helping to defray the cost of gloves, practice uniforms and items for current 110 members.
