Blue Devil Marching Band Heads to Syracuse

Following a string of first place finishes, the Huntington High School Blue Devil marching band is heading to the state championships at Syracuse University this weekend.

Huntington will vie against Rome Free Academy, Schenectady, Auburn, Walt Whitman, Horseheads, West Seneca West, Greece, Hilton and Sachem for top honors in its New York State Field Band Conference division.

“This has been a truly amazing season,” said Jason Giachetti, who co-directs the band along with Brian Stellato. “Our members have worked extremely hard and we are so proud of them.”

The HBDMB has been preparing all season long for its final performance at the Carrier Dome this Sunday. The band has been rehearsing nightly throughout this week on the Blue Devil Field turf.

The band’s most recent victory was an outstanding performance in Mineola last weekend. Huntington tallied 79.95 points, outdistancing its nearest rival by nearly five points, an impressive spread in such a competition.

This year’s drum majors are Megan Boyce, Brian McConnell and Matt Rosenbauer. The field major is Mike Stafford.

The Blue Devils will compete for the final time this season on Sunday at 2:33 p.m. A state title is within the realm of the possible. “I’m so excited for the 2013 HBDMB,” Mr. Stellato said. “They have proven to be a passionate, motivated and dedicated group.”

The 2013 field show is “The Planets,” featuring music by Gustav Holst. This fall, the band has finished first in four separate competitions and placed second twice. It marched in the Unity in the Community Day parade and the Homecoming Day parade and also performed during halftime of varsity football games. It performed an exhibition at its home show earlier this month.

The Huntington Blue Devil marching band began its season over the summer and to date has put in almost 300 hours mastering 66 sets of drill, 282 measures of music, 878 steps on the field and counts of color guard work. 

More information can be found at www.huntingtonband.net  under HBDMB. To purchase championship photos, videos, and/or clothing visit www.huntingtonband.net and select the link for Syracuse.

Early Band History

The Blue Devil band was organized in 1934 and was open to boys and girls in all four classes, according to the 1936 edition of The Huntingtonian, the high school yearbook.  “Although newly organized, this group has worked very hard and with the cooperation of the student body, the band members have received blue and white uniforms,” states a yearbook entry. “They gave a new feeling of school spirit to all of the occasions at which they appeared this year.”

The 1936 yearbook is the first to picture the marching band dressed in traditional uniforms.  The book notes the uniforms were the product of fellow students, most likely referring to a campaign by the General Organization to raise funds for their purchase or an outright grant of monies.

The first director was high school music teacher James C. Doty, who attended Oberlin College in Ohio. The 1936 drum major was Edwin Riggs. He is the first student listed in any yearbook as the drum major. Mr. Riggs, known as Eddie, was a member of the varsity basketball and track teams as a junior and senior, served as the Athletic Council president as a senior, was drama club stage manager for three years a member of the General Organization’s Executive Council and on the Question Mark (student newspaper) staff.

“Under the able direction of Mr. Doty, the musical leader, our band is expected to further the musical of the Huntington High School in the future,” states the 1936 Huntingtonian.  Principal Robert L. Simpson helped spur the development of the band. He was a devoted lover of music. Mr. Simpson wrote school songs, sang them and played musical instruments. Few things were closer to his heart than the music program at the school and in the community. 

James Cloyd Doty came to Huntington in 1924 and began his supervision of the music department. The 1935 high school yearbook was dedicated to him. The dedication, listed on the yearbook’s second page extolled the teacher and music director: “Who through his devotion to music has helped many students to develop a love and appreciation of one of the fine arts.  Who by his sympathetic understanding of young people has both earned and enjoyed the love and respect of all those privileged to have been his pupils.”

That same 1935 yearbook depicts the band sitting on the stage at the old Huntington High School on Main Street (now Town Hall). Members were dressed in formal attire, with boys in jacket and tie. “Great progress was made this year by the band,” reads the caption under the photo on page 44 of The Huntingtonian. “Money was available for new instruments and through careful spending Mr. Doty purchased several which have filled out the band in both appearance and sound. Besides playing at games the band performed at the Huntington Theater, at Woodbury Avenue School, as a concert given for its own benefit at the high school and participated in the Music Festival at Lindenhurst.”

Since those early days, the Blue Devil marching band has continued to flourish and its alumni now number in the thousands.