At every home varsity basketball game, high school band can be heard playing the Fight Song along with many other songs.

Pep band is made up of students in the Spring Semester M1 band class, who spend their class periods rehearsing for concerts, and basketball games, and are directed by Matthew Rome.

“Every now and again we get a day dedicated to pep band, but we mainly focus on music for contest and concerts,” sophomore Joanna A CarrilloMaldonado said.

In pep band the students play several songs, some from the marching season, but they also play several new songs.

“Both (marching band and pep band) are really fun, but if I had to choose I guess I would say pep band because it’s inside and I don’t have to learn marching routines,” sophomore Michaela Austin said.

Musicians are typically in the stands of the band section ready to play by 5:50 and play music to entertain the crowd before and during the game. They usually take the third quarter of both boys and girls games off to get a snack and do anything else they need to before reporting back to the stands.

Junior Paige Zamecnik said that her favorite part of the games is getting to hang out with friends and making memories.

Pep band plays for all home varsity basketball games, entertaining the crowd during timeouts and between games. They always close the night by playing the Alma Mater, a tradition started by Rome.

“Playing the Alma Mater was a tradition I stole from my college,” Rome said. “It started when I was a student at Fort Hays, and I thought it was just a really cool thing. It just kind of grew and that’s what I wanted to bring here, and it was kind of fun, my first year, to watch the same process happen. That first game everyone was confused, then a few games in they caught on and were like ‘hey, lets go do that thing.’”

19rporter@usd489.com