Clear Eyes, Full Hearts and Horns in the Air

“Get those toes up!” comes the cry across the field. Sweating and squinting into the August sun, students drill relentlessly during the three-a-days, their aching legs and arms reflecting the work they’re putting in before the season starts.

But that’s not the football team out there. It’s the players’ loudest support: The Mighty Sound of Maryland, the 260-strong student marching band.

“When you see the football team play a game here on campus, you can imagine the amount of practice and rehearsal it takes to get them to be able to perform at that level,” says Eli Osterloh ’99, the band’s upbeat interim director, who stepped up after 10 years as assistant director when former Director Rich Sparks retired. “That’s the exact same thing for us.”

Each summer, the band gets a jump on the fall semester with its “early week.” Students arrive on campus with instruments, flags, poms and music in tow (they have about two weeks to practice it beforehand) along with one goal: to transform into one cohesive unit. The musicians, color guard and dance team start with 8-11 a.m. marching practice on Memorial Chapel Field, then lunch and indoor practice with individual sections in the Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center, before they’re back outside for another three hours—more than 12 hours daily in total.

“Your feet feel like they’re about to fall off. It’s insane,” says trumpet player Jessica Brewer ’19, one of 80 freshmen joining the band. “Holding your trumpet up that high and keeping it there—it really hurts your shoulders, oh my God.”

“Blood, sweat, tears,” chimes in fellow trumpet player Savannah Gaines ’19.

This year, at least, they’re getting a reprieve from the usual late-summer mugginess with temperatures in the 70s and 80s and low humidity—though the long hours in the sun nonetheless spur certain band members to strip down to nothing but sports bras and bare chests. The drumline in particular seems to enjoy having nothing between them and their padded harnesses.

As the season goes on, however, cold weather becomes a major problem, says flute player Angela Maio ’16, who’s played through snow. “Our parkas are really hard to move in. Your fingers freeze and you can’t play that well, and your toes get frozen and you can’t march that well. That’s the worst.”

What keeps them coming back each year is the members’ strong bonds with each other; more than one student referred to the band as “family.” Even during the most grueling of practices, they get to indulge their goofy sides. A random member yells, “Tuba!” and Osterloh booms back from his megaphone, “Tuba, or not tuba—that is the question.” On Spirit Day, each section chooses a theme, getting decked out in pool gear (including one guy who practiced with an dinosaur-shaped inner tube around his waist), dressing up like dominos and creating cardboard headgear. During mealtimes, a sudden buildup of clanging glasses, clattering silverware and banging fists turns into a rendition of “Maryland, My Maryland” and other traditional songs.

Of course, it all culminates with the excitement of game day: the roar of Terp fans, the rowdy students and the blast of the touchdown cannon that cues Maryland’s victory song.

Away games are memorable too, many of the upperclassmen agree, including the 2013 Virginia Tech game when the Terps came from behind to win at the last minute, silencing what had been a stadium-shaking crowd. This year, everyone’s looking forward to the away game at No. 1 ranked Ohio State. But before they can play for that crowd of 100,000-plus, they’ve got to tackle their inaugural game, when the Terps play the Richmond Spiders at home on Saturday. They’ve got just three more days to memorize their music and routines.

“When they get into that stadium for the first time, the nerves may get to them a little bit at first,” says Osterloh. “But it’s so great after that first performance of the season. Everyone comes off the field with these huge smiles.”