The Pattonville marching band traveled to Farmington, Missouri, for its first band competition of the year on Saturday, Sept. 16, finishing 3rd overall out of 17 bands.

Band majors Carter Kennedy, Sarah Baker and Savannah Wooten prepared their band by making sure everyone was coming to morning practices and memorizing the notes of their show “13 Paranormal Lane.”

Freshman Bryan Burns said learning the show was quite simple.

“When you march, you get coordinates so it’s very easy to find your spot at the beginning and after repetition, it just gets easier and easier,” he said. “At band camp, we marched for 3 hours and performed for 3 hours so we learned the music pretty fast.”

Parents and families drove two hours on Saturday and watched the students play the music they have been working on throughout band camp and the first six weeks of school.

The eerie music of their theme this year produces a different sound.

“It is a creepy looking show, and the music is really, really creepy and it sounds like it is out of tune, but it’s not,” Burns said. “We normally play B flats and E flats but we are playing E naturals and a lot of A flats and a lot of F sharps. That means in creepy-sounding pieces, you want more out of tune notes and with those notes, those are the most out of tune notes that you will find.”

For the Pattonville band, the Farmington competition was a great success and just a start to its competition season. The band will compete at Fox (Sept. 30), Collinsville (Oct. 7) and at SIU-Carbondale (Oct. 21).