RIDERS MARCH TO MARCELLUS’S BEAT AT ROOSEVELT

If not for armies, there would probably be no marching bands, so it makes sense that Roosevelt High School Band Director Treg Marcellus is both soldier and musician. (It’s hard not to insert an ‘h’ between the ‘c’ and the ‘e’ when you type his name.)

Almost 30 years ago DMPS’s version of John Philip Sousa thought enlistment in the Iowa National Guard made sense as a way to pay for college at the University of Iowa. That original commitment was for six years, but the native of Humboldt, Iowa never left.

National Guard soldiers
Treg Marcellus (second from right) with members of his National Guard squad that won the Governor’s X marksmanship competition.
After he graduated from Iowa he began a teaching career that took him to Roosevelt in 1999 where he’s been giving the marching orders and racking up enough festival trophies to line the walls of Roosevelt’s band room ever since.

Speaking of trophies, Marcellus has won plenty of them for marksmanship as a soldier too, most recently in the annual Governor’s X marksmanship competition as part of a team made up of comrades from the ING’s 34th Army Band. Marcellus & Co. won five out of the six categories in the event at Camp Dodge. He is as precise on the firing range as on the marching field.

Just ask his troops about his insistence on precision. Better yet, just watch him put them through their paces and see for yourself. They’re not supposed to talk.

“Nobody talks besides me and my staff!” Marcellus boomed from atop the portable bandstand at a recent preschool practice.

The sun was just rising behind the shopping center across 42nd Street from the practice field. Grass that will be trampled and brown by the time the band and the football team are through with it later this fall was still lush and green and damp. A metronome repeated a beat over (and over) a PA system, interrupted only and unpredictably by clipped, military-style commands from Marcellus.

“Hustle!”

“Heels together!”

“Straight lines!”

Sometimes all he had to say was “Band!”

At that, everyone froze and raised a hand. The order might as well have been “TEN-HUT!”

“You’re not just walking,” he’d remind. “How are you gonna get where you’re supposed to be on time if you just walk?”

Fair question. But somehow, Marcellus and his counterparts at the rest of the district’s comprehensive high schools DO get their bands where they’re supposed to be on time – and in style, year in and year out. Roosevelt already performed this year’s set, a tribute to the music of Queen, at halftime of last week’s opening football game.

On September 11 the Roughriders, Rails, Polar Bears, Scarlets – AND Huskies will come together for the 4th annual DM Marching Festival at East’s Williams Stadium, a non-competitive performance and clinic for all of the district’s marching bands. This year will mark the first time that Hoover has participated thanks to the resurrection of the Husky program under the direction of Ryan Rowley.

It’s a great chance to see all five district high schools represented in the same event, strutting their stuff, and admission is free. No first half to sit through, just band (after band, after band, after band, after band). Nothing but rooting and tooting, and you won’t be just walking when you leave.

The scheduled order of bands:

4:45 – Hoover
5:30 – North
6:15 – Lincoln
7:00 – Roosevelt
7:45 – East