Pitt Band celebrates centennial

It’s Tuesday night, and the sound of horns trumpets through the air. A drumline taps out a… It’s Tuesday night, and the sound of horns trumpets through the air. A drumline taps out a fast staccato.

More than 200 members of the marching band mill through the Cost Sports Center during a tri-weekly practice, blasting songs reminiscent of football games and school spirit. They’re not athletes, but they’re just as integral to sports culture.

Drum major Will Cowan said that the band is just as dedicated as sports players, putting in hours of practice for shows that might only last a few minutes.

“Since Pitt doesn’t have a music school which requires marching band participation, everyone that is here wants to be here. The members have a great amount of pride every time we practice and run out of the smoke on game day,” he said.

It’s been 100 years since the Pitt Marching Band had its musical debut. And in the last century, the band has transformed from a miniscule octet to a musical powerhouse that helps lead the cheers for Pitt’s athletic programs.

A modest beginning

The Pitt Marching Band first appeared as an eight-man band at a Pitt-Ohio Northern game on Oct. 14, 1911. The men sported scarlet caps with blue tassels and only played classical music and military marches on their instruments, which were borrowed from the Becker’s Music Store.

During World War I, Pitt Band activities were placed on hold. In 1919, the band was reinstated with 60 musicians who received their first “real” uniforms: blue overcoats with blue and gold caps, paid for by the Athletic Council.

On April 5, 1922, the band gave its first home concert at Carnegie Music Hall. By the late 1920s, the band represented male musicians from multiple schools of the university.

In a few years, band enrollment would be restricted to ROTC members, as Pitt’s Military Department took over its direction in the 1930s. All bandsmen wore classic ROTC uniforms and had to pass rigid musical aptitude and marching tests.

“It was a military band. The uniform was very military with cross belts, because in the ’50s and in the late ’40s after the war, the band was in the ROTC department,” said Pitt alumnus Jack Anderson, head director of Pitt Marching Band since 1994.

Anderson began playing snare drums in Pitt’s marching band as a music major in 1964. He went on to become the band’s assistant director in 1986.

“The band had a national reputation back in the ’40s,” Anderson said. “At this point, Pitt, Ohio State and Michigan were like the big three. When we played Ohio State in the early ’50s. That’s when Pitt, Ohio State and Michigan were dubbed as the big three in the country.”

Times change, tradition remains

In 1972, the organization received a new addition: female musicians.

“Females were added, baton twirlers — the Golden Girls — started in, I think, 1975, and it just changed to more popular-style music,” Anderson said.

More changes came in 1985 when a 16-member color guard joined the band.

Although the Pitt band has undergone a series of transformations in the past hundred years, Anderson said some aspects of the 1911 band have carried over throughout the years.

“The traditions of the band have stayed the same ­— the fight songs … Since I’ve been head director, the style of the band has stayed the same,” he said.

“We’ve done more in my tenure to relate to the student section, so that at the football games, the students participate in the touchdown dances and first-down cheers.”

Geoffrey White, a 2002 Pitt graduate and former band member, said that the 2011 Pitt Band has more structure now, compared to when it played at the Pitt Stadium on upper campus when he was in school.

“Back when it was at Pitt Stadium, they would do a march up Cardiac Hill, and there would be people out for the first game. And then that was the only game you’d really have much of a crowd,” he said. “At Heinz Field, the pregame warm-up is now actually a concert.”

After every practice and every game, a different senior leads the entire band ­— including the color guard and the Golden Girls — in singing the Alma Mater, which he said is one of his favorite traditions.

“All that creates the camaraderie and the family feeling that the band has — that’s one of the biggest things that I hope would never change. It’s not just a band … it’s a family,” Anderson said.