March 4th is National Marching Band Day, a day to march forth and celebrate the vibrant tradition of marching bands across the nation. To celebrate, we spoke with Directors of two of Pennsylvania’s premiere marching ensembles-Dr. Matthew Brunner from the Temple University Diamond Band and Dr. Brad Towsend, Director of the University of Pittsburgh Varsity Marching Band.

For Brad, he knew early on he wanted to pursue a career in music as a high school band director. But that changed when he took a school trip to the University of Pitt for Pitt Band Day.

“They came out, pulled out all the stops, man. They played the over to 1812 and they had cannons. And when the game started, they sat the bands, the high school bands in the end zone. And there's a tunnel that the pit band came running out of, which I'd learned later is called their run cadence. And I was like, that's it, right there. That's what I got to do.”

Brads collegiate career kicked off with the Temple Diamonds, before becoming the Band Director at Pitt.

“I did direct the Diamond Band for six years and taught in the music education department there. And I made a big move across the country to Oregon State. was there for 11 years. And I've been here at Pitt for the last 12.”

Matt was introduced to the band while his uncle was in the Ohio State Marching Band. His grandmother even made him a little marching band uniform for him when he attended the games.

“My grandmother made me a little marching band; Ohio State Marching Band uniform and we would go down there and every time I would stand there, and I would conduct and it's kind of fortuitous what I was going to do with the rest of my life.”

When Matt went off to college, he set out to study computer science, but switched his major to music and the rest was history.

“I was finishing my doctorate in Indiana at Indiana university in Bloomington and I, um, uh, the job came open and it was open. I saw it posted the year before and, um, you know, then it came open again and I applied for it and they hired me and I've been there for 17 years now.”

Listen to the podcast to hear the entire conversation. 

Support WITF: https://www.witf.org/support/give-now/

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.