For many HC extracurricular activities and sports, the state tournament is the biggest opportunity that teams can achieve. The HC Marching Band has a long history of success, and has made the state tournament before. However, William Kite, the director of the HC Marching Band, feels that this year’s performance was one of the program’s best. This year’s state tournament semifinals took place at North Hardin High School, and the final round was at the University of Louisville’s football stadium, the L&N Federal Credit Union Stadium.
“Henry Clay did great [at the state tournament],” Kite said. “We had our best 5A finish ever at semifinals. We were fourth and scored an 88. They take the top six for finals, so we were squarely in the final, and then we went up to Louisville that night. We ended up finishing sixth in the night show overall. [The] kids did great, [it was a] really fun day.”
HC performed especially well in the semifinal round, and Kite is very proud of the marching band’s performance.
“That semifinal, I think, is one of the best shows that we’ve ever had,” Kite said, “here in a competitive setting. I think this is one of the strongest bands in the school’s history. This is the third final we’ve ever made, [of those] two in the last three years. This band was really strong, as strong or stronger than the group two years ago.”
The HC Marching Band’s strong performance was not limited to the state tournament. According to Kite, one of the many strengths of this year’s team was the consistency that they showed in all of their competitions this season.
“It was a fun group because start to finish [HC performed well],” Kite said. “We performed at a show at Dunbar in early September and then went out to Lafayette. We were top four all year long in all of our shows. I think at GRC we may have been fifth. It was top five kind of stuff all year. They were pretty consistent. They did a great job setting themselves up for a good semifinal and final day.”
Despite how well the band has performed this year, Kite is optimistic that the program can continue to improve in future seasons. A primary reason for this is that the marching band has a lot of younger members who will be able to continue to improve in the years to come.
“We have a pretty good group of young students.” Kite said. “Usually every year we’re able to replace some of the outgoing seniors as they go. I do think the senior room is over 20. The last two years we’ve had about eighteen to twenty-five seniors that leave and we get about that many freshmen back in. So, we’ve been hovering right around 100 [members]. [Future membership] looks good. A big class came in for 8th grade band night, and a lot of them were really interested in marching band, so I think we might actually see some growth next year.”
