Give to the Wildcat Marching Band
Donations go toward the general operating expenses of the band, including travel, instruments, uniforms, and other equipment. We appreciate your support!
Every year, our budget is stretched to its limit paying for travel expenses, band camp housing and meals, staff salaries, equipment, copyright fees, field lining, photocopies, repairs, and more. Because of this, we have no budget to replace instruments or to implement new technology. The band is also in a growth period, which means increased costs against a static budget.
We are beginning a campaign to raise funds to supplement our travel budget, to replace equipment that has reached the end of its useful life, and to expand the electronic front ensemble.
Travel
Travel is one of our biggest expenses. Each year, we travel to one away football game and stay overnight. We also typically perform at two to three band shows in exhibition and often one parade off-campus. The recent growth of the band means a likely move from two buses to three, as well as more hotel rooms. We also rent a vehicle to pull the equipment trailer and pay for the gas.
We would like to be able to maintain our amount of travel and possibly increase to include small group trips to recruit or give clinics at schools.
Instruments
Brass and Woodwinds
We have an excellent relationship with Yamaha and plan to replace all our marching brass with Yamaha instruments. After much experience and research, we have found the Yamaha horns to have a much better sound and playability in addition to being more durable than our current stock. We would also like to purchase additional tenor and baritone saxophones to avoid the need to share these instruments between two or sometimes three students in the marching, pep, and concert bands. Our reach goal is to be able to provide silver Yamaha trumpets and trombones to those players, so we have a consistent look and sound across the entire brass section. If we dare dream to be able to outfit the entire woodwind and brass with matching instruments, that would be the ultimate goal.
GIVE NOWPercussion
The battery percussion was replaced in 2007 and will be approaching its replacement date in the coming years. We were lucky enough to be awarded a grant from the UNH Parents' Association to purchase the current line. Unfortunately, the organization no longer awards grants of this size or nature, and other grant opportunities are limited.
In 2014, we resurrected the front ensemble utilizing electronic instruments. Utilizing some equipment we already owned along with many borrowed or donated and some small purchases, we were able to get the front ensemble up and running for the past two seasons. We have found success with this model and hope to build upon it. The borrowed items should be replaced with our own and we would like to expand the instrumentation to include electronic mallet instruments to allow percussion majors additional options to participate in the band. Storage constraints prevent us from being able to field a full traditional front ensemble. Additional electronic equipment will expand the possibilities and innovations we can bring to our performances.
GIVE NOWAdditional
Other possible future purchases include new uniforms, colorguard costumes, repair or replacement of raincoats, purchase of additional colorguard equipment, repair of equipment, purchase of additional music and/or licenses, production of promotional and recruiting materials, and more.