Santa Monica High Band Wins Regional Competition

Members of the Santa Monica High School Marching Band were glowing Monday after winning their first Grand Sweepstakes Prize in regional competition in Riverside over the weekend, the payoff of a six-year effort.

The band’s turnaround began in 1991, when it had only 70 students, and the parents association started raising $150,000 a year through bingo games and other activities to pay for uniforms, transportation and related costs, said Joy Kurtz, co-chairwoman of the Santa Monica Band Parents Assn.

At the same time, the Santa Monica-Malibu Unified School District hired a new band director, Terry Sakow, and began allocating an additional $20,000 per year over five years to buy more flutes, trumpets, trombones and tubas, said Pat Henderson, district music coordinator.

The district also hired three part-time drill instructors and Henderson became its first music coordinator.

The band now has 180 students and “a huge sound and presence,” said Kurtz, allowing it to prevail Saturday against about two dozen competitors at the Lester Oaks Band Review and Field Show Tournament.