COLLEGE STATION, Texas — Jon Seale of College Station high school and Steve Fry of A&M Consolidated have taken their respective bands further than anyone has ever before.
The A&M Consolidated Tiger band, color guard and the College Station Cougar band and guard have advanced to the 5A UIL state marching competition.
"It's been amazing. I'm just constantly getting messages or phones calls, texts, something on social media. Just congratulations, emails through the campus," Seale said. "It really feels like a Cinderella story in a way. It's just such an amazing thing."
It all started with more than 250 bands going to regional band contests. Then, that was trimmed down to 13 bands who qualified for the UIL area marching contest.
The College Station ISD bands are just two of 33 competing for the Class 5A crown in the Alamo City, San Antonio.
"Some of these students have never been out of this town," Fry said, holding back tears. "They're going to experience things that they've never seen or done before. Things that 20, 30, 40 years from now they will be able to go, 'I was there, I did that, I accomplished that.' No one can take that away from them. So that's really cool."
This is the first time in district history that any band has advanced to the state level. The state marching contest will take place in San Antonio's Alamodome.
A&M Consolidated and College Station will both perform in the preliminary round on Monday, Nov. 1.
"When they walk out the first time and see the dome, see the lights, they see how everything be is, it's going to take their breath away," Fry said. "We told them they're going to have about 45 seconds to enjoy that, and then at that point, game on, game face on, go do your show, do your job."
Both bands will leave for San Antonio from A&M Consolidated high school on Sunday. The district has planned a send-off parade around the school beginning at 1 p.m. and is inviting the entire community to come out and line the parade route.
"We've kind of had mini send-offs like last week at arena," Seale said. "It was so neat to hear just the kids on the bus I was on just talk about how special that was to them."