The Tomball Cougar Pride Band will be having its first contest tomorrow at the Henry Winston Stadium, in Friendswood.

The band will be performing parts 1, 2, and 3 of their show called Celestial Journey. They will also be performing with props for the first time.

“The show complete with all of our props…and our choreography will be very exciting to see develop in a contest environment,” Band Director Joe Nunez said. “The props definitely help bring the Celestial Journey theme to reality.”

Band has been working on this show since mid-July and are very proud of it.

“While it has been fun performing at halftime, a marching contest is all about us and the focus of the audience is completely on the band,” Assistant Director Mathew Cho said.

They will be competing, for both prelims and finals, in the 6A classification for the title of Grand Champion, with musical, visual, general effects, percussion, and auxiliary divisions.

This will be the first show for freshmen and sophomores to ever compete, which brings out a lot of nervous yet potential performers.

“The first contest of the season always has many flaws and the first contest in two seasons will definitely have flaws to be corrected as we gain our confidence week to week,” Nunez said.

The last time they competed in 2019-2020 with the show “Out Of The Box” was at state, getting 21st out of approximately 35 bands.

“This year is about rising to the challenge of starting that momentum again and coming out swinging despite all odds,” junior Hector Ulloa said.

Stakes are definitely not the same as before. With the change in division from 5a to 6a, the Cougar Pride Band is going to compete with a more difficult competition than before.

“I am so excited to finally get to showcase our marching show. It [contests] is such an exciting atmosphere, and I can’t wait to get to perform!” Cho said.