By Jason Wesseldyk
Sports Editor
For one day, Otsego will be the color guard capital of Michigan.
Winter Guard Field Day—featuring 15 color guard teams from throughout the state—will take place on Saturday, Jan. 18, at Otsego High School.
The event starts at 4 p.m., with doors opening at 2 p.m. Cost is $5, with proceeds benefiting the Otsego band program.
Otsego Band Booster co-president Kelley Dendel is excited about the opportunity to host more than 200 color guard students, ranging in age from middle school to college.
“My favorite part about color guard is probably the same as my favorite part of the marching season: watching music come to life with so many different varieties of movement and artistic style,” Dendel said. “And I love the joy on the faces of our students, seeing them come to life doing exactly what they love.”
Winter Guard Field Day is a precursor to the color guard competition season. Judges will be present and offering critiques, but no official scores will be given.
“Field Day allows performers to gain performance experience in a more relaxed, non-competitive atmosphere,” Otsego color guard instructor Issa Lewis said. “Performers will use traditional color guard equipment such as flags, rifles and sabres, as well as other props and dance to convey the emotional content of their program.”
Teams also have the option to perform their program twice in order to get more practice and additional feedback from judges.
“Spectators will no doubt enjoy seeing these young people bring music to life with creativity, skill and emotion,” Lewis said. “Watching teams at Field Day is also a great opportunity to glimpse the process of creating these programs.
“As this is the first performance opportunity of the 2025 season, teams will just be in the beginning stages of putting together their programs, and it is very gratifying to see them develop and grow over the course of the next two to three months.”
This is the first in-person Winter Guard Field Day since 2019. The 2020 event was cancelled due to weather, and 2021 was a completely virtual season due to COVID.
“We returned to in-person events in 2022, but had no bids to host an in-person Field Day until the Otsego Band Boosters took up the cause,” Lewis said.
By hosting events such as Winter Guard Field Day, the Otsego Band Boosters are able to keep the cost of participating in band as low as possible for the district’s students.
“The Otsego Band Boosters work tirelessly to make sure that our students are offered the best music education possible at little or no cost to the families,” Dendel said. “In Otsego our students do not pay to play like many area schools.
“I have heard that it can cost some families $1,500 or more per student just for marching band in many of our area schools. We are proud to say that our students pay nothing to be in marching band. They of course have some basic supplies that we ask each family to cover—shoes, gloves, theme shirts—but again, if a family is in need of assistance we are prepared to assist.”
The Band Boosters also want to help offset as much of the expense as possible for the high school band’s upcoming trip to Florida.
“Like everything else, the cost of that trip has gone up,” Dendel said. “As a board, it’s our goal to be able to offer $100,000 towards that trip. We are very confident we will achieve that goal and offer our families an affordable opportunity to send their students on this amazing trip.”
