Glide step

Glide step is a form of movement used by marching bands to minimize upper body movement, enabling musicians to play their instruments and march without air-stream interruptions. Standardizing the style of marching also serves to add to the visual effect of a marching band. Sometimes special shoes are worn with a curved heel that facilitates rolling the foot. Glide stepping is used by many high school marching bands, college marching bands, and by many Drum Corps. Glide stepping is sometimes also known as "roll stepping".

Glide step seeks to restrict all motion above the upper-body to a smooth unchanging motion in the direction of travel and to restrict all motion below the waist to that which is completely necessary. Before the glide step can be learned, the general posture of the body must be normalized. This is called "attention". The important aspects of attention for marching are having a tall, straight posture with hips shifted slightly back, keeping weight distributed slightly forward and off the heels, and general relaxation of all major muscles. A general guideline for the body's position relative to the rest of the body is the ears should be over the shoulders, the shoulders over the hips, and the hips over the ankles. In the "attention" position, the feet are either together and parallel to each other, or each foot is approximately 30 degrees off of parallel to each other. This call and response is commonly used by bands that follow George N. Parks' training examples to standardize posture: "Feet! (Together!) Stomach! (In!) Chest! (Out!) Shoulders! (Back!) Elbows! (Frozen!) Chin! (Up!) Eyes! (With pride!) Eyes! (With pride!)"

From attention, the next step is to learn mark time. This involves alternately picking up the left and right legs from their position at attention to the "check" position. At "check", the leg is bent slightly, the heel is approximately 1-2 inches off the ground, and the toes are in line with each other. Important aspects of marking time are that the hips should not shift as the legs are lifted and that the weight is kept forward on the balls of the feet. A common command, often called out by a drum major, usually consists of, "Mark time, mark!", followed by four beats of marking time (left, right, left, right) and then the first step with the left foot.

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