Kentucky State Marching Band Championships

KMEA SMBC
Activity:	Marching Band State Championships
Level:	High School
Founded:	1986
Location:	Kentucky, USA
Current State Champions:	2017 A: Murray AA: Adair County AAA: Bourbon County AAAA: Anderson County AAAAA: Lafayette
Official Website:	http://www.KMEA.org

The Kentucky State Marching Band Championships are an annual contest held by the Kentucky Music Educators Association that takes place each fall over the course of several weeks to determine the Kentucky high school marching band state champion in five respective classes.

The Kentucky State Marching Band Championships first began in 1986, when the Kentucky Music Educators Association (KMEA) first sponsored the event, with the finals held at Commonwealth Stadium in Lexington. Before 1986, several other contests claimed to be the Kentucky state championship, such as Murray State's "Festival of Champions" and Middle Tennessee State University's "Contest of Champions." The first state champions were George Rogers Clark High School (4A), Glasgow High School (3A), Bremen High School (2A), and Adair County High School (1A). Also that year, 4A champion George Rogers Clark was awarded the Overall Grand Champion title. However, this "overall champion" concept was discarded after the first year, and since then state champions have been considered by the association to be equal in stature.

The KMEA championships have been held each year in late October and occasionally early November, and with one exception have always been a multi-round contest. In 1993, snow and the prospect of unsafe, icy roads after dark led KMEA leadership to cancel the final round, and class championships were determined by bands' placements in the semifinals earlier in the day.

Prior to the start of each marching season, all Kentucky marching bands are grouped into five different classes (1A, 2A, 3A, 4A, 5A) based on the enrollment of the bands' respective high schools. (Before 2005 bands were grouped into four classes based on band size instead of school size.) Beginning in September all bands have the opportunity to participate in contests, held throughout the state, that have been sanctioned by KMEA. The requirements for qualifying for regional quarterfinals competition has been lowered several times in the 1990s and early 2000s. Currently, bands that attend at least two sanctioned contests are then allowed to continue to regional quarterfinals competitions within their classes that take place in mid- to late-October. Following regional quarterfinals competition, sixteen bands from each class (the top eight scoring bands from the east and west regions) advance to the state semifinals, which take place the following week. After semifinals, the top four bands from each class advance to the state finals held that evening. The four from each class then perform one last time. After all twenty performances have been presented, the top scoring band from each class is then named class state champion.

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