Halftime entertainment at the Friday night varsity football games encompasses the marching band, the Majestics dance team, and one of the most eye-catching attractions, the color guard.

An extension of the band that adds the color and the story through the use of dance, props, and multi-colored flags along with movement to express dynamic passages in the music, the color guard accompanies the marching band’s show.

The original traditional color guards first began around the time of the American Revolution. A band would accompany the soldiers to play music to keep their spirits up and to keep them in beat, and along with the band, they also had a soldier holding a flag with their colors on it, hence the name color guard.

The school’s color guard was started back up again last year with only one girl in the program after being stopped for a couple years previously.

“I did it last year and I thought it was pretty interesting and there was only one girl on it so I thought I’d join again,” freshman color guard member Robyn Frome said.

In the spring, color guard director Amanda Bailes started to try recruiting girls into the program, having some success, with this year’s team having 9 girls instead of 1.

“We tried to recruit last year and we showed them some videos of college guards and other high school guards,” Bailes said. “They saw how fun it could be if we had a bigger guard than just one person like last year. I think they saw potential of having a family and a team, and that’s what it is. There’s so much, you become kind of like a family. It’s a lot of fun having the opportunity to perform in front of the crowds and being with the band and making new friends.”

Because of the shortage of people in the program few students truly know what the color guard is or does.

“I think the color guard is part of the band competition that twirls the flags around the band and helps emphasize the music,” freshman Miranda Perry said. “I think it’s a big part of the bands competitions to help them win.”

There are also those students who have no clue what it is at all.

“I don’t know are they like cheerleaders or something?” freshman Marcus Mao said.

Color guard is more similar to the Majestics dance team than the cheerleaders because of the use of choreographed routines.

“It would be more closely related to the Majestics because there is a lot of dance in color guard, but it is with props,” Bailes said. “It’s not like pom-poms; we have these six foot poles that they spin with. It’s a complete story, almost like a theatrical dance play.”

The choreographed routines depend highly on one of the most important aspects of the color guard and the band: the music.

“We hear the music and a lot of the choreography has to fit the musicality and it has to fit their drill,” Bailes said. “We have to take in where each girl is so they’re not hitting someone and not hitting a band member. I think most of it has to do with the music.”

Music not only inspires the choreography of the routines, it also inspires the uniforms or outfits they wear and the types or colors of flags or props they might use.

“We have a bunch of flags to pick from and we order them depending on what we feel like the music is,” Bails said. “A flowy flag would go with music that’s a little softer and calmer. There are flags that have different cutouts in them, and we pick those for more exciting music, something that’s more erratic, not quite as flowy.”

Before they perform, however, the members of color guard practice a total of 8 hours a week before and after school on certain days, since they do not have a class period like athletics or band.

“Definitely more than 100 percent [effort is needed],” Bailes said. “I mean, you’re practicing here and then you have to go home and practice. A lot of times I assign them videos and they need to turn in ones of them practicing so I know that they’re doing stuff at home. Not only that, they have to work on performing as well as practice to over prepare them for the game and competitions.”

Practice does indeed make perfect, and when on the field during halftime, the students get their time to shine.

“Watching them perform [is my favorite] because we start from band camp at August 1 and you work all through band camp and then you wake up and get here by 6:45 in the morning and you practice,” Bailes said. “There’s some ups and down definitely, but I watch them perform and I’m like ‘Oh my god it’s paying off’ and it’s so exciting because they come off the field and they’re excited that they performed in front of everyone and they did well. Performing at competitions and performing at football games is the best part.”