Hey Alumni!
The 2025 BRMB season has officially come to an end, and as we look back on all of the experiences we’ve had together it can’t help but feel bittersweet. This season we performed at not 6, not 7, but 8 football games, including trips to Yale, Harvard, and Penn (where we educated our peers on what it means to be a Real Marching Band). On November 22nd, we held our annual Senior Concert to bid farewell to the Class of 2026. We loved getting to see so many of you throughout this season at Reunion, Homecoming, or any of the away games!
As your Alumni Relations Chairs, we aimed to keep you all in the loop and to welcome each and every alumnus that visited the band. Thank you to everyone who joined us, cheered us, and played with us this year! Four years goes by pretty quickly, but your continued energy, enthusiasm, and enduring friendships remind us that the BRMB will be a part of our lives forever. We genuinely could not ask for a better group of fans and supporters. This year had some amazing experiences on football fields, parades, bus rides, or just during practice. In those moments, we built relationships that last lifetimes, and it is your support that has made these experiences possible.
A few short years from now, sooner than we realize, we will join you all in the great Post-Band beyond, and when we do, we hope that we will treat the Alumni Relations Chairs of the future BRMB with as much joy and support as you have treated us this year. Our sincere thanks: we are in your debt.
Lastly, we want to extend many thanks to our Head Manager Emily Mawhinney who has provided us with guidance and support throughout this past year, to our fearless Drum Major Josh Faber, and to all the fine musicians of the Big Red Bands.
It has been a wonderful experience serving as your 2025 ARCs and as we share these Band Notes with you, we are passing the torch to those who will hold this position in 2026.
Peace and apparently football can go into overtime,
Abbott “Pidge” Sherlock ’27
Max “That Guy” Troiano ’28
And now… presenting the only REAL Band Notes in the Ivy League!
A Manager’s Memories: Looking back on the 2025 Season
Carrying the Mace: Notes from the DM
Auld Lang Syne: Notes from the PBM
From the Blue Line: Reflecting on the 2025 Season
Show Much Fun: Notes from ShowComm
Section Shenanigans
Welcome to the Family: A Freshman Perspective
Hey Alumni! 
My name is Emily Mawhinney and I was your 2025 Head Manager. I am a senior majoring in Environment and Sustainability and minoring in Entomology
The Big Red Marching Band has had such a fun year and I am so excited to share with you everything that we have been up to!
During the off season we played at some fun events such as Dragon Day and the Hotel Schools Server Derby. We held our own Spring Concert in the Commons, where we had just an absolute blast. And over the summer we played at reunion events and saw many of you at our Band Luncheon!
We started off the school year with several recruitment events like New Student Orientation and Auditions/Open house. We then held our first night, where new members got to learn our traditions and meet the sections. In the coming weeks we started learning our drill at rehearsal and band camp. We also worked on Cornell Victorious with the football team after one of their practices!
Then, we hit the ground running with our trip to Yale, where we got to see a lot of alumni and marched for our first audience of the season. We then had the pleasure to welcome you all back to the Hill with Homecoming. Shout out to our alumni chairs for hosting such a great luncheon and it was so much fun to play with everyone again! On our away trip to Harvard we got to play a Friday Night Lights game and met the wonderful Harvard band. The next day we performed a concert at Faneuil Hall (my favorite memory of the season)! Thank you to everyone who came out to watch us perform. The next few home games were great, with a four game winning streak and a visit from the ever friendly Princeton band. We then visited the University of Pennsylvania for our final away trip, with an exciting surprise that we would be able to play both a pre game and a halftime show! Last but not least we wrapped up our season with a home game against Columbia! We were able to continue the tradition of performing in the libraries with a very exciting concert in the cocktail lounge. We also bid our seniors farewell with the senior concert. It was really meaningful to me as a senior to watch all of my friends, who I went through the BRMB with, conduct a song to close out the season.
I am extremely grateful to have had the pleasure of leading this band over the past year. I have grown a lot as both a leader and person, and I will always be grateful for this opportunity. It was also very rewarding to watch all of the sophomores and juniors grow into being leaders within the band, and I am very excited to see the direction in which they take this group.
I want to send a shout out to my wonderful Drum Major Josh – Thank you for leading with me through the craziness of this role. From football games to band center gas leaks, we’ve been through a lot, and I am very happy to have done it alongside you.
Also a huge thank you to my wonderful Bandstaph. Nothing we do is possible without you, and I am very grateful for the work each and every one of you put in!
Thank you band!
Emily Mawhinney
Hey Alumni!
I am beyond proud to be writing to you all as the season comes to a close to report that the band is doing great. We had an incredible year, welcoming a large, enthusiastic class of new marchers while the upperclassmen continued to keep up the hype and excitement. We’re having so much fun on and off the field, preserving old traditions and making new ones, and strengthening the sense of community that makes the BRMB so special.
The band put on 8 fantastic performances of 4 amazing shows this year, including some more challenging music and drill that really pushed the band to grow. If you’d like to read more about those shows, I encourage you to check out the Band Note written by our Show Committee! We sounded and looked great on the field and received a number of compliments at all our games, including from fans of the opposing team!
This season, the band joined the team on trips to Yale, Harvard, and Penn. We were proud to have full buses for all of those trips, which is a reflection of the band’s commitment and dedication, as well as a testament to our great recruitment and retention over the past few years. At every game, we kept spirits high and brought the Big Red energy to all of Schoellkopf (or opposing stadiums) and the greater Cornell community. The football team had a great season too, including its first four-game win streak since 1999. Cornell Victorious has never sounded so good!
Playing at Quincy Market was an especially meaningful moment for me and for the band. The day after a Friday night Harvard game, we were able to continue our tradition of performing a concert at the historic site before heading back to Ithaca. Conducting in front of the landmark steps and drawing in a huge crowd of passers-by was surreal to me. It was also very exciting to see all of the amazing alumni from the Boston area and beyond who came to join us. Hearing you all join in as we played your favorite songs and watching you dance along with us made me so happy and brought a huge smile to my face.
As my term comes to an end, I’m incredibly grateful to all of the people who help make the band so special. To Emily, the section leaders, the show committee, bandstaph, and the band at large, thank you all for all of your hard work, for your energy and enthusiasm, and for playing every note with the spirit of the BRMB. And, of course, a huge thank you goes out to all of you, the alumni. Your constant support makes all of this possible and helps ensure more generations of music and memories.
Being Drum Major has been a great honor and I’m so lucky to have all of these amazing experiences and memories from the past four years that I will carry with me for the rest of my life. I am so proud of the band and I have so much faith that they will continue to do amazing things in years to come. I can’t wait to see you all at Homecoming next year!
GO RED DAMMIT!!!
~ Josh Faber ’26
Hey Alumni!
Time flies when you’re having fun. So unsurprisingly this year went by in a flash. It feels like it was just yesterday we were at Toledo, screaming our heads off as our team finished off Michigan State. Or in Lake Placid, watching our team defeat two teams we thought would be the end of us. Or in Foxborough, watching the first Cornell NCAA champs crown themselves in Gillette Stadium. Or at First Night, watching all the freshmen find their way into the band center and diving head first into both marching and pep. Or even at MSG, performing our pregame and enduring a depressed bus ride home.
It’s been a hell of a year and I’m incredibly grateful to have served as Pep Band Manager throughout it. There were ups and downs, things I wish I did better and things I think the band did spectacularly well despite serious challenges. Like I said, we managed to make it all over the northeast and beyond, even being able to watch Cornell’s first NCAA championship in fifty years, with a band of alumni and students celebrating in Gillette stadium. We had one of the busiest playoff seasons in a while and we managed to get to nearly everything, and for that I have to be grateful to athletics and BRBAA, who helped organize the funding and last minute organization of such crazy endeavors, along with all the alumni who joined us on the road.
The fall is always a little more relaxed for Pep, but we still managed to get involved. The Pep Board has been hard at work, and this year the social chairs organized a social with the Women’s Hockey team, only for us to turn around and support them by traveling to Colgate. We also managed to attend a variety of spirit events, and even had a small playoff run with Men’s Soccer. We capped it off with MSG, where 75 band members traveled to New York to perform at Red Hot Hockey. Despite our tragic loss, I was still happy to see how many people attended and how strong the band looked.
As my term comes to a close I get to watch the band rally for the spring as hockey season begins to swing into high gear. I feel honored to see how passionate the band has become, to the extent that a “skeleton band” feels like a thing of the past. With my successor elected I’m preparing for a nice retirement semester, watching as the band that has given me so much grows even more. To that end, I want to say thank you to all of the people who have helped me along the way, and I hope you continue to enjoy and support the Pep Band!
Go Red!
Tommy ‘26
Hey Everyone!
Our names are Pidge and Jonathan and we were your Pep Band’s conductors for the Fall 2025 semester! We have been so lucky to attend events all around campus inspiring school spirit, while also keeping up some of our really amazing traditions and spending time with the people in our little Pep Band family. We’ve been able to support our incredible fall sport teams throughout their normal seasons and even into some playoff runs! We were able to be in the 1st round of the Men’s Soccer NCAA tournament and we got to celebrate a Big Red Win! We are also so proud of our Sprint Football team for winning the Ivy League this year!
Our men’s hockey team has been off to a fantastic start with an 6-3-0 overall record and a 5-1-0 conference record as we write this. The home games that we have been able to attend have been super exciting and we recently got to support the team at MSG for Red Hot Hockey (we were so happy to see all the alumni who were able to come out!) Our women’s team has also had a fantastic season so far with an overall 10-3-1 overall record and a 6-2-0 conference record. This semester we were able to go on our first ever regular season Women’s hockey away trip!
Rehearsals this semester have been super fun as well. We’ve been looking through our folder and removing some songs while also adding some other fantastic student arrangements! We’ve even been able to bring back some cheer sheets that we don’t play as much anymore (Here’s to Scrivens!).
It has been amazing to meet all of the new members and see all of the fun adventures that the band has gotten up to! We are so excited for our new Conductors to continue building the Pep Band spirit!
Peace and Screw BU,
Pidge “wait but the script says…” Sherlock
Jonathan “nah let’s just play” Miller
Hey Alumni!!
After a season of adventures, shenanigans, and fun, we’re here to tell you about the band’s journeys across the Ivy League! We pushed the band this season with harder music and drill, and we were delighted to see it come to life.
We started off our season with the “Get Up and Groove” show, which included “Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go” by Wham! and “Dance the Night” by Dua Lipa. As always, we were impressed with the band’s ability to quickly adapt when we had to cut the second half of pregame last minute during our away trip (and very first game!) at Yale. Watching the alumni rush the field to join us at homecoming vs Colgate was a surreal moment, and then we got to play “Paradise City” by Guns N’ Roses all together, in the shape of a city we had built… what a memory!
Next, we marched our “Dungeons or Dragons?!?” show away at Harvard and home against Bucknell. We had a lot of fun crafting this show! In “I’ll Make a Man Out of You” from Mulan, we formed a majestic sword that sliced through ranks like butter. Then we marched “Fireball” by Pitbull and made a huge ball of fire (whoaaaa) that soared across the sky. Finally, we marched a medley from the hit movie “How to Train Your Dragon” and formed a magical roaring dragon that breathed trombones and tubas (spooky)!
For our third show, we marched our “Reckless” show at home against both Brown and Princeton. This show featured iconic bangers: “Toxic” by Britney Spears, “I Knew You Were Trouble” by Taylor Swift, and “Light ‘Em Up” by Fall Out Boy. Our goal was to lean into reckless relationship energy and bring that to the field. During “Toxic,” the band formed a giant heart, only for the drumline to march forward and break it to perform their drum break, written by Max “Heads” Fanning (‘27). The band followed with a dance break, choreographed by Hannah and Kathy. As always, this part of the season was pretty crunched for time, which makes us even more impressed that the band was ready to march all of show 3 for both games for the first time in at least 3 years!
As fun as the season was, we and our ShowComm2 had to wrap it up with our “Wave Goodbye” show. For pregame we marched “50 Ways to Say Goodbye” by Train, with drill written by Emily Andersen (‘27) and Jake Donovan (‘28), spelling out “BYE” to all the seniors who have shaped our band community for the past 3 years. For halftime we “waved” in a different way: by marching “Come Sail Away” by Styx and forming a grand sailboat across the field, with drill written by Jamie Heskett (‘27) and Dylan Carson (‘28). Finally, we all teared up during “Counting Stars” by OneRepublic, a sendoff for our seniors.
Thank you all for a wonderful season. We can’t wait to see what next year brings!
Oops all nets,
Hannah Blank ‘27
Ben Isaacson ‘27
Kathy Miller ‘28
Hey Alumni!
This is Grace (Bone, ‘29) and I just wrapped up my first season with the BRMB! Talking to the rest of my ZOZq crew (class of ‘29ers), we all agree that band is one of the best parts of Cornell, and there’s been no shortage of memories already, from First Night and performing at Faneuil Hall to little section traditions like Underboning and 1812 Night. While being in the band has lots of perks that are fun to brag about, like gym credit and free hockey tickets, at the end of every day, band is so much more to me. Joining the BRMB was the greatest choice I’ve made at Cornell, so I wanted to say thanks to all you alumni who make it possible for all of us to have a place where we can have fun and meet some of our very best friends. Go Red DAMMIT!
FLUTES
The Flutes have had a wonderful time this season! The Spring semester started off strong with our Flalentines concert. The flutes sounded amazing and we raised some money for the Trevor Project. The Fall semester proved to be great as well, with fantastic new members joining the BRMB family. From frequent koomcha games to fun dances during rehearsals, it’s been a really good time for everyone involved. We had an impeccable time during our away trips, with the Harvard one being significantly enjoyable as we explored Boston and ate some lovely pizza and pastries together!
It’s been a pleasure to see the flute section grow into even more of a community and giving people, both new and old, a space where we can all have a good time as we play and dance and (respectfully) yell at the Drum Major during many concerts. Thank you to all of our incredible flutes for cultivating this community alongside us. We flove you all!
Flove,
Katherine and Jordan
CLARINETS
Aaaaannnnd with that the 2025 season has come to an end! The Nets have had a fantastic season!We welcomed 18 new members including lots of freshmen and a few other bandies that joined our ranks. Each and every one of them brought amazing energy into our group and watching all our freshmen find their home both within the band and at Cornell has been so incredible. Somehow, we made it all season without busting out the rain coats! It was so much fun going to Yale, Harvard and Penn and getting to connect with our alumni in the area. There were so many highlights of the season but rallying the troops to have our first ever “grand” homecoming was so much fun. We really enjoyed welcoming back such a large number of our alumni and being a part of such a special moment for our section.
Of course, we stayed up to shenanigans, winning the scavenger hunt, putting ourselves to work squatting every time the football team scored, and carrying on the newer tradition of making pudding bags. We also started some fun things like wearing green on mondays for no reason and doing silly dances on the field. We want to thank our seniors for all they have given to our band during their time here. We have so much pride in our section, see such a great future for the nets, and feel so lucky to have been able to lead such an amazing group of people!
Clove & for the glory of the pack,
Lila & Heck
SAXES
The 2025 season was Incredible(s) for the Big Red Saxes! We welcomed fourteen new slovely saxes to our section in marching and pep. From sax tag and rank games to minty cocoa at rehearsals, from collapsing sax pyramids to JL bumping and # jumping (co-opted by the dastardly members of $), there hasn’t been a dull moment in the saxiest section in the only real marching band in the Ivy League. We enjoyed beautiful weather at all five of our home games and our three away games at Yale, Hahvahd, and Penn. We even started to believe in the power of manifestation after the football team’s four-game winning streak! Three new tunes made their way into our sax cheers box, but the Vengabus remains a crowd favorite.
What a great year it’s been! Seeing the section grow has been wonderful to see, and it makes us so glad to see all of the saxes, the youthful and the aging, hawing even though we didn’t say yee. Thank you to all of the alumni for your continued support and thank you to all of the current members for making our terms as section leaders so fulfilling!We’re psyched for next year!
Gimme an S, gimme an A, gimme an X,
Alannah & Dawson
TRUMPETS
What have we accomplished this season? Well, we’re glad you asked! To expand upon our tradition of excellence and excellent shenanigans, we have: (1) expanded our favorite numbers to include the number 67 (pronounced “six-seven”)* (*not an opinion held in unanimity); (2) absolutely demolished a pizza piñata (thank you Olsens!) in celebration of completed morning rehearsal (the strat for anyone looking to perfect their technique? Hang the piñata off a guard flag held by the tallest member of your group, and then beat it with a metal folding chair); (3) increased our variety of Mooses, including flavors that incorporate visual components, successful jukes (consistently breaking Josh’s ankles, literally bringing him to his knees that one time), and improved mockery of the b*nes. We’re proud that our new member retention has been so high–our family has gotten so much richer by our 7 new additions who have each brought new ideas, jokes, and great presence to our section. Our culture is thriving, our silliness ballooning, and our playing remains (f&a) loud and high. The “t” in desCANt is still invisible, and the b*nes still base their personality around us. Life is good. We send out love to our Olds!
HORNS
The Horns continued to thrive this year, welcoming 4 new members and 5 new section hoppers to the Hamily! With this horn explosion, we’ve tackled many fun adventures. From surviving baked goods that are vegan-dairy-free-nut-free-crab-free, to jractice in the parking lot, and flying kites at Stewart Park (and almost reclaiming the strut-off title), the horns have always been up to something! And the olds were out in full strength this year, rallying for a Mean Girls Day of EPIC proportions (we didn’t even have to kidnap Ryan!) and closing off the season with us, too, at the Penn away trip! We also had a great time riding the 4-game win streak (including a crazy insane double overtime!!), and can now actually kinda sorta play Cornell Victorious! This year, we are saying goodbye to six amazing seniors: Derek, Jen, Jacob, Jonathan, Josh, and Komet. Luckily, we still have a few final shenanigans left this year (HORN CAROLING!!) before the season truly comes to a close. Thank you all for such an amazing year as your Section Leaders, and we can’t wait to see what the future holds for the horns!
Hlove,
Allison and Campbell
BONES
Da bones accomplished many great feats this year! Our freshman class is strong and spirited, and our ranks are full. We’ve also welcomed a boom of section-hoppers and bone brunchers! Da bones are particularly competitive in pep this season. The section routinely takes a fifth of the band’s hockey tickets, filling up the top row of Lynah. We’re playing loud and proud for the team, and dripping just a bit on the trumpets, as always! And of course, we’re thriving on the greatest bus-bus-bus-bus-bus and Tetrising like never before. Da bones were graced by the flawlessly marching Unknown Bone on a particularly foggy practice this October. We remembered, remembered the fifth of November(d) to cheers all across campus. For the first time, the bones UNDERBONE!-d off of the clocktower, which was audible from homes in Collegetown! We also had a particularly tropical Hawaii 5-0 all going dawgs out on the sandy shores of Schoellkopf, followed by the traditional Thanksgiving Feast. We’re not done yet! Da bones are eagerly awaiting bone caroling and making the season bright. It was a fun-filled season, and we can’t wait to see you in 2026!!
TUBAS
The Big Red Tubas had an unforgettable year filled with laughter, and plenty of spirit! Our new members learned the way of the tuba quickly, enjoying some of our fun traditions. Including Tuba Halloween, blocking traffic, leaving rehearsal slightly early, Tuba Narco, and Tuba dinners. Tuba Halloween was especially great because we were finally able to go up the clock tower for the first time in 4 years. With a total of SIXTEEN tubae we were able to raise money for Tompkins County 4H with fun songs like the Minor Moose, and Halloween Medley. Can’t wait for more fun next year!
DRUMLINE
The 2025 season has ended, and it sure was a great one for the Drumline! We had an amazing group of 12 new members to the drumline who were either freshmen, transfers, or played with us from other sections. We really branched out with members coming from other sections to play with us, and some of our members even went to other sections to play with them. We even had a lot of changes within our subsections that led to an enormous 10 BASS BASSLINE! Even after getting new instruments last year, we’re at max capacity with a lot of our subsections, and we couldn’t be happier!
From making our own silly visuals during halts to doing cartwheels at every event, we made sure to have fun! Especially memorable for the whole drumline was the craziness that Pinball Wizard brought with everyone trying to knock each other’s hats off with no mercy. We’ve even been improving our hat throwing and we came incredibly close to landing a hat on Josh’s head so. many. times. There was never a dull moment for us, and we made sure to make each bus ride to Yale, Harvard, and Penn full of… personality. There was a lot of enthusiasm for playing this year, with everyone STICKing around and playing A after every! field rehearsal! By the end of the season, it was sounding real clean. Overall, it was a fantastic year, and we can’t wait for 2026!!
GUARD
It is difficult to believe that the 2025 marching season is coming to an end. This was an absolutely fantastic year for the Big Red Color Guard. We reached many new heights: not only did we have the biggest guard we have had in a long time (ten people on the field!!), we kept testing the limits of the atmosphere with our tosses. We remained at the front of the field, just like last year. Finally everyone has realized who the real show stoppers are. We have so many glovely new members in the section, from our freshmen to new seniors, truly everyone is welcome in the guard. We have continued to try to beat the non-musical allegations through dabbling in many different instruments. We have members playing trumpet, cymbals, clarinet, and sax! We are taking full advantage of the band, and gracing many different sections with our presence. Speaking of, as a section, we have become very vocal. It is because of us that the band brings MORE PEP during the parade. And who else would inform them that we are interested in DRUM CADENCE?? Oh, where would the band be without us? We cannot wait to see what the next season will bring us, but the fantastic weather and historic winning streaks of Cornell Football will always be remembered.
