North DeKalb's Lakeside High School Viking Marching Band Kicks off a New Season of Music

Fall 2016 is shaping up to be one of the most exciting seasons in the 51-year history of North DeKalb's award-winning Lakeside High School Viking Marching Band, according to Lakeside High School Music Director David Fairchild, who is also a Lakeside graduate. In addition to entertaining the crowd at all Lakeside football games, the 101-member marching band is slated to perform and compete at a number of venues and special events. However, the highlight of the season for the Viking Band will be a trip to Hawaii in late November to take part in the festivities to commemorate the 75th Anniversary of the attack on Pearl Harbor.

“This trip will be once-in-a-lifetime experience for many of these students,” said Fairchild, who, in addition to his full-time job at Lakeside, is also an enlisted Tech Sergeant in the Air National Guard Band of the South. “Lakeside’s Marching Band has been invited to perform in the Waikiki Holiday Parade on Friday, Nov. 25. Lakeside is the only Atlanta school that will participate, and we will join other school marching bands from across the country, Hawaiian bands, military units, local officials and dignitaries. The parade route will take us on a torch-lit route down Kalakaua Ave. along Waikiki Beach.”

To help fund the trip and other band activities, band members will sell citrus fruits beginning in October. Funds raised are used for a variety of band needs including new instruments and instrument repair, travel expenses and music costs, among other items. Group private lessons funded by sales are currently underway, and visits by Dr. Paul Bhasin, director of wind studies at Emory University, and Dr. Chester Phillips, associate director of bands at Georgia State University, will take place later this fall. www.facebook.com/pages/Lakeside-Viking-Band/125390257503268