page_title: University of Minnesota Marching Band
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: University of Minnesota Marching Band / History
caption_attribution_description: Please attribute to Lorie Shaull if used elsewhere.
context_page_description: The University of Minnesota Marching Band is the marching band of the University of Minnesota and the flagship university band for the state of Minnesota. The Pride of Minnesota serves as the university’s ambassador, representing the school at major events both on and off campus. The band performs before, during, and after all home Golden Gopher football games and bowl games, occasional away games, local parades, numerous pepfests, exhibition performances, as well as a series of indoor concerts at the end of the regular football season. Members of the band, along with non-member students, also participate in smaller athletic pep bands that perform at other major sporting events, including men's hockey, men's basketball, women's hockey, women's basketball, and women's volleyball. Here is a link to the intro video and fight songs of the Pride of Minnesota.
context_section_description: The University of Minnesota Marching Band was formed with 29 members as the University Cadet Band in 1892, functioning as part of the university cadet corps and stationed in the University of Minnesota Armory after its construction in 1896.  
  The band performed its first halftime field show during the 1910 football season at Northrop Field.  Among the formations included was the "Block M" that now serves as the University's logo.  The "Block M" formation is still present in the band's pregame show.
  Near the end of World War I in 1918, the University Cadet Band was merged with the local Army band in order to form First Regiment of Minnesota Band, in addition to a second, more briefly existing Second Regiment of Minnesota Band.  However, both bands were decommissioned along with the Regiment at the conclusion of the war.  Following the war, university students who were members of the band were offered a position in a separate University Band, with the word "cadet" having been dropped from its name.
  After the 1923 football season, Memorial Stadium was constructed, and the band began to perform on the field, which was the home of football games and marching band shows for 57 years, the longest of any of the university's stadiums.  The band "brought spectacle and song to game days," and halftime shows included moving renditions of rivalry trophies such as Floyd of Rosedale and the Little Brown Jug, as well as greetings to university figures such as football coach Bernie Bierman.
  In January 1965, the Minnesota Marching Band was featured in the Inaugural Parade in Washington, DC for the second inauguration of U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson.
  In 1982, the band's performances moved once again after the opening of the Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome and the subsequent relocation of Golden Gopher football from Memorial Stadium.
  The Minnesota Marching Band performed during the halftime show of Super Bowl XXVI on January 26, 1992, along with former Olympic champions Brian Boitano and Dorothy Hamill, and singer Gloria Estefan.
  In the fall of 2009, with the opening of TCF Bank Stadium on the university's campus, the band's game-day performances moved back to campus and to an outdoor field for the first time since leaving Memorial Stadium in 1981.
  On February 4, 2018, the Minnesota Marching Band performed alongside Justin Timberlake in the halftime show of Super Bowl LII.  The band was featured in Timberlake’s R&B hit “Suit & Tie”, and performed additional choreography and drill during “Mirrors" and the show’s finale, "Can't Stop the Feeling!".
  Members of the band and the University of Minnesota Dance Team performed with the Jonas Brothers in concert at the Minneapolis Armory during the NCAA Division I Men's Basketball Final Four on April 6, 2019.  The band joined the pop-rock group onstage for the finale of their newly-released single "Cool".
caption: The Pride of Minnesota performing in the Super Bowl LII halftime show with Justin Timberlake.
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