A new season means a new look for Marching Mizzou. The band will premiere a brand new uniform design at the opening day football game Sep. 3, when the Tigers face off against Miami of Ohio.
The current uniform style has been in place for about 20 years, and most of the uniforms currently worn by the band have been around since 2001. Marching Mizzou Director Brad Snow said the life expectancy of uniforms is six to eight years.
“The uniforms we’re replacing started off white and over the course of the last nine or 10 years, the white has really started to gray and yellow, and a lot of the sequins on the uniforms were just falling off,” Snow said.
After receiving funding for the new uniforms, Snow worked with several designers to create a new look for the band.
The new design will feature an offset “M” on the right-hand side. This is meant to represent Marching Mizzou’s nickname, “The Big ‘M’ of the Midwest.”
Snow said the new design incorporates more of the “Mizzou Gold” instead of the sequin-color gold used in the past so the uniforms will be more clearly associated with the university.
The band’s hats will now display the preferred tiger logo for athletics. An image of the columns on one sleeve, a traditional element of the uniforms, will remain.
The total cost of the new uniforms is $164,000, one of the largest single expenses the band has ever had. Snow said Mizzou Athletics decided to fund the purchase outright.
“They’re really sharp — nice and clean, a big improvement, and they’re very subtle,” Marching Mizzou drum major Andrew Monnig said. “They’re not too busy or anything. It’s just a very simple design, and they look really sharp. It’s really going to improve the look of our band.”
Marching Mizzou drum major Paul Heddings said the new design is well-timed as Marching Mizzou will have a lot going on this season.
“I think it’s a good time for a change,” Heddings said. “I think there are a lot of great things that are happening this season, and adding the new uniforms on top of everything else that we have going for us is really going to make this a big statement year for Marching Mizzou.”
The “great things” Heddings refers to include a freshman class of more than 150 new Marching Mizzou members, the celebration of MU’s centennial Homecoming and a trip to Dublin for its annual St. Patrick’s Day Parade.
Heddings said the design is something that no one has ever seen before and will really make the band stand out, both at home and away.
The process of designing the new uniforms took around six months to complete. The sketch stage led to examining samples of each design to make sure what looked good on paper had the same effect in three dimensions. That process took an additional month.
Snow said the new design helps to reenergize everyone involved.
“It’s just kind of a new attitude we’re trying to bring to the games — more of a progressive, contemporary look rather than following the trends of other bands,” he said. “We’re trying to be the trailblazer for not only bands around the state but bands around the country.”