David Thornton proudly carries on traditions of the Spartan Marching Band

<p>“I've been going to MSU football games since I was probably six or seven-years-old,” Beekman says. “And to me, every football season when <a href="http://spartanband.net">the band</a> comes out of the tunnel and they do the kick step and they come out in the same sort of way every single year, it just sends a shiver down my spine. To me, that's sort of the first moment to me that you feel like the season’s begun and we're really at a football game. The band is a much larger part of our culture here on campus than many of us maybe even realize.”</p><p>“The preparation of the marching band is really a year-round project for us,” says <a href="https://twitter.com/thorntondt">Thornton</a>. “We have about 310 students in the band. We're a part of the athletic department and supported by the athletic department. But we also are an academic class that students sign up to get credit for.”</p><p>Thornton talks about the process of developing halftime shows.</p><p>“It starts with a note on my phone where I'm constantly brainstorming and thinking about what are songs that would be fun, or what are themes, or what are artists that are maybe having an anniversary, or are really popular in pop culture, or we have a significant anniversary, or an event coming up on campus. It starts with always being open minded and always brainstorming. </p><p>“And then we start thinking about the design aspect of our show based on how many shows we're going to do. So we do a new halftime show for every home game. So depending on the schedule, that could be anywhere, six, seven, or eight games. And so from there, then we look at things like Homecoming and Halloween that might dictate the type of show that we would do. And so there's a lot of brainstorming time and thinking about what we're looking at. We've got a new football coach this year. So I've met with Coach Tucker to talk about some of his musical interests to see if we could collaborate on a show to welcome him to our MSU family. And so all of those things are our influenc