Everything’s Coming Up Roses Steigleder to march in Rose Parade
Summit director to march with band of band directors
For Donna Steigleder the wait has been worth it and as she puts it “wonderful.” As wonderful as Roses.
Steigleder didn’t receive the chance to march in the 2021 Tournament of Roses Parade as it was canceled due to the COVID pandemic. But Steigleder will receive her chance to march in the 2022 Rose Parade on Saturday, New Year’s Day in Pasadena.
The Summit Collegiate High School band director was selected to participate in last year’s Rose Parade as part of the Saluting American’s Band Directors marching band. Since last year’s parade was canceled, Steigleder will be marching with the band in this year’s parade.
Steigleder will be among more than 270 band directors from across the country who will march together in the parade. The band is sponsored by the Michael D. Sewell Memorial Foundation of Pickerington, Ohio.
The band’s theme while marching in the parade will be “we teach music, we teach life.” The theme describes why Steigleder wanted to march in the parade as she said she wanted to encourage her students
to “dream big. Persistence and hard work are not exciting but the payoffs are wonderful.”
Steigleder found out about the chance to march in the Rose Parade through an email sent by the Tulare/kings Music Educators Association. She also said she wanted to try out for the chance to march in the parade because both of her sons marched in the Rose Parade and she wanted to share that experience.
Steigleder was one of only 30 alto saxophone players selected to
march with the band. “I am excited to be chosen as part of the Band Directors March Band because I play a popular instrument and they are only taking 30 players fo that instrument. It sounds like a lot but when you consider how many band directors there are in the United States it really isn’t.”
Steigleder headed to Southern California on Wednesday as the participation in the Rose Parade is actually a fourday event. The band will be rehearsing during that time and today there’s a
Bandfest in which all the marching bands who are in the parade participate in which they perform mini field shows for each other.
The band directors band will also participate, playing four songs at the Bandfest. The band will perform three songs during the parade. There will also be an event on New Year’s Eve for the Rose Parade entrants.
Steigleder attended Burton schools from kindergarten through eighth grade before graduating
from Monache. She attended Porterville College, then transferred to Point Loma Nazarene University where she earned her bachelor’s.
She worked in the business sector for several years but continued to stay involved in music, performance and giving piano, woodwind and voice lessons. She was eventually asked to teach music at Rockford School which has led to a career in music that’s now reached 27 years. She has taught at Burton Middle School, Sequoia Middle School and is now in the Burton School District with Summit.
Her bands have won numerous first place awards in parade competitions and have earned parade and music sweepstakes awards at the Shafter and Fowler competitions. She has also led both bands and choirs to multiple superior ratings at the California Music Educators Association Festival.
Marching in the Rose Parade won’t be easy as the parade route is long — 5.2 miles. Steigleder has already put in the practice, marching and playing for 7.5 miles.
While Steigleder has marched in numerous parades as a band director she noted, “I haven’t actually marched as a band member in a parade since high school.”
The band directors band will be part of an entry that also includes a custom-designed animated float. The band will have to perform an intricate move with the float where the parade is seen on television at the corner of Orange Grove and Colorado Boulevards before proceeding down the parade route on Colorado Boulevard. The float will move through the band as the band parts ways.
The parade will begin at 8 a.m. and will be televised by several networks.