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Virginia Pep BandThe Virginia Pep Band is a student-run band at the University of Virginia, officially known as The Award-Winning Virginia Fighting Cavalier Indoor/Outdoor Precision(?) Marching Pep Band, & Chowder Society Review, Unlimited!!!. In the tradition of scatter or scramble bands, like those at Stanford, Rice and the Ivy League, the Pep Band prefers irrevent humor and indiviuality to marching in uniform formations. Founded in 1974, this group of students served as UVa's band supporting athletics in an official capacity until 2003. Unwilling to favor just basketball and football with their performances, the Pep Band took on other sports that marching bands typically ignore, like lacrosse, soccer, and occasionally swimming, field hockey and ice hockey. The Charlottesville community also enjoys Pep Band appearances at the Charlottesville 10-miler, Alzheimer's Walk and the United Way Day of Caring, to name a few. The Pep Band traces it's earliest roots to 1909, when it first appeared in the UVa yearbook, Corks and Curls, as the East Lawn Chowder Society. The East Lawn Chowder Society was a secret society like group that engaged in general tomfoolery, often involving their rivals, the West Lawn Chowder Society. It was the East Lawn Society that merged into a fledgling band that would eventually become the Pep Band as we know it. Over the years, the band has had varied guises, and at some point even marched as the UVa Marching Band, adding both "award-winning" and "marching" to the band's long appellation. It was in 1973 that students who knew of the scramble bands in the Ivy League brought those ideas to UVa, and the Virginia Pep Band was born. The one thing common to all the Pep Band's predecessors was student governance, a proud UVa tradition. , the band's existence is in peril, as the University athletic department, in an effort to have direct control of the UVa band, created a new marching band. The Virginia Pep Band was banned from entry to all University athletic events in April, 2003, to make room for the newer band, which debuted in September 2004. The new Cavalier Marching Band is run by a professional band director, in contrast to the Pep Band, which is student governed and thus chooses a director from among the band members. The UVa student council in 2004 passed a resolution asking for the Pep Band's return to athletic events, especially those ignored by the marching band, but the athletic department has so far defied that request. Unwilling to give up on 30 years of scrambling, and a much longer UVa tradition of student goverance, the Pep Band remains active, performing its traditional roles in Charlottesville events and supporting UVa student athletes outside the jurisdiction of the athletic department, such as Ice Hockey and Rugby. The athletic department hasn't completely succeeded in removing the Pep Band from UVa football gameday activities, as their traditional "pre-game scramble," which involves playing for tailgating fans outside Scott Stadium, continues. External links
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