It’s autumn — football season. And in towns across America, that means big games, halftime, and marching bands.

These days, in many towns and schools, the marching band can be as big a deal as the team. At the Rose Bowl and the Macy’s Parade, they dazzle. But they dazzle too on Friday nights, under the lights, in towns you may never have heard of.

Kristen Laine marched for the Red Devils in Indiana as a high school girl. She’s gone back now, and gone deep, on the marching band of Elkhart, Indiana.

This hour, On Point: inside the booming culture of the American marching band.

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

Kristen Laine, author of “American Band: Music, Dreams, and Coming of Age in the Heartland.”

Grant Longenbaugh, former solo trumpet in the Marching Minutemen for Concord Community High School in Elkhart, Indiana.

Eddie Ellis, South Carolina State University band director of The Marching 101.