Saturday brought a low note for the local marching bands after none of them survived the UIL Area A Class 5A Marching Contest on Saturday at Ratliff Stadium.
Keller High School, Fossil Ridge High School in Keller and Hanks High School in El Paso were declared the finalists Saturday evening after 18 schools marched all day. They will face high schools from across Texas on Nov. 4 at the Alamodome in San Antonio.
The bands played until the afternoon in a preliminary round, when judges selected seven bands to play again that evening. During the first round, the Permian Panthers came in last and the Odessa High Bronchos came in 14th, knocking both of them off the area finals.
Of the five 5A schools that competed, Midland Lee was the only local school that survived the preliminary round. Lee came in fifth in the competition, meaning they may go to San Antonio if two of the three finalists were to withdraw or be

disqualified from the state competition for any reason.
Two 3A schools fared much better in a separate competition in Lubbock, as Andrews and Seminole will both head to San Antonio on Nov. 3, said Bill Harden, the Odessa High band director and an organizer of last Saturday's UIL competition.

Results
Bands are listed in order of their rank in each round.
Finals Performance
>> 1 - Keller High
>> 2 - El Paso Hanks
>> 3 - Keller Fossil Ridge
>> 4 - El Paso Americas
>> 5 - Midland Lee High School
>> 6 - Justin Northwest
>> 7 - El Paso Bel Air
Preliminary Performance
>> 1 - Keller Fossil Ridge
>> 2 - El Paso Americas
>> 3 - Keller High
>> 4 - El Paso Hanks
>> 5 - Justin Northwest
>> 6 - Midland Lee
>> 7 - El Paso Bel Air
>> 8 - Midland High
>> 9 - Keller Central
>> 10 - Lubbock Monterey
>> 11 - El Paso Franklin
>> 12 - Amarillo High
>> 13 - El Paso Eastwood
>> 14 - Odessa High
>> 15 - San Angelo Central
>> 16 - Lubbock Coronado
>> 17 - Abilene High
>> 18 - Permian High