Unique Events and Venues: Rutland, Vermont, Halloween Parade

The annual Halloween Parade in Rutland, Vermont, includes dozens of floats representing organizations and many local businesses, and every high school and middle school band in the region. All in a parade that occurs in the dark, happens despite Vermont’s late October weather, and requires that every float, marching unit and band member come in costume.

Thousands line the city streets to cheer for their favorites, sing along with the popular tunes played by the bands, share in the free candy that seems to be everywhere, and for the most part, come in costume, regardless of the rain, cold and often snow that accompanies the event. Run by a team of hundreds of volunteers, the parade includes trophies for best (and runner-up) marching units, marching bands and creative float – awards that are coveted in every school in the area.

Peter Roach, a band director who grew up in the area and now has his own children participating in their school band, said this about the event: “I have experienced all types of weather: hard rain, snow, extreme cold, wind in different years. Not very good for instruments and such but . . . The turnout is amazing. There wasn’t a foot of open space in the entire loop of the parade. Wall-to-wall people and the excitement was electric. The word was 10,000 people! Where else would you get to play for that many people.

“I remember playing ‘Phantom of the Opera’ in high school and marching in all black with masks that we bought for like 20 cents and had to cut ourselves. I remember Proctor (High School Band) would ALWAYS have these amazing huge floats that were just spectacular. One year it was the yellow submarine. Another year they made the U.S. Enterprise and played ‘Star Trek’ and then another, it was ‘Crocodile Rock’ and they had a piano all lit up with smoke on their float and a kid pretending to play while the band played.

“During one very cold year, my band played musical chairs right in the parade. I had my band form a rectangle with the drumline in a straight line down the middle. Around them, I had parents and volunteers carrying folding chairs. We started playing music and the volunteers in the middle started to walk around in a circle around the drumline creating the atmosphere that the outside was circling the chairs. On a whistle signal, the parents would set the chairs down and the kids on the outside would have to ‘find a chair.’ At the next whistle, the music would start up again, we would form back up and start marching forward again, parents and musicians. It was such a creative year with that band from Fair Haven. I loved that about this parade.”

The Rutland Halloween Parade – where bands shine in the dark. https://www.rutlandrec.com/halloweenparade

Steffen Parker is a retired music educator, event organizer, maple sugar maker, and Information Technology specialist from Vermont who serves as the Performing Arts/Technology representative on the NFHS High School Today Publications Committee.