Welcome everyone to ILMarching.com. We have been gearing up for the 2008 season, and we hope you all have as well. A lot have been going on here at ILMarching during the off season and since we havent had an update in a while, we thought we would share with everyone what has been going on.

As some frequent visitors know, during most of the off season, ILMarching.com was hacked. Someone changed our front page to a self promoting hack page. So unless you had direct links to the message boards, you were unable to get to most of the site. It took a very long time to finally get the main page back up as the only moderator of the main files was very busy. We have now backed up the main site to a few locations, and have more people able to fix the problem should it occur again. So hopefully if it happens during the season, it will be fixed before most people notice it!

Also as many of you have noticed, the site was still in 2007 mode. That has changed, as the festivals, scores, and band repertoires have been updated through 2008, officially preparing us for the 2008 season. Do you know if your band has their repertoire listed for this year?? Check ilmarching.com/bands_check.php to find out. If your band is in red, you do not have a 2008 show listed with us.

We have a lot happening right now, which will continue all season. We are going to be doing predictions for most major shows in Illinois (hopefully all predictions posted by the Wednesday prior), just like last year. Also, anyone who writes a review of a show can send those to us, and we will post those reviews. Remember, the reviews have to be unbiased. We had a few reviews last year if you want a reference. We will be updating scores for each show as usual. So that means if you have official scores for a show, email them to us. The quicker we have them, the quicker they will be posted on the site.

We also have some site updates planned for the coming season. The festivals page will be overhauled to be dynamic. It will list each festival for that year and some high level details. You can then click on the name for a new screen that will have more in depth details such as performance times and schedules, festival website link, judging panel, and links to this years and previous years scores. Also we plan to add a form where you can submit your bands repertoire easily. This form will just have a drop down box of all of the bands, and a space to enter the show title and movements. They will be emailed to us, reviewed and placed on the site. This method will be much quicker than we used to do it, which was compiling show announcements on the forums. If you have an idea for updates to the site, let us know! Feel free to drop me an email at lunarman55@hotmail.com, or Dan an email at dbalash@gmail.com. When sending an email, please put ILmarching in the subject line.

Well everyone, again, we are glad you are here. Stay tuned throughout the season for the latest scores and reviews and good luck to all of the bands in Illinois. We at ILMarching hope everyone has a fun, safe, and successful season.

~ILMarching Staff