Newtown High School (NHS) Band & Guard will host the 30th Annual Joseph P. Grasso Marching Band Festival on Saturday, October 17, beginning at 2 pm at Blue & Gold Stadium, 12 Berkshire Road, Sandy Hook.

The show will be followed by a final awards ceremony at 7:30 pm, honoring graduating members of Nighthawks Band & Guard.

Tickets are $15 for general admission, $10 for seniors and students, and free for children under 5. Tickets will be sold at the main gate; cash and credit will be accepted. The stadium's Snack Shack will serve festival favorites including chili bowls and pulled pork sandwiches, along with walking tacos, snacks, and beverages. A bake sale will offer homemade treats throughout the day. Proceeds from concessions and the bake sale support the NHS Band & Guard program.

The annual home show honors Joseph P. Grasso, the longtime Newtown music educator who founded the NHS band program in the late 1960s and inspired generations of student musicians. The event is also a major fundraiser for the NHS Band & Guard program.

Part of the USBands competitive circuit, this year’s festival brings together 13 visiting high school marching ensembles from Connecticut and New York for a day of music, visual performance, and competition.

Participating schools include: Brien McMahon High School (Norwalk), Cheshire High School (Cheshire), Danbury High School (Danbury), East Haven High School (East Haven), John F. Kennedy High School (Waterbury), Naugatuck High School (Naugatuck), New Milford High School (New Milford), Norwalk High School (Norwalk), Norwich Free Academy (Norwich), Port Chester High School (Port Chester, N.Y.), Shelton High School (Shelton), Trumbull High School (Trumbull), and Wilton High School (Wilton).

NHS Marching Nighthawks will close the event with its 2026 exhibition production, “Kintsugi: Beauty in the Broken."

The show takes its inspiration from kintsugi, the Japanese art of repairing broken pottery by highlighting its fractures rather than concealing them. In kintsugi, cracks are not treated as a flaw to be erased, but as part of the object’s history, something that can be transformed into a source of beauty.

The Nighthawks bring that idea to the field in a production about fracture, healing, resilience, and transformation. Through music, movement, color, and an evolving visual design, “Kintsugi” asks the audience to see brokenness differently: not as an ending, but as evidence of what has been endured, repaired, and made whole again.

Families, friends, alumni, and community members are invited to spend the day at Blue & Gold Stadium and support students from the NHS Band & Guard and the visiting ensembles.

For more information, contact Grasso Chair Amanda Armato at 203-707-8021 or mandyrosed@yahoo.com.