The Environmental Encroachment
Marching Band brings art and music to the public and in certain environments.
In 1998, EE did its first Mardis Gras March in Chicago's Wicker Park neighborhood.
Since then, we have grown and continued our mostly summer time marching band
activities.
Themes include seasonal parades, sporadic parades, musical encroachments, clowns and circus, organic food, outer space, fashion shows, etc.
We make our own unique costumery, and play and choreograph shows that include visual elements. Musical processions may include giant puppets or masks.
We have been asked to play
music at funerals and farewell to life ceremonies and we do.
Contact us for your needs, whether funerary music, street parades, or hyping
up any kind of special event, program or show.
These links will take you
to some of our marching band events in the past.
For booking, link to our CONTACT page.
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Here are links to photos and descriptions of some of our marching band events through the years. |
| Evil Clown
get together for pre-Halloween and mid year celebration. These are shots taken while EE was walking to the gig on the street. Halsted Street, April 23, 2004 |
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| Downtown with the kids. Summer
2003 Children's Music Festival. Dance Chicago Stage and Grounds, Michigan Avenue, Chicago. |
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| EE marching around the confines of the Halls of Lollapalooza, and joining forces with Dream Circus from LA, marched through the crowd right before Jane's Addiction's show. | |
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Our insane marching band sessions over two days at Chicago Motor Speedway for the 2002 Tropicana 400 NASCAR Championships. We made a huge Dale Earnhardt effigy puppet and marched in front of 70,000 people! |
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The 2002 Chicago Folk and Roots Festival. We marched in the crowd while the marquee bands were striking and setting up. This was some of our tightest material. |
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More photos and movies on the way for this march, which featured members of EE as well as artists from the performance series, LoveChaos. |
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Our first Folk and Roots Fest parade, where we used a nature theme, and got to march right before the amazing Femi Kuti show. I think he liked us. |
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A quick peak at our practice space neighborhood, the desolate streets surrounding Che Luis Gallery. |
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An indoor march at the wildly acoustic Field Museum. |
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The marching band was a big part of the children's puppet parade at the Oz Festival, at Lincoln Park Zoo in Chicago. Not the Ozzy fest, but the Wizard's. |
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An outdoor march as part of a big pyrotechnical performance, IN THE MIDDLE OF CHICAGO WINTER at night nonetheless. |
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Our 1998 Easter Bonnet Parade. Unfortunately, most of this march is undocumented. Great hats. |
| Our "Death of the neighborhood" Mardis Gras March for Around the Coyote Arts festival. |
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1998 Mardis Gras Marching Band hoopla, and our now traditional stops in Myopic Books and Rain. |
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The dueling trombones of the vent worms. Much better than Dune! Two, totally portable, comfortable, lightweight, and effective costumes built as back pack puppets. These were some extraordinary marching trombone costumes. |
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Bret Lortie in another back pack puppet that allowed for trombone playing
in a children's puppet parade at the Black Sheep Puppet Festival in Pittsburgh. Beet's character was based on the ancient Piasa Bird (also proficient at Jazz Trombone). |
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Sometimes, it is too dark, and you need to stick your alien head out of the puppet for air, or vision. It can be dangerous in there. |
Older NEWS worth mentioning:The Chicago Chapter of the All American Anti-War Marching band, or
Chicago Antiwar Marching band, or the skeleton marching band has an
e-mail list that you can join by e-mailing one of these addresses: In addition, Fred Hickler has put video footage of the Sunday March
16th and Thursday March 20th peaceful demonstrations against the war.
The movies are in many formats so that all may view, regardless of bandwidth
or browser. from a participant |
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Copyright ©1996-2002 Environmental Encroachment (EE)
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photos on page by Alyce Henson, Bret Lortie, and Mike Smith
