Editor’s note: The Viewfinder is a weekly feature in which a photographer tells a story through the lens of a camera.

NATCHEZ — After a rigorous week of preparation, the Natchez High School marching band entered the football stadium ready to do what they do best — get people standing up and cheering.

But Saturday’s entrance wasn’t for a football game — it was for the annual battle of the bands competition against Ferriday High School, Baker High School and Peabody Magnet High School.

The band members began strutting out onto the track to the beat of the drum line. Instruments were methodically raised to lips. In unison, they played.

All the while, they continued to move their feet forward and backward, going nowhere at times but still marching.

Those that are not playing their instruments are chanting and waving their horns through the air.

On queue with the band, the crowd gets on their feet.

“We run on adrenaline,” said senior Jonathan Pritchard, a trombone player and one of the student leaders of the band.

Energy and enthusiasm are paramount to the success of band and have become unifying forces.

“One section, one sound,” said senior Brianna McNeil, one of the section leaders for the drum line. “We are a family, and we have a lot of fun together.”

Band director Marcus Washington encouraged his students to have fun.

“Organized chaos — we just let them go crazy,” he said, “A lot of these kids don’t have a good outlet for their energy, so we want them to use it up in band because that energy will carry over onto a crowd.”

The energy of the band is one of the reasons senior Jasmine Winding, a piccolo and flute player, loves being in the band so much.

“I love to liven up the place when we start playing,” she said. “People start moving their bodies, it is how we protect our house.”