Bruno Mars: Marching Band Banned From Playing “Locked Out Of Heaven”

Lancaster Online reports that Bruno Mars has been locked out of the Garden Spot High School marching band playbook. At least his song “Locked Out of Heaven” has been. School officials have recently declared that song and Fallout Boy’s “Thanks for the Memories” are both inappropriate songs for their marching band to perform. The high school is located in Lancaster, Pennsylvania and is a public school.

Even though the songs are played only as instrumental pieces, the songs have been removed from the marching band’s lineup despite the fact that the band has rehearsed the songs previously. This decision is being called unfair by certain members of the band, including the directors and choreographers.

A parent of one of the band members told Lancaster Online that she believed “these songs are not that bad.” Another parent says that the school board made a “hasty decision” in yanking the songs from the performance roster.

ABC 27 reports that it was the school Superintendent Robert Hollister said that he was the person responsible for making the decision to pull the songs from the marching band performance line up:

“Initially it was my decision. I take responsibility for that. It has some pretty sexual language in them that I didn’t think was as a public school was appropriate for a public venue.”

Parents, however, have spoken out against the decision. Pauline Redding has a student on the marching band who worked hard to learn the songs, “It’s a stupid decision that was made. The biggest point here is you will never hear the lyrics,” she has said about the decision.

But the school board is sticking to its guns. Hollister stated the following:

“What are we telling our kids, we are condoning inappropriate sexual behavior, dangerous sexual behavior in some ways that sort of hint at it in the song choices and as a public school we can’t condone that.”

Furthermore, school board member Heidi Zimmerman, who voted to veto the songs, has called both the Bruno Mars song and the Fallout Boy songs “trashy” and “inappropriate” for high school students. Another school board member was quoted as saying, “The kids know those songs. They know the lyrics. When you play the music, the lyrics come to mind. And therefore those lyrics would be endorsed by the school if the band is playing them on the field.”

As it stands now, these songs remain indefinitely banned from the marching band performance.

What do you think? Has the school board made a good decision? Do you agree that the songs are inappropriate for a high school marching band to play?

[Photo credit: The Sun/Getty Images]