Friday, October 2, 2026

Pasadena Unified Launches ‘All-Star Year’ With Rose Parade Band, Student ‘Les Misérables’

Pasadena Unified School District has launched what it calls an “All-Star Year,” with its All-Star Band set for the Jan. 1, 2027, Rose Parade and its All-Star Musical staging “Les Misérables” Feb. 17-21 at Pasadena High School.

The Pasadena Educational Foundation is sponsoring the All-Star Year, the district said in an Oct. 1, 2026, press release. The district said the two programs together involve more than 350 students from its high schools, including Blair High School, John Muir High School Early College Magnet, Thurgood Marshall Secondary and Pasadena High School. The district serves students in Pasadena, Altadena and Sierra Madre.

“Our All-Star Year shows that, when a community invests in its students, they rise to meet the moment,” Superintendent Elizabeth Blanco said in the release.

The All-Star Band is among the 21 bands the Pasadena Tournament of Roses Association announced March 4, 2026, for the 138th Rose Parade. The Tournament says a committee of its volunteer members selects bands based on musicianship, marching ability and entertainment or special interest value. Students learned of the band’s selection at a surprise assembly in the Pasadena High School auditorium on Sept. 3, 2025.

The district says a PUSD band last appeared in the parade in 2022, as a special entry invited by the Tournament of Roses president. This time, the district says, the band won its place through an audition, competing against marching bands from around the world.

According to the district, the band was formed in 2020 and now includes four drum majors, one from each of Blair, Marshall, Muir and Pasadena high schools, along with 121 band members, 20 color guard performers and 12 dancers. Before New Year’s Day, it is scheduled to perform in the Hollywood Christmas Parade on Sunday, Nov. 29, and at Band Fest at Pasadena City College in December.

“Wearing the colors of all four of our high schools reminds me that we are one Pasadena, and I am so proud to represent it,” Santiago Smith Ruiz, a senior and the band’s head drum major, said in the release.

The district also tied the season to recovery from the Eaton Fire, noting that students and staff produced the band’s Rose Parade audition video in March 2025, months after the fire.

“Les Misérables” will be the third biennial All-Star Musical, following “Into the Woods” in 2023 and “Hadestown: Teen Edition” in 2025. The district’s Visual and Performing Arts Department produces the show in association with Pasadena Playhouse. Students fill every role on stage, in the orchestra and on the crew, and design and build the sets, props and costumes, with PUSD teachers and teaching artists guiding them.

PUSD and the Playhouse announced the title in May 2026 and said auditions for student actors, pit orchestra members and technical crew in grades 9 through 12 would take place in October.

The district plans five performances in the Gladiss Edwards Auditorium at Pasadena High School. All sixth- and seventh-graders are to attend a Feb. 17 matinee, and high school performing arts and history classes are invited to a Feb. 18 matinee. The district expects the two matinees to reach more than 3,000 students and the full run to draw roughly 6,000 student and community audience members.

According to the district, grade-level lessons developed by student assistant directors and classroom teachers are meant to support preparation before the show and classroom reflection afterward. Cast and crew members are scheduled to visit sixth-grade classrooms on Friday, Feb. 19, to answer questions.

The district said program and performance information will be posted at pusd.us/Arts.