The Associated Press

LEXINGTON - A Lexington high school band will have a prominent role in the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade in New York City.

The Lafayette High School Marching Band will lead Santa Claus into Herald Square to close the parade that rings in the Christmas season.

The band, winner of 13 straight state marching band championships, left for New York on Tuesday.

The traveling party of nearly 300, including 230 band members, left in six chartered buses.

"I've grown up watching this parade," senior Ashley Johnson said. "This just sums up my four years here. It's the biggest thing you can do."

Lafayette also went to the parade in 1991, when head chaperone Marcie Morgan's son, Rick Morgan, was a freshman.

Now, her daughter Ashley is a senior.

"Macy's is the ultimate experience," Marcie Morgan said.

The band members, she said, are "in awe of everything."