Assorted ramblings from the world of entertainment:

• Football is king in the Mahoning Valley.

But for some, football merely is the opening act for the halftime show by the marching band (former marching band kid here). For those people, Youngstown State University has just the event on Friday.

YSU will host its “Meet the Marching Pride” at 4 p.m. at Stambaugh Stadium, 577 Fifth Ave. The YSU marching band will perform music from its pregame and halftime shows along with the YSU fight song. Members of the Penguinettes and color guard also will perform their routines, and the feature twirler and members of the drumline will be in attendance.

It’s all the music and marching and none of the passing and tackling.

Admission is free. Paid parking will be available in the M-81 surface parking lot across from the Watson and Tressel Training Site, accessible from Service Road. The west stands will be open for watching the performance.

• Earlier this month Joe Walsh announced the 2023 edition of VetsAid, the charity concert he started to support veterans’ causes.

Last year’s event was in Columbus and boasted an all-Ohio lineup – Walsh (both solo and with the James Gang), Nine Inch Nails, The Black Keys, The Breeders and Warren native Dave Grohl sitting in with a couple of the acts.

It was the most memorable show I saw in 2022.

Ohioans will have to travel a bit farther for the 2023 edition, which will be held Nov. 12 at North Island Credit Union Amphitheatre near San Diego, Calif. However, there still will be a bit of Ohio in the lineup.

In addition to Walsh, the concert will feature a set by The War on Drugs, the Grammy Award-winning rock band that includes Youngstown’s Anthony LaMarca.

Also on the bill is Jeff Lynne’s ELO, The Flaming Lips, Lucius and a guest appearance by Stephen Stills.

• The total solar eclipse is more than seven months away, but the Great Lakes Science Center in Cleveland already has a weekend of events planned leading up to the April 8, 2024, event.

Total Eclipse Fest 2024 from April 6 to 8 will include hands-on science activities, free eclipse viewing glasses and programs with NASA experts. The main event will be a free outdoor concert by the Cleveland Orchestra at 1:30 p.m. April 7 at Dock 32 behind the science center on Lake Erie.

The program will include Richard Strauss’ “Also Sprach Zarathustra” (prominently featured in “2001: A Space Odyssey”), music from “Star Wars” and other “out of this world” selections. The music will be paired with images from the Hubble Telescope, International Space Station and NASA’s photo archives.

NASA TV will be broadcasting live during the eclipse from Cleveland which is in the center of the path and should experience several minutes of darkness. Trumbull County also is on the edge of the path, and projections indicate Warren could experience about 2 minutes of total darkness as the moon blocks visibility of the sun.

The science center is predicting crowds up to 5,000 people on April 6 and 7 and as many as 30,000 people for the eclipse itself