The East Carolina University Marching Pirates Drumline is the rhythmic force behind the famed ECU Marching Pirates. This ensemble is comprised of 8 snares, 4 tenors, 6 basses, and 10 cymbals. In addition to providing entertainment at athletic events, the ECU Marching Pirates Drumline performs at high school marching band contests throughout the mid-Atlantic region of the United States, and assists in hosting ECU Band Day, an annual massed-band show that includes more than thirty high school bands performing at halftime with the ECU Marching Pirates. The ECU Marching Pirates Drumline along with the ECU Marching Pirates play an active role in recruiting for the university.

In recent years the band has traveled to football games at the U.S. Naval Academy, UNC Chapel Hill, Virginia Tech, Duke, South Carolina and NC State, and has performed “exhibition” performances at high school marching band festivals throughout North Carolina and Virginia, including trips to Washington, DC and Richmond, VA. Other performance highlights have included performing at the 2003 Rockingham NASCAR race and President George W. Bush's visit to ECU in April, 2001. The band has also performed at the the 2009 AutoZone Liberty Bowl in Memphis, TN, the 2006 PapaJohns.com Bowl in Birmingham, AL, the 2001 GMAC Bowl in Mobile, AL, the 2000 galleryfurniture.com Bowl in Houston, Texas, the 1999 Mobile, Alabama Bowl, the 1994 and 1995 Liberty Bowls in Memphis, Tennessee. Since 1996 the Marching Pirates have performed halftime shows for the Washington Redskins at RFK Stadium in Washington, DC, and for the Carolina Panthers at Bank of America Stadium in Charlotte, NC.