Samantt:

I could give you the lyrics to quite a few songs, but if you don't know the tunes the words won't help you much.

A lot of good marching songs are based on traditional and older British and American popular tunes. For example, "Our Sergeant Major" mentioned earlier in this thread is sung to "The Battle Hymn of the Republic."

I have had good results with a couple of sea chanties, "Johnny Come Down to Hilo" and "Roll the Old Chariot". If you know any sea chanties, some could work well for you.

Some of my favourite marching songs are "Mama, mama, can't you see", "They say that in the Army", "Hey, hey, Captain Jack", and "Way, hey, rock and roll." The words are often pretty stupid and the tunes are simple, but they can keep you going when you are tired and your feet hurt.

You will need at least one real song leader, somebody who can sing loud and isn't tone deaf. A "good" voice is nice, but not essential. Call and response songs are the easiest because the whole group doesn't have to learn all the words. However, the song leader has to know the tune cold, even if he or she uses a song sheet for the words.

Simple tunes, without too much variation in pitch and fairly short lines, work the best. I have found that some good songs don't adapt easily to marching because they are just too hard to sing while marching at 5 km an hour or more. My marching was done wearing a rucksack, so it might be easier for your group.

Final word of advice: make sure your cadets drink lots of water throughout the march. They will suffer if they don't.

Good luck

Edmund