Drum Corps

[mnoble485]

Dustin,
Interesting thread but can you explain the memberships? I thought at first these were HS teams but the more I looked it's almost like AAU basketball. Ages?

Mike

[dashDustin]

Age-out is 21 or 22 and performers are accepted via an audition process...as far as I know, anyone can audition. I don't know that there's really an age that you have to be in order to audition, but if you search YouTube, you'll come across a 16yr old snare for BD that was playing with them when he was 12. Not performing, but going to camps, anyway. I imagine the physical demands kinda limit things a bit, as well as the time commitment and travel.

[spopepro]

Yes, auditions happen in November typically and are "open", but some have a video screening to try and keep people from making a trip when they have no chance. My audition year we had around 300 new brass players auditioning for maybe 20 open spots. Most vets are invited back for the next year, but not all. BD has (had?) a rough policy of not wanting to take minors on tour with the A corps. I started with the BD B corps in 98. My youngest brother started with the C corps (they are the amazing!). People audition from all over for the top corps. I marches with Linda (an alto) from the UK, Otto (guard) from the Netherlands, we would always have 2-3 from Japan, not to mention pulling from all over the U.S.

For horn players, most of the audition is marching. Nearly everyone who shows up can play (I was an exception... I'm a bassoonist!), but not everyone can keep their feet in time at 190bpm and look good doing it. That's how I made the 99 A corps hornline... only to get cut in February. I went back to the B corps, marched the whole season there (we ended in early July at the time) wandered over to watch the A corps rehearsal field to watch the run through at the end of the night and Gino (the instructor who told me I was cut in feb) told me to grab a book and charts because they had someone unexpectedly quit and I was back in the A corps. It was 3 days before leaving on tour. My first show was about a week later in Denver.

Rehearsals are all day on weekends and 2-3 times on weekday nights starting in January. Memorial Day weekend is the start of the summer, and from then on it's everyday 8am to 10pm. The time commitment is a huge barrier for many. Tour means ~6 weeks on the road. We sleep in HS gyms (when we get floor rest), and are sometimes in a new state every day. Typical tour day: 9-12 rehearsal, 1-4 rehearsal, 1.5 hours for dinner, pack up and clean up the school, and pack the bus and the truck, go to show site and play the show, snack after the show, leave around 11pm, arrive at next site ~3-4am depending, get a few hours of sleep in the gym. Rinse, repeat.

It's a hard thing to explain to people, because kids don't generally do stuff that takes this kind of a commitment. We would have fun laughing at the Texas HS football teams that would come onto their campuses for their "grueling" 2-adays after we had been going for a couple of hours and leave before our dinner break. We would start our mornings running a mile in a block, feet in time, and breathing together (8 steps in, 8 steps out) and then go march for 10 hours.

It's also a hard thing to deal with when you age out. For most, it will end up being the hardest thing they do, and their greatest accomplishment in life. It might be my greatest accomplishment. I toured Japan in 98, won a world championship in 99, toured Europe in 2000, signed autographs and am in countless videos and pictures of others. And once you turn 21, it's gone and there's not a graceful transition to the next thing. It's just over. I actually didn't march my age-out year. We had 2 days of rehearsal on the hardest AstroTurf field I've ever been on in Rome NY in 2001. I inflamed and tore my lateral meniscus during rehearsal (had done the other knee years before, so I knew exactly what the issue was). The last week and a half was a shot of cortisone, toridol shots, and survival. Surgery the summer after kept me out, but years later, I'm totally ok with that.

Anyway, the point is that it's a pretty special activity, and you don't really get a sense for how crazy it is until you see it live. Even better is finding a HS near the show and watching a bit of rehearsal.

[dashDustin]

Wife and I went to Big, Loud, and Live last night (or whatever they call it...). Basically, the Prelims are on a live feed in theaters. The multiple camera angles was pretty cool, and actually seeing the formations. Music was, obviously, flat, given that we were in a theater. It was cool to see the changes that have been made to various shows since I started this thread. Good shows have become great. Great shows have become "holy shit".

[dashDustin]

The point at 3:27 is quickly becoming one of the more enjoyable bits from the shows this year. Out of the context of the show, it doesn't quite have the feeling.



Seems as though DCI and Tresona Music are at odds, and as such, all show vids are being removed from YouTube, and are, at this point, not being sold by DCI. It's an unfortunate situation, and I'm hoping it gets resolved, as I'd love to own the 2015 shows.