Cozy Ponders DCA ’06
Drum corps is as much about people as it is about music, possibly more so. We all thirst for opinions about our beloved, yet somewhat specialized and secret passion. Our next door neighbor is likely to express an unsolicited take on major league baseball, the Super Bowl, etc., but when was the last time the friend on your block ran over to gush about someone’s new horn instructor?
DCA’s resident wordsmith, Cozy Baker is back with his take on our upcoming all-age season . . . and I thought I was enthusiastic about the coming months!
Here’s a heads up, Cozy returns from Loud Music Symposium today. Think he was into it?
Cozy’s DCA Planet
DCA’s goin’ to Disney World, Houston, and Pearly Gates, MN
by Cozy Baker
The 2006 DCAssociates summer is shaping up, up and away into possibly the finest and largest season in all-age history – Well, at least in the DCA era, since 1965. Fan$ can look forward to a Tower of Power summer that will escalate up the Stairway to Heaven and entertain like Vegas, with rhythms a la Ray Charles, all ready to Syne off into the DCA Championships Labor Day weekend in "Rachacha"! It’s all latin to me!
DCPlanet was tremoring like a San AndRenegades Fault, abuzz with speculation about which corps would appear here, there, yonder and afar. As Jeff Ream so eloquently stated last week in his personal post #gadzookszillionandone: "I believe a DCA meeting is this weekend. I am sure lineups will be more solidified then."
’06: The year the sun did not set on DCA shows?
Visiting with Vic Kulinski, Jr., DCA South coordinator, and Dave Stollberg, CorpsVets director, just after they arrived back from the DCA Scranton meeting last weekend (bleary-eyed from a long delay at the Philly Airport that would have allowed enough tiempo at even an andante walking tempo to go ring the Liberty Bell), they were excited about the summer and spoke of many corps traveling hither and yon to be in old and new DCA venues.
DCA wasted no time and had the latest additions a click away from the Homepage by Monday. Click into www.dcacorps.org, then click Schedule for foot-stompin’ shows. Get your feet wet to start the DCA season at Wildwood, NJ, where you’ll get your jollies with Sky, Hurcs, Buccs, Brigs, Empire, Cabs, and also see Jersey Surf and Cabs Alumni. The July 1 Dover, NJ, show is so full that the sun will not have considered setting when the Sunrisers, Caballeros, Carolina Gold, Hurcs, Bush, Sky, CorpsVets et al. (seven competitors, three exhibitions), will take the field. Also July 1, in Rachacha, NY, you’ll see the hometown faves plus Brigs, Buccs (defending DCA champs) and White Sabers. Let me evince that this July 1 show is the Vince Bruni Preview of Champions. The classic show in Clifton, NJ, July 15, showcases the Hurcs, Gold, Bush, Buccs, and Cabs, along with three exhibitions.
The only drum corps show this summer in all of Florida’s Heat Wave of 65,758 sandy square miles (22nd largest state) will be near Walt’s World at DCA South, Haines City, July 15. ("Wait’ll we get our Haines on you." – Now, I know why Michael Jordan, uh, Fred Windish is the DCA marketing pooh-bah, not me.) Gulf Coast Sound, Shenandoah Sound, and the Jackson Generals, competing in this Orlando area "local regional" show, are traveling so far that they almost need passports.
And all those shows are merely a dab of June and July. On August 19, the Lakeshoremen, Frontier and Music City Legend are traveling their Chisholm Trails to the Pearly Gates of St. Peter, MN, with a "TBA," the day after the St. Peter show. The Chisholm Trail, the most famous of all the cattle trails, recorded 75,000 moo critters were trailed to Abilene, KS, from Texas in 1868 and that swelled to 350,000 by 1869. Corps pokes are expecting a passel of paying adorer$ in staged stops like Houston; Lewisburg, PA; Milwaukee; Waterbury, CT; Endicott, NY; and Central Square, NY.
The all-age corps on the Left Coast will also be busy. The Renegades, Dream, River City Regiment, etc., will be strutting their finest at DCI shows.
"(The Renegades) are cranking it up a few notches," a brass staffer stated for my benefit to Mac McEntire, viz cap head.
Mike Nash, darkman, posted, "SoCal Dream is looking forward to an exciting 2006 drum corps season, including performances at all the local DCI shows and the DCA World Championships in New York."
Need Glen Johnson to tabulate the number of shows
The biggest winners are the fan$. Unofficially, (Using my fingers and toes and more to count on the DCA Schedule), I counted 20 sanctioned shows, the TBA, and the shindig Labor Day weekend, the DCA Championships in Rachacha. (Rochester, if you haven’t been lurking in the DCP Forum.) Stay posted for updates…
…Fred Windish, DCA marketing guru, burned DCP EarAmps™ just Monday, when he hinted, "Now here’s a tip – Look for another Pennsylvania show to be added sometime in July!" Soooo, 20 + 2 maybes + Rachacha = Tons! Tons of entertainment!
Windish also posted that a couple of the show orders on the DCA calendar did not match some of the Scranton meeting agreements…Yep, when I tried to click deep into the Schedule, I could no longer open each individual city just prior to wrapping this up. DCA, once again, is roaring through fixing glitches as voraciously as Pepe Nataro cleaned horn lines.
Corps aficionados need to add to their knowledge some new and fairly new DCA corps who have horn-popped all over the drum corps planet: Music City Legend, from The Grand Ole Opry (with "Carrie Fox as our new assistant drum major"); Jackson Generals, from that Dixie state with too many "sses;" Alliance, where guard denizens tried to protect against Gen. Sherman and where Scarlett shunned Rhett (Thanks to franklymydear.com); Frontier and Gulf Coast Sound, both proudly carrying the Texas flag to the left of the U.S. colors; Lakeshoremen, Mitten State; and more. Who will be the next rising Austin Star? Ask Brent Unger in Louisville…Nashville…Austin…or Dallas.
Evil Campbell’s soup?
The Loud Music Symposium 7, a Renegades evil affair, will be invading and stirring the pot in Campbell, CA, south of Treasure Island, roughly 470 miles north of Kingsmen Alumni rehearsals. Tickets are $15. Buy ’em or be bland at www.renegades.org. See other evildoers and fan$ there April 30. Dinkle up and say a cozy "Hi!" when you see me there. I’ll be the one with the Evil Grin.
LMS LA; i.e., Los Angeles; takes place July 7. Did I say "7"? Enjoy all the hoopla there, including the Kingsmen Alumni! John Donovan, DCP Top Potentate, and his daughter enjoyed a recent Kingsmen rehearsal.
Bush may troop in ’06 glory
Look out for the Bushwackers this season! Bush already has a strong staff, including Dan DeLong, percussion arranger. Recently, they’ve added Jeff Mitchell, program consultant, Frank Dorritie, "Ironlips" iconoclast, and James Mallen, percussion think tank. Many corps are going to be whacked up the side of the shakos when Bush troops the stands.
To rustle blatantly from an old cowboy campfire song:
"I woke up one morning on the (expanded) Old DCA Trail,
Drumsticks in my hand and euph by the bent elbows and tail.
Come ti yi youpy, youpa ya, youpa ya,
Come ti yi youpy, youpy ya.
Come along, boys ‘n girls, and listen to my wail,
I’ll tell you of my troubles of trooping the Lackawanna Trail.
Come ti yi youpy, youpy ya, youpy ya,
Come ti yi youpy, youpy ya."
Curl an ale or a broom?…Hard of Haring on a mike
Curling is now a contact sport apparently, at least when Bob Bohanek, lead mello USNA ’86-’90, currently Chops, hits the ice. Nine lip stitches later, Bohanek is planning to use a contra? mouthpiece in his mello until the stitches in time wind down.
Fran and Barbara Haring, per the emcee’s own baritone mouth, stated that the Haring family will be working/attending these shows: Saturday, May 13, Elverson, PA (Buccaneers’ "Spring Preview" concert); Saturday, June 17, Wildwood, NJ (DCA); Friday, June 30, Westminster, MD (DCI/YEA); Saturday, July 1, Dover, NJ (DCA); Saturday, July 15, Clifton, NJ (DCA); Saturday, July 22, Manassas, VA (DCA South); Saturday, August 19, Scranton, PA (DCA); Labor Day Weekend, Rochester, NY (DCA Championships). Haring added, "There may, or may not, be another date or two added. See ya’ this summer!"
Fran Haring, emcee extraordinaire, Private Messaged to moi, "I’ll see ya’ at both the Dover and Manassas shows. I’m working both of them…Wow! (I’m) glad to see you ‘back in the game.’ Cool! Stay well, and see you this summer!"
Racine Kilties, other corps, lose brothers and sisters
Bob Doran, bigbluekiltie, posted: "The Racine Kilties have lost another brother. As most of you know, they lost Lothar (Joel Magnuson) on the DCA field this summer. Recently, they lost former drummer, Jim (Gio) Giordano following heart surgery. Then, on April 2, they lost the quintessential Kiltie (and Des Plaines Vanguard alum), Joe Schmidt, a lead baritone who could play with the best of them. He died in his home of heart arrhythmia. According to his wife, he did not suffer.
"Joe was the second Kiltie I met in 1996. When I went to my first rehearsal, Mario (who has also died) took me to the YMCA rehearsal room and had me sit next to Joe, a lead bari of the caliber of (Doug) "Pooh Bear" (Kenyon) and (Ray) "Moon" (Johnson) and John Cassell…He never wanted to be a soloist. He was too shy, too soft, but always played his best. We could never get him to stop playing at rehearsals…."
Refer to DCWorld, first week of June issue, for more news regarding the loss of other personalities of our corpsdom.
Anyone wish to know more about the tradition, history, even leading edge progression in DCA? Simply, refer to "A History of Drum & Bugle Corps," Vol. 2, Chapter 3, for Tom Peashey’s excellent DCA history. Steve Vickers, DCWorld publisher, is working on more history books. Refer to the associated "Drum Corps World Looking for Photos" on DCP News story.
Refer to DCWorld’s "Cozy’s Corner" for oodles more CorpsVets news and show dates. The May issue of DCW, now in mailboxes, has a review of a CorpsVets camp as well as a Spirit of JSU. Both were March camps. Subscribe at www.drumcorpsworld.com.
The summer of aught six may just be far more throbbing than the summer of ’42 or any other juiced up era in the ol’ corpsdom. Buy your tickets now at www.dcacorps.org. Order your DCP EarAmps ahora as you cruise "de" long way down the aisles of the DCP Store, and enjoy a sizzling hot time, summer in the cities!
Fred Windish is the Director of Marketing and Public Relations at Drum Corps Associates and the host of Drum Corps Planet’s DCA … All-Age, All-Good! column. You may contact him directly at prdirector [at] dcacorps [dot] org. Watch for regular updates from Fred in this section.
