Statesmen Jump Four Points, Can’t Catch Bucs

Rochester’s Empire Statesmen jumped more than four points on the score sheets at the Cavalcade of Champions contest in Lewisburg, PA on July 22, but still couldn’t quite catch up to Reading Buccaneers, who are still undefeated this season. Statesmen scored 86.520 to finish second to the Bucs for the third time since the contest season began in mid-June. The Buccaneers scored 88.350 in the contest held in Christy Mathewson Memorial Stadium at Bucknell University.

Empire Statesmen took the high ensemble brass score and high brass total, and were tops in music effect.

The Buccaneers and Statesmen will sail up the Susquehanna River from Lewisburg to compete again Saturday, July 29 in Sounds on the Susquehanna, to be held at Binghamton Alumni Stadium, in Binghamton NY. The contest was originally scheduled for nearby Endicott, NY.

The Bushwackers finished third in Lewisburg, with a score of 84.925, slightly ahead of fourth place Hawthorne Caballeros, who scored 84.750. Three western New York corps rounded out the score sheet: Syracuse Brigadiers scored 78.263; Rochester Crusaders scored 69.600; White Sabers scored 64.575, about five points better than their previous contest in Central Square, NY.

Empire Statesmen and Buccaneers will meet once more after the contest in Binghamton. The Statesmen will take on the Bucs on their home field in Reading, PA on August 26, their last meeting before the Drum Corps Associates (DCA) championship tournament is held at PAETEC Park Stadium in Rochester on Labor Day weekend. Buccaneers are the defending 2005 DCA champions. Empire Statesmen finished second to the Buccaneers at last year’s DCA finals in Scranton, PA.

The Empire Statesmen, five-time DCA champions, are sponsoring the three-day DCA Labor Day weekend championship tournament this summer and again in 2007. The schedule of weekend events includes individual and ensemble contests, a mini-corps contest, an old-fashioned outdoor drum corps party in downtown Rochester, induction of seven new members into the World Drum Corps Hall of Fame, a concert by nine top U.S. and Canadian alumni corps, and prelims and finals for the competing corps in PAETEC Park Stadium. More than 40 units will participate in events over the weekend.

Nine of the 42 DCA championships from 1965 to 2005 have been held in Rochester: four from 1968 to 1971; four from 1973 to 1976 and one in 1996.

The Empire Statesmen drum and bugle corps is a self-supporting independent group that represents the city of Rochester across the United States and Canada and as far abroad as Europe, the Caribbean and South America.

For ticket information about the DCA championships and other events on Labor Day weekend, call (585) 266-2232 or visit the Empire Statesmen Web site at: www.statesmen.org