SDCA Schedules Shows For Its Third Season

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SDCA’s second Annual scheduling and information meeting was held in Milwaukee WI and Sponsored by The Pioneer. It was attended by 17 people who represented the Northern, Central and Eastern Midwest as well as Canada.

We covered many topics in order to provide corporate information as well as be educational, address members concerns, have an interactive work shop, critique last year?s shows and schedule for the 2011 season.

 

During the reading of the state of SDCA it was mentioned that last year, the 2009 season, there were 6 corps participating and 3 shows; where as in this 2010 season there were 15 participating corps and 6 shows. Additionally it was mentioned that this circuit was directly responsible for the re-organization of the Americanos from Appleton WI, the McHenry Viscounts from McHenry IL and the Imperial Knights from Sudbury Canada as well as providing a venue for the newly organized MCA corps the Sine Wave Brass from Chicago, IL. Further, SDCA has divided existing regions and added regions. Currently there is the Northern Midwest Region directed by Chris Wellner, the Central Midwest Region temporally directed by Chris Ferrara, the Eastern Midwest Region directed by Randy Kratofil with co-director John McKivigan and the Southern California Region directed by Carl Allison. Announced was that there is an East Coast Region, an Eastern Canadian Region and a Texas region that are all in the talking stages.

The agenda then moved to getting playing members for individual corps as well as building up existing regions of SDCA by encouraging defunct corps to form alumni corps. 

2010 shows were critiqued and it was mentioned that performance of recognizable music with effective visuals were of the utmost importance in order to promote a fan base and the use of music stands should not be used except in rare occasions by selected individuals. Detailed discussion of ?what a corps must do to make an audience want to buy a ticket to see you? was conducted.

Member concerns were next discussed as it pertains to the host corps? incentive to promote a well attended show. Then the discussion moved to the audience voting by texting in to SDCA?s voting program. Although we are still working out the bugs of this program we feel that this program is still the best option to provide audience interaction which we feel will help to promote ticket sales as well as give direction to the participating corps as to how to put on a pleasing show for the audience. 

There was a long discussion of how to host a show successfully. Details included a talk by Rich Tessitore, the Direct of Show Promotions, and the use of our comprehensive promotion sheet as well as a talk by Jeff Williams, the Director of Research, who detailed ?networking in your community.?

Finally we put together a tentative 2011 show schedule with many sketchy commitments, this being so early in to the 2011 season. We do see that the Steel City Ambassadors and the G Force from PA as well as the World Gone Mad from Texas will be participating in the Midwest Region?s shows. The crossing over of imaginary regional lines is exactly what SDCA is attempting to promote.

We intend on putting together a schedule for the Eastern Midwest as well as the Southern California Region before the calendar year ends. 

That was the meeting in a nut shell.

Our concerns still remain that we may be pushing ourselves onto a market that is not yet developed along with corps that are not comfortable with putting forth a large commitment. But this is drum corps life and we love it. We will work hard for it and with it. We may be moving too fast for some and not fast enough of others but with patience and a lot of volunteer help we will morph into what ever works and is enjoyable.

Visit our web site and watch us grow www.theSDCA.org .You can also have your corps join us or just volunteer yourself. 

Special thanks to our many many volunteers and to the drum corps fans. 

Posted by on Friday, November 5th, 2010. Filed under DCI World.