Empire Statesmen Performing Weekends At Darien Lake

Rochester’s Empire Statesmen are giving new meaning to the old drum corps term “park and play.” They’re going to play in a special park on three separate weekends this summer. There are plenty of other engagements on the performance schedule over the next three months.

The Statesmen’s summer schedule will see them play one weekend a month in upstate New York’s Darien Lake Theme Park and Resort, on June 16 and 17, July 7 and 8 and August 11 and 12. Statesmen will perform Saturday mornings when the gates open to admit park patrons and again later in the day.

The weekend performance schedule allows plenty of time for rehearsal on both Saturdays and Sundays. Corps members will be housed overnight in RVs in the park’s campground.

Darien Lake, located about halfway between Rochester and Buffalo, opened as a campground about 50 years ago. It has grown to become New York state’s largest theme park with six roller coasters, about 40 other rides, a large water park, 20,000 seat performing arts centre and accommodations ranging from tenting campsites to the 160 room Lodge on the Lake Hotel.

The Empire Statesmen will compete in six Drum Corps Associates (DCA) field contests, beginning in Bridgeport, Connecticut on June 30, followed by contests in Lynn/Boston, Massachusetts on July 21; Hornell, New York on July 28; Kingston, New York on August 4 and Scranton, Pennsylvania on August 18. The contest season will wind up on Labor Day weekend with the DCA championship tournament in Annapolis, Maryland.

Empire Statesmen will host a non-competitive field show in Rochester on August 25, featuring several drum and bugle corps and the area’s top high school marching bands. Information about the show is available by visiting the Website at: http://www.statesmen.org/

The summer schedule follows the busiest spring ever for the Empire Statesmen, who have been strengthening community ties across upstate New York since late April, with a benefit concert in Medina, an appearance in Rochester’s big Lilac Festival parade, Memorial Day parades in neighboring Irondequoit and Pittsford, a concert in Geneva during a weekend stay at Hobart and William Smith Colleges and a concert and rehearsal weekend in Mexico, a small town northeast of Rochester near Lake Ontario. Later in June, the Statesmen will perform during a weekend rehearsal in Webster and march in Independence Day parades in Oswego on July 1 and Irondequoit on July 4.

About the Empire Statesmen
Since first competing in 1983, the Empire Statesmen have won five DCA world championships, four American Legion national titles, and the World Show Band championship while placing in the top four at DCA championships for 23 consecutive years.

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. The Empire Statesmen also sponsor the Empire Cadets youth band as part of a longstanding community outreach program, which includes participation in community parades and festivals across a wide area and benefit concerts to support music programs across western New York and southern Ontario.

For more information about any aspect of the Empire Statesmen organization, call (585) 266-2232, e-mail esmen [at] rochester [dot] rr [dot] com or visit the Empire Statesmen Web site at: www.statesmen.org