Scout House Youth Drum Line Starting In September

The Preston Scout House Alumni Band organization now includes the Scout House Cadets, a new youth drum line which will begin to offer weekly instruction sessions to area youth in September. The Cadets are expected to draw membership from a wide area around Cambridge, including Kitchener/Waterloo, Guelph and Brantford.

The new group shares its name with the original Scout House Cadets band, which was active throughout the 1960s as a feeder group and continued for several years after Scout House ceased activity in 1967. Scout House Cadets drum line is open to all boys and girls ages 12 to 18. Percussion instruments and uniforms will be supplied free. Annual membership fee is $20.

The new Cadets program is being headed by Jim Pratt, of Guelph, who has been teaching drum lines in the area since the early 1980s. He guided Conqueror II of Hamilton to an undefeated championship season. He more recently worked with the Kitchener Dutch Boy drum line and is currently also teaching the Ajax Sea Cadets of Guelph. He is also involved in the efforts to revive the Ontario Drum Corps Association to help promote the growth of new community-based drum and bugle corps in the province.

He has already outlined the entire first year instruction program for the Scout House Cadets, including education, music and event goals. The main qualitative goal is to ensure that members receive a quality education and have fun in an encouraging and respectful environment. The Scout House Cadets drum line should be ready to perform on the street in local Christmas parades this fall.

Rehearsals will be held from 7 to 9 pm Wednesday evenings at The Scout House, 1580 Queenston Road, Cambridge beginning Wednesday, September 19. Information night for members and parents will be the preceding week on Wednesday, September 12. It is expected the Scout House Cadets will expand into a full drum and bugle corps in the near future. The youth initiative is beginning with percussion lessons because instructors, instruments and uniforms are all immediately available.

The Cadets are being sponsored by Preston Scout House Alumni Band as part of the recruiting drive leading up the Band’s 75th anniversary year in 2013. Youth drum lines have become a popular activity across Ontario in the past few years. Drum lines, which are springing up in high schools all across southern Ontario, meet several key objectives. They coincide with provincial government initiatives to offer activities to youth which help promote physical fitness. Student members of youth drum lines can count the hours spent performing toward the mandatory community service volunteer hours required to graduate from high school.

The M. M. Robinson high school drum line of Burlington, which has appeared in a number of the same parades as Scout House this summer, is the current Ontario Drum Line Association champion.

For more information about the Scout House Cadets, contact Bruce Witmer, Scout House Band President, telephone (519) 756-0245, or email wwitmer [at] rogers [dot] com or Jim Pratt, Program Head, telephone (519) 823-8033, email kusankusho [at] hotmail [dot] com

The Scout House Cadets Facebook page began attracting visitors within a few hours of being introduced late last week. To check out the new program, search for “Scout House Cadets”

For more information about Preston Scout House Alumni Band, contact Activities Director Nancy Weiler at telephone (519) 653-3376, email prestonscouthouseband [dot] adm [at] sympatico [dot] ca or visit the Web site at http://www.scouthouseband.com/