Hard Corps

Summer. For most kids between the ages of 16 and 22, summer is freedom. The monotonous drone of the education system is replaced by splashing and laughter. But each May, about 4,000 young people give up their freedom and disappear from their normal lives to a world of sweat and discipline. And music.

Drum and bugle corps, now generally shortened to “drum corps,” have been traveling the States for over 75 years almost completely under America’s radar. High schools are abandoned for the pool and the mall, and charter buses pull in unnoticed. It’s 4:00 a.m. 150 young people pile out like groggy robots. The bus bays open and every suitcase, air mattress and sleeping bag drags through a door propped open with a trash can. They follow arrows to the gym and within minutes everyone is asleep again. The lights go out.

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