Last Two Concerts In 2014 Scout House Indoor Season

Scout House Band, of Cambridge, will wind up its indoor performing season on May 10 with performances at two events: the Drumline Ontario provincial championships in Waterloo and the 10th annual “And The Bands Played On…” concert in Simcoe. The Band’s outdoor activities begin the following weekend with Woodstock’s annual Victoria Day Parade.

Scout House is performing in concert at the Drumline Ontario season championship contest, beginning at 1 pm at Wilfrid Laurier University Athletic Complex, 75 University Avenue West, Waterloo, in support of the Scout House Cadets drum line, competing in its second contest in two weekends. Drumline Ontario is a Canadian not-for-profit organization established to provide percussion ensembles of every level the opportunity to improve and perform. The best interests of each musician are of paramount importance. Good musicianship, sportsmanship and skill improvement are the goals of the organization.

The evening stage concert on May 10, beginning at 6:45 in Simcoe Composite School auditorium, will feature seven musical groups and the St. John’s Winter Guard.

Scout House will present its 2014 field show repertoire, including Waterloo Fanfare; a percussion feature leading into Miserlou, performed originally in the 1920s as a desert love song and transformed into a modern rock classic by the Beach Boys and guitar legend Dick Dale; Waltzing Matilda, the Band’s signature song since the mid 1950s, presented this year in military style with a formal introduction by the percussion section and glockenspiels to establish the mood; Land of Make Believe, one of Rochester composer and performer Chuck Mangione’s most popular hits; Johnny One Note, the novelty number made popular by Judy Garland; Through The Eyes of Love, the emotional love ballad from the movie Ice Castles.

Other groups performing at the “And the Bands Played On…” concert include the Haldimand Norfolk Concert Band, DOCA (De La Salle Oakland Crusaders Alumni) Brass Ensemble, Niagara Militaires alumni drum and bugle corps, Mighty St. Joe’s drum and bugle corps, The Optimists alumni drum and bugle corps and United Alumni drum and bugle corps.

Three of the participants in the Simcoe concert, Scout House, Mighty St. Joe’s and DOCA, have been “playing on” for a very long time, with roots extending back more than 75 years in marching music history.

In 2013, Scout House marked the 75th anniversary of its founding as a Boy Scout bugle band in 1938.

In 1931, the Rev. T. Bernard Kelly, pastor of St. Joseph’s Church in Batavia, New York, started a choir which became a fife and drum corps and finally a parade corps. In 1951, corps graduates formed St Joseph’s Drum Corps Association Inc., to perpetuate Father Kelly’s work.

The original De La Salle school marching band was formed more than a century ago, in 1910. The drum and bugle corps started in 1958, merging with the Etobicoke Crusaders in 1975 to become the Oakland Crusaders drum and bugle corps.

Marching in the Woodstock Victoria Day parade, taking place this year on Monday, May 19, is a Scout House tradition dating back to the 1950s. Over more than 50 years weather conditions on parade day have ranged from light snow to blazing heat and high humidity and such heavy rainfall that sticky mud sucked the shoes off Band members’ feet during a field show performance in the late 1950s.

Scout House will be marching in several other high profile parades across southern Ontario this season, including the Burlington Sound of Music Festival parade, Welland Rose Festival Parade, Preston’s Canada Day parade on July 1, Hanover Homecoming Parade in early August and the Dundas Cactus Festival Parade in mid-August.

Scout House has performed at six events since the beginning of the year, including the Battle of Atlantic Sunday parade and cenotaph ceremony in Waterloo on Sunday, May 4 honoring veterans who served during World War II. On the same weekend, the Scout House Silver Leaves brass ensemble and heritage drill team are performing at the Great Alliance of Seniors (GAS) reunion in Binghamton, New York.

Since the band’s first appearance at the GAS reunion weekend in Mississauga in 1999, Scout House has performed more than 425 concerts, street parades and field shows in Ontario, Quebec and 10 American states: Michigan, West Virginia, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New York, Massachusetts, Connecticut, New Jersey, Maryland and Florida.

Scout House now includes about 100 marching members from more than 20 communities across southern Ontario who had previously been associated with more than 75 marching music organizations. The Scout House family also includes the Scout Houses Cadets drum and bugle corps for boys and girls from age 12 to 18, established to help mark the group’s 75th anniversary since starting as a Boy Scout bugle band in 1938.

Scout House Cadets, named for the Band’s original feeder group, began activity as a drum line in September 2012, adding a brass section in September 2013 to become a full drum and bugle corps. No prior music experience is required to join the Cadets. Scout House welcomes new non marching members to help with various support activities.

For more information about Scout House 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/