ironlips

Garfield Cadets 1970-71 George Tuthill 1974-76 Bill Gaeckle (USMC) 1977 Gerry Shellmer

Thanks, Ghost. That's certainly possible. I will contact him. One way or the other, he'll know the answer. In the days when a soprano high G was proof of bugle "manhood" (and only a few could render that consistently), a double C was a most rare unicorn, especially on that piece of glorified plumbing called the G/D horn. That Kevin's musical stiletto was the first I had ever heard "live" to that point. My buddies and I looked at each other with eyes bulging wide, and nobody said a word. We were wishing that note would last forever. In a way, it actually did.

I watched SKEK win the Dream in '64 at Roosevelt Staduim in Jersey City, and seriously considered dropping out of school to move to Dorchester that very afternoon. Does anyone know who played the double high "C" at the end of Stars and Stripes? I swear it seemed to ring the stadium rafters for about half an hour.

I was lucky enough to see both corps in their primes at the '65 VFW Nationals in Chicago's McCormick Place. Kevin's were their usual spectacular selves, but St. Mary's Cardinals delivered one of the most effective moments in corps history when they rotated a full corps company front on the 50 while wailing the Enoch Light arrangement of "Heat Wave". To this day, the sound, color and energy of that resonates with me, particularly when I'm called upon to evaluate General Effect at the highest levels. As to which performance "in all eternity" I would like to have witnessed, I think I'll go with Joshua's Hebrew drum corps, marching around the walls of Jericho. I hear that had some juice.

This premise is positively Shakespearean, complete with references to the Bard of Avon (the river, not the cool HS band). " ...suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune. " Though the great playwright opined that "brevity is the soul of wit", this lengthy and well-constructed screed may be the exception that proves the rule. It's witty, to be sure.

I suggest you contact the US Naval Academy Drum & Bugle Corps. They may still have their pre-Bb set of G bugles.

This was the line up for DCI Pittsburg last month, the Sunday after the Allentown circus: Seattle Cascades - Seattle, WA 7:27 PM Genesis - Austin, TX 7:44 PM Madison Scouts - Madison, WI 8:01 PM Intermission 8:18 PM Troopers - Casper, WY 8:35 PM The Academy - Tempe, AZ 8:52 PM Spirit of Atlanta - Atlanta, GA 9:09 PM Blue Devils - Concord, CA It's not unimaginable that the pre-intermission corps could be replaced by Reading, Cabs, CV and White Sabers. But the booking part is easy. Convincing the DCI planners that adding DCA corps might put more people in the house is the real nut, and it's far from certain a convincing argument could be made for that, given the anemic draw of most DCA shows.

Perhaps I was not clear. The suggestion is a cooperative event, not one running "against" the other. Did that Scranton show include major DCI corps?

You are describing (as you well know) the model pioneered by Petrone and Fr. W. ;i.e., "The Dream". It could happen, particularly around the Allentown weekend when all DCI corps are in PA and not competing on the same evening. Coordination would have to begin right about now.

Stockton Commodores Des Plaines Vanguard Avant Garde.....and on and on. Of course, there are dozens more, and the amazing thing is that they all had distinct, clearly defined identities.

I find this a real revelation: " An interesting twist to this thread: those who are intrigued by this idea vs. those who are totally confused as to why anyone would put a Babs (or even worse, "who's that?") show on the field is a clear litmus test for who's gay and who's straight on DCP. " Nobody told me about this litmus test when I arranged the 27th Lancers show in '86. It was based in it's entirety on Streisand's covers of Sondheim on the "Broadway" album: Putting it Together, Ladies Who Lunch, Being Alive, Not While I'm Around...etc. Who knew that sexual orientation was tied to a liking for great melodies? Live and learn.

Jim Donnelly's bio, from the World Drum Corps Hall of Fame web site: "Jim Donnelly was a World War I veteran who modernized the North American drum and bugle corps activity through his musical genius and instrument innovations. He is best known as the musical director of St. Vincent’s Cadets, Bayonne, NJ, selected as the World Drum Corps Hall of Fame junior corps for the 1950’s, but was earlier associated with the Harry Doremus American Legion Post in Paterson, NJ. He helped remove the musical limitations of straight G bugles through the introduction of the D crook and the piston. He helped introduce the French horn and obligato soprano horn to the brass line of drum and bugle corps. St. Vincent’s Cadets were Veterans of Foreign Wars (VFW) New Jersey state champions twelve times between 1944-57; American Legion state champions seven times between 1949-59; VFW national champions eight times between 1946-57; American Legion national champions 1951 through 1953. St. Vincent’s is the only corps ever to win the round robin twice: 1951-52 VFW state, Legion state, VFW nationals, and Legion nationals 1951, 52 and 53."

Getting back to Vinny's, I believe Jim Donnelly was a WWI vet, making him one of the folks who actually started the veteran's organization drum corps movement in the US in the 1920s. Fr. Edward F. Wojtycha (Wo-tech-a) was the first moderator of the corps, which was an activity of the parish's Boy Scout troop. St. Vincent's is the archtypical example of a neighborhood corps growing into a national power. It took coordination and cooperation of the Church, the Scouts and the VFW, all of which were powerful societal organizations in those days. Fr. Gerald Marchand, a Vinny's alumnus, wrote a book, "All for One and One for All", a history of the corps, and also contributed an excellent chapter devoted to his corps in Vol. 2 of "A History of Drum & Bugle Corps", published in 2003 by Steve Vickers. Alumni from Vinny's fanned out across the country to provide the instruction and expertise that enabled the establishment of the activity nationally. These folks, having been taught by people like Donnelly, Petrone and Chapelle, constitute the very foundation of what came after, down to the present. They should be honored forever by all drum corps participants and supporters.

If you marched in the Manville corps you must have performed my buddy John Arietano's charts. We played together in the Sunrisers for many years.

" Memorial Stadium in Baltimore had the bleeping pitchers mound. " Yes, and when you turned "backfield", there was no backfield, just a symmetrically curved outfield wall that guaranteed instant disorientation. There were no yard markers, naturally. It was a baseball field, after all. There was a rumor about an orange cone somewhere, but I never saw it. The Manning Bowl was my favorite. I'm with Ghost on that. The audience was so close it was like playing in some oversize outdoor nightclub. What a great vibe.