ironlips

Barbara Bergdoll

Both sides have a point here as to "fame", if you will. But it helps to remember that drum corps is an ensemble endeavor wherein all performers contribute to the whole. It's the achievement of the corps that matters most. Still, when we assembled the Artistry in Brass CD for the "Echoes" series, I insisted we name all the soloists. The prevailing opinion was that it would be impossible to ID everyone. Not so. They were stars, after all, in our particular galaxy.

While you're at it, you might thank the veterans for the drum corps activity itself. They pretty much invented it and sustained it all the way through the last century.

Xavier High School in NYC had a "Bugle Corps" founded by Dr. C.B. Brusack when he was a student in the 1920s. The corps existed side-by-side with a marching band, a color guard and a drill team (Xavier is a miliitary school). Located in downtown Manhattan, the institution drew students from NY, NJ and CT, with the result that there were Xavier Bugle Corps members who also marched in Blessed Sac, Garfield, St. Catherine's, St. Vincent's, St. Patrick's...etc. The great Jim Donnelly taught bugles (and handed me my first "piston" soprano), and Bobby Thompson worked with the drum line. The drill instructors were regular Army DIs. To my knowledge, there have never been very many HS drum corps compared to Legion, VFW. FD, PAL, church affilliated or Shriners.

I suggest some respect for those old schoolers. Without them...(I respect you all enough to know you can fill in the blank.)

Rich, Sunriser Hall of Famer Tony White hipped me to your query. Brian Tolzmann, drum corps historian extraordinaire, lists this corps on page 406 0f The History of Drum & Bugle Corps along with other Red Devils Corps from Rochester, PA (jr. & sr.), Bayshore NY (I remember them as a parade corps in the '60s), Crystal City, MO, Gowanda, NY, Kingston, NY, McHenry, IL, and Pawtucket, RI. There are no details given. Does your picture have any Post identification or names below or on the back? Where did your customer find it? What a great find! It definitely needs to be preserved. I suggest you send a scan to Vickers for the next volume of the History.

That's a fine piece of writing about a very exciting season. The race in the East was for second position behind the Muchachos. One of my colleagues on Garfield's '74 staff remarked that he was relieved we had inched past the Purple Lancers at DCI East with only 2 weeks left in the season. We figured there would be 2 easten corps in finals, Muchachos and "the corps to be named later". As someone who was just beginning to learn arranging techniques, I paid close attention to the work of people like Dreitzer, Sasso, Norman, Kerchner and Corky Fabrizio. I admired "real" musicians like Jerry Kelsey who had studied theory formally while I scuffled along by trial and error. It was clear to me that Auburn had the superior musical book, and that if those notes ever lined up they would move past us with alacrity. A week later, they bested Garfield by half a tenth. By DCI prelims, the spread had widened. Alacrity had arrived.

I notice that Geneva played lead sop in the Auburn Purple Lancers in 1974. What a magnificent hornline! Book by Corky Fabrizio, tech by Jerry Kelsey, if I'm not mistaken. Just outstanding.

Assuming you're listening to the Ithaca finals recording, I think I can shed a little light on the crowd reaction. The entire back stands was filled with kids from corps that did not make finals, most of them from Eastern corps. There had been a bit of a "demonstration" of solidarity earlier involving Boston, Cadets, Beverly Cardinals and a few others when the hornlines combined and played a few massive chords together back at the housing site. Afterwards, all marched up the hill together to the stadium, causing a bit of a traffic jam, and sat together specifically to cheer the Muchachos whom they saw as the top representative for the "East" (notwithstanding the fact that the Auburn Purple Lancers were also in the mix). Jeff, naturally was their hero. When the Muchachos entered the field, Don Polzo, one of my Cadets soloists, stood and played the Bullfight Call from the stands. The house erupted. Kievit later told me it was one of the most emotional moments of his career and really energized the corps. That crowd applauded, stomped for, whistled at and generally cheered for everything the Muchs did that night. Given that the microphones were oriented towards the field, hence the back sideline crowd, it's not surprising that their reactions sound impressive. Footnote: After the Muchachos performed, most of the East Coast kids simply got up and left the stadium, following them out to the parking lot. That kind of regional solidarity is unlikely today. I would think.

These "who-did-what -first" discussions are fascinating to a person who first marched onto the field in 1962. True story: At a 1985 Freelancer camp, Marc Sylvester, sporting an unorthodox (surprise!) hairstyle walks by Pete Emmons who slyly comments, "What the he*l kind of a haircut is that?" Without missing a beat Marc replies, "It's asymmetry. You invented it." You want innovators? Bill Ludwig - first to place a horizontal valve on a G bugle(c. 1928). Jim Donnelly & Scotty Chappelle - first to use bugle tuning slides to access accidentals(c. 1952). Scout House Bugle Band - first major contender to use bugles in Bb and Eb(c. 1954). Jim Donnelly and Caesar La Monica - invented the French Horn bugle(c.1940). Dominic DelRay- invented the Mellophone bugle(c.1963). Jerry Shellmer - first to use horizontal keyboards(1969). St. Catherine's Queensmen - first corps to perform it's show at Carnegie Hall (1962). Long Island Sunrisers - first DCA corps with a female colorguard(1969).

Gus was an inspiration to all drum corps brass players of the '60s and '70s. He taught countless future instructors who would later pass on his lessons to their students. I daresay his influence is still present whenever a soloist steps out, or a section executes a particularly fanciful lick. God bless Gus Wilkie.

There were 34 candidates for this round, all of them deserving. With 8 National Championships in their history, the Sunrisers have had a wealth of talent come through their ranks, and it's no surprise that the World Drum Corps Hall of Fame named them the "Corps of the Decade" for the '80s. Most of the 2005 Sun Hall of Fame inductees marched or were on staff during that illustrious run.

The following Sunrisers will be inducted into the Hall of Fame at the Alumni Reunion on Nov. 12th: Tony White Brian O'Connell Bobby Steinhilber Billy DiPaolo Tom Beresford Joe Coppola Jim O'Hara Congratulations to all! Reunion details: jcopla@aol.com

Elphaba, I've just listened to Vol.2 of "An Evening with the Corps at Carnegie Hall" (Hawthorne, Intertsatesmen, St. Kevin's) and enjoyed the remarkable barbershop harmony of "Somebody Knows". It's probably the first recorded instance of vocal music in a drum corps performance, and pre-dates that "A-men" by 15 years. The audience response was clearly favorable. I suppose that was a combination of having high musical expectations of SKEK to begin with and experiencing drum corps in that esteemed venue. That was a heady evening for us all. I imagine that in the days that followed there were plenty of corps moms and dads who nonchalantly noted at PTA meetings all throughout the land that their kids had played (and/or sung) at Carnegie Hall.

I applaud your idealism and heart. You're going to need infrastructure and seed capital as well. Take a look at how drum corps got started in the townships of South Africa (www.fieldband.org.za/). Two of their corps are composed of visually impaired kids. You will find a good deal of moral support among the drum corps alumni in Canada and the USA, especially from those who marched in the '50s and '60s. "Never,never, never give up." -Winston Churchill "Do the right thing." -Spike Lee

Her name was Sylvia (Fillipelli?). I wrote the "All the Things You Are" solo specifically for her. What a talent!

You do what you have to do. Perhaps you could find another syllable that sounds more like a train. Chut...Chut...Chut..Chut..Chut.Chut.ChutChuchuchuchuchu....woo, woooo..........

Elphaba01, Is that on the Carnegie recording? (I'll have to go to the stacks now.) I do recall that the Kevin's guys played that little fanfare just before the announcer says, "To open our concert this evening, it is with a great deal of pleasure that I introduce, from St. Albans, New York, The St. Catherine of Sienna Queensmen." Mike (my old and true friend from back in the day), I think "duts" are fine as a rehearsal technique, but if you use them in performance you are making a statement. I suggest that statement is: "We can't establish a tempo without this."

This thread has everything: trajedy, comedy, truth, falsehood, niavete, foolishness, swagger, arrogance, comeuppance...And I thought I had heard everything, but the topper was referring to the incomparable Fred Sanford as a "band aid". Now that's a hoot!

Storkysr raises an interesting point. Permit me to point out that there was no precussion pit 40 years ago. Microphones do not discriminate, and if you sat where the mics are normally placed for a drum corps show recording, guess what you'd hear: Correct. An imbalance. And now we're amping the little buggers. If the mic's are placed at the audience perspective, the music is more evenly blended, since the distance to brass and percussion is now similar. The problem now becomes the distance vis a vis the audience. While we can selectively listen to the corps and ignore the guy next to us, the mic cannot. Here's a little tidbit from Psychoacoustics: The ear/brain mechanism tends to interpret clarity as volume. That's why the corps that plays cleaner and in tune sounds somehow louder than the one that doesn't, all other things being equal. Who said recording drum corps is a nightmare? That's as fine an analogy as I've ever heard. One of my colleagues in commercial recording compared it to skydiving with an umbrella. All drum corps recordings are a compromise. Ask Larry Rock, Tom Blair, Tom Johnson, Bill Duquette, Ken Mason, (or me, for that matter). They will never duplicate the live experience, just provide a hint of it.

Overall dynamic level on your drum corps CDs is a result of how they were mastered. Levels are sometimes set conservatively to avoid possible digital clipping problems in the duplication process.

I have two questions: Who were the judges for this show? How does one get recordings of these corps?

When Ralph Hardimon "invented" the "dut", it was as a rehearsal technique. Why would anyone use it in performance? It's the equivalent of Dr. Beat, and you wouldn't use him, would you? I judged a band show in Denver last week. They were dutting all over the place. I explained that, since I was the music judge, I was charged with evaluating both instrumental and vocal sounds. Since this utterance appeared in the show, I assumed it was to be judged for timing, quality, balance... etc . It was an interesting critique.

Hi Felix. No, the "Amen" remained for '77 finals. I considered removing it since we were right on the cusp of making the night show, and we were guaranteed a penalty. The corp members wouldn't hear of it, so it stayed. With the penalty, we tied the Kilties for 12th. So, in a sense, the "Amen" put the Kilts into finals. (On the other hand, perhaps our GE score would have slipped w/o the vocal. We'll never know.) By '78, I was teaching the BDs, and my old team, Garfield, chose not to sing at "Class A" finals (or whatever they called the show for the 13 through 25 group) since their penalty would have been a full point. (Does anyone keep a tune for more than one season anymore?)

Ah, the "Infamous Aaa-men". That was really something. At the time, the rules (DCI, VFW, American Legion) all prohibited "singing or chanting". But they also stipulated that there were "no penalties after the gun, except for sideline violations". So, at the end of "I Don't Know How to Love Him" (from "Jesus Christ- Superstar") we thought it would be both appropriate and legal to emulate Joel Kaye's arrangement and sing the plagal cadence. You would have thought we had advocated the overthrow of the government by violence! Penalties were assessed, disqualifications threatened, ex-communications announced. The audiences, of course, loved every minute of it. At DCI East Prelims I was told to exorcise this abomination under pain of disqualification. We had the staff sing it from the sidelines, having made a secret pact to re-insert the offending two notes if we made finals. There was to be a manager's meeting about this between shows. We went a.w.o.l. and, having come in 12th, were the first on in the night show and, after telling all our friends and supporters what to expect, sang the "A-men". The place erupted. It was great. During the mayhem, with perople standing and cheering in support of this feisty corps, I sought out the executive director and the contest sponsor. "So", I asked, "you want me to take that out?" The only time we didn't get a penalty was at CYO Nationals. Dr Baggs was chief judge and I framed his sheet which says "No penalty for singing "Amen" on a Sunday afternoon in Boston at a CYO show."