Why do parades?

[BRASSO]

Everyone says money. ok... How much money are we talking about for an average parade?

Parades don't happen every day. So given a choice of doing parades in a community or doing rehearsal in a community, it's a no brainer.. you do the parade as it's a way to find funds to operate the Corps. Parade can pay anywhere from a few hundred to thousands.

Plus, lets not forget where this activity we still call " Drum Corps " first began to perform for the public. It wasn't on football field inside a stadium, that for sure. It was marchng down a community's street with the flags out front waving in the breeze, and a drum line with a street beat, and that Drum Corps looking sharper and crisper in their marching style and straight formation lines than most of the marching bands that would be in most parades with those Corps. Most in the public first became aware of Drum Corps through seeing them in parades. There might be upwards of tens of thousands of spectators lining the route of a parade . This is several dozen times more than would see the Corps in field competition. The parade is where the Drum Corps generally could shine, despite it's obvious limitations in instrumentation utilized compared to many of the local maching bands in the surrounding communities that would march in these parades...... finally, I know of a prominent wealthy benefactor that is a decade long major financial contributor today to a prominent DCI Corps that knew nothing about that Corps until he simply was impressed with that Corps when they marched in his community parade a few years back... made inquiries... and then began to make annual significant financial contributions to them. Parades are about $$$$ ( first and foremost ), exposure, and heritage. The day Drum Corps cut back on parades is the day that both Drum Corps... and the country loses, imo.

Edited July 2, 2010 by BRASSO

[Northern Thunder]

Back in 1981 I co-founded an adult marching band. Even in those days we got as much as $2,000 for a parade.

[dbc03]

One of the parades in 06 I was about to explode... drank too much water when the bottles went around I guess. That was not good. Might've been Bunker Hill? I dunno. My memory is not good with individual places on tour (I can't remember housing sites, etc)

edit: might've been that wakefield parade... I'm pretty sure it was in Boston, and somewhere in the 4-7 mile range.

During the Bristol parade in 05 a guy I marched with had to crap so bad that he had to get out of the block and go ask to use someones bathroom in full uniform and then catch back up with the corps

[FTNK]

Hoppy said in '06 that it was $10,000 for both Cadets and Crossmen to do Bunker Hill

[shostahoosier]

Some organizations are even making more money by splitting the corps in half and sending them to twice the number of parades.

The most I've ever done on July 4th is 4 parades...I have no idea how a corps can organize more. We were literally the first unit in the first parade at the butt crack of dawn...and then after finishing parades 2 and 3...and were rushed in right before the garbage trucks in the 4th parade in the early evening.

[7567BC]

Corps do parades for the money. Simple as that. The thing is that around the 4th of July no high school or college bands are available. Corps can make out pretty good. If they are fortunate to have a group of parades that are close together, that's where they really make out. Very profitable and maybe they can get use of a local school and field. I remember doing 6 parades around the 4th of July back during the bicentennial. The corps i marched with made over $10k. Good chunk of change back then. Now I think a corps can get $3,000 or more for a parade.

[MikeD]

Some organizations are even making more money by splitting the corps in half and sending them to twice the number of parades.

The most I've ever done on July 4th is 4 parades...I have no idea how a corps can organize more. We were literally the first unit in the first parade at the butt crack of dawn...and then after finishing parades 2 and 3...and were rushed in right before the garbage trucks in the 4th parade in the early evening.

That is my most on a single day too...four.

One parade...might have been in Fairlawn NJ right after our Garfield parade, our busses dropped us off about 1/2 way through and a block off the route...we had carried our equipment with us on the bus...we formed up quick with our equipment and marched up this side street to the parade route, scaring the heck out of those watching the parade as we got to the route!

One parade, might have been Israel day in NYC, we did twice...marched for one group near the front, got on our busses, went to the back, and marched again for a different group!

[ImperialSound_Director]

The quality of a corps is not really an issue when it comes to dishing out cash for appearances, at least not in my experience. Some parades expect units to pay in order to play (dumb), but most parades I've gotten offers from vary widely. I've even gotten offers for $20,000 for a VFW parade. Parades are a great way to build revenue for any starting corps, once they start coming together.

Its also a little difficult to figure out and plan in advance where parades are and how much they pay. Some also offer to cover cost of transportation. The key is to not get greedy, otherwise when these organizations start to see cut-backs in their programs, they might not want to invite you back.

[BRASSO]

Funny story out of the past on a parade:

Years ago, our generally very organized Corps Director had us in so many parades in a holiday whirlwind binge of parades that he inadvertantly confused one communities parade format with another's format. He thought one Community's parade was a children's " Horribles Parade"where the format was for our Corps to march in funny costumes, painted faces, etc instead of uniforms and they'd be ice cream, cake, cookies, and children's games played in a neighborhood park for the children. We'd be the only musical unit, and it would be a good fun gig for the Corps and it would pay well.

Wrong.... oh so VERY wrong. When the Corps bus arrived in the community, we got off the bus to howls of laughter all around. Here we were.. surrounded by busloads after busloads of other Corps and marching bands in uniform. This community was not only going to have a parade... it was going to be a very large JUDGED parade, where we would be competing in the Drum Corps judged parade division. But here we were: we had very tough masculine drummers in ballerina outfits...Guard in cheerleader and tinkerbell attire... painted faces.... Groucho Marx glasses and nose... clown outfits.... We looked " horrible " all right. We marchers initially were po'd as could be. More than a few marchers had to be coaxed out off the bus. We wanted to commit homicide on our beloved Corps Director who looked ashen faced and positively stunned with what his confusion had wrought.

Then we had some marchers suddenly from other units come over from the nearby busses and said they thought our Corps was " so cool.. to have the cajones to do this ".... and " you guys are so rebellious ".... " wow hat a hoot to do this"... and so forth. We then learned that they thought we had actually PLANNED this. So now we thought" what the heck, lets go with the flow, and lets just do this thing".

When we marched down the parade route we got a great hand from the spectators all along the route who laughed and cheered for us all the way. When we got to the competition zone near the reviewing stand, we crossed over the chalked line signifying the competition zone and looked at the perplexed look on the face of the 3 judges... all who set aside their clipboards to their sides, shook their heads and just laughed . We got a " Disq." for our score. But what we thought was going to be the parade from hades, turned into one of the most fun parades we ever had... plus, we were all properly dressed and ready to go for the NEXT parade later that day in the next community where the childen and their parents were ready for us in the park...... later, the Corps Director told us he was not sure the other Community would pay us for the " disrespect " we had shown them in their parade. But he got a note from the Chairperson of that parade shortly therafter and the note said something to the effect... " enclosed is your fee for participation in our parade. While we employ you to inform us in the future should you intend to alter your regular standard uniform attire for our parade, please note that in our opinion, your Corps was the hit of our parade and added just the degree of unexpected levity the parade could have used. Please consider us next year for our parade... but please... next time in standard uniform ".

True story.

Edited July 2, 2010 by BRASSO

[Fran Haring]

Everyone says money. ok... How much money are we talking about for an average parade?

I don't know what the pay scale is for the July 4th weekend parades in and around the Baltimore, MD, area.... but several DCA corps from as far south as Georgia and Florida have made the trip in years past, and/or are making the trip to march in several of the area parades this year. So I gotta figure those corps are paid enough money to make it worth their while.