New "Local" Drum Corps Circuit?

[3rd Glasgow BB]

Good luck to them.

And for those of you who fear change, don't worry.... it's all good.

[DAvery]

Does anyone else find it interesting that DCI is seemingly behind this venture of local circuits? I mean, didn't they actually have a hand in killing all the local circuits?

Another thing I find interesting. We all know DCI does not seem to care about smaller, local corps. But I do not think it has ever been official. This pretty much makes it official. DCI is out of the business of ever promoting a grassroots campaign for building drum corps. That is the only reason I can figure out as to why they posted this on their web site.

[audiodb]

Does anyone else find it interesting that DCI is seemingly behind this venture of local circuits? I mean, didn't they actually have a hand in killing all the local circuits?

Another thing I find interesting. We all know DCI does not seem to care about smaller, local corps. But I do not think it has ever been official. This pretty much makes it official. DCI is out of the business of ever promoting a grassroots campaign for building drum corps. That is the only reason I can figure out as to why they posted this on their web site.

OK....but before we assemble the lynch mob:

1. Since it was a DCI.org news blast that got this thread started, it's kind of silly to suggest that DCI is "out of the business of ever promoting a grassroots campaign".

2. I was DCW rep to the Garden State Circuit when it elected to shut down operations again after the 2002 season. At that point, all the remaining organizations participating in the circuit were also involved in DCI division II/III and the Atlantic Division. Those five organizations chose to have the Atlantic Division manage their shows from 2003 forward. This option was entirely voluntary, arrived at by the directors of those five corps. There was no DCI representative in the meeting room.

Fact is, these corps directors did a lot of extra work to run an independent local circuit for as long as there were local corps (i.e. non-DCI corps) that needed it. Once there weren't, that extra work wasn't necessary anymore, so it ceased. Now, maybe there is interest in local corps again, and a circuit is being talked about....with DCI's blessing.

I know the DCI parade has stepped on some toes over the years, and there's certainly more to be said about how certain regional circuits were transitioned into DCI divisions....but honestly, I don't believe it has ever been part of the agenda of DCI or any of their members or staff to "kill" local circuits.

[warsawstory]

If Mexico joins I guess I'll have to get out my Microsoft paint and make a new logo. Oh wait I'm not

computer literate enough to use MS Paint. lol

All you need is a little splash of green.

[craiger59]

I think you forgot to mention who really killed JFK and who actually perpetrated 9-11. DCI is not "behind" anything we

are trying to do. They came along just recently. If an organization with an outreach as large as DCI offers the post

a press release, again as I said yesterday, we'd be fools not to say yes. I guess I'm stuck in the 70's. I miss the days

when there were corps all over the country. The days when kids of all skill levels had the chance to march. We've all

been standing around complaining about missing the "good ol days". It's time to stop complaining and do something.

If it takes using the resources available to bring drum corps back to those kids we'll use em.

Does anyone else find it interesting that DCI is seemingly behind this venture of local circuits? I mean, didn't they actually have a hand in killing all the local circuits?

Another thing I find interesting. We all know DCI does not seem to care about smaller, local corps. But I do not think it has ever been official. This pretty much makes it official. DCI is out of the business of ever promoting a grassroots campaign for building drum corps. That is the only reason I can figure out as to why they posted this on their web site.

[mobrien]

Does anyone else find it interesting that DCI is seemingly behind this venture of local circuits? I mean, didn't they actually have a hand in killing all the local circuits?

Another thing I find interesting. We all know DCI does not seem to care about smaller, local corps. But I do not think it has ever been official. This pretty much makes it official. DCI is out of the business of ever promoting a grassroots campaign for building drum corps. That is the only reason I can figure out as to why they posted this on their web site.

DCI was never really IN that business to begin with, It was the baby that was left on their doorstep starting back in the 70s and 80s (well before the whole DCM debacle).

Personally, I'd love to see them work with these guys and with the smallest of the open class corps to 'seed' the new circuit with ready-to-go corps, so that any start-up corps this might foster have someone to play with from the beginning. It's a chance to create a whole new type of drum corps that breaks from the competitive conventions that have served to make small drum corps so hard to promote against the big corps. More power to them.

[drumz5150]

This is a great idea.

[Hup234]

"A fundamental element of DCI's strategic plan is to engage more young people..."

Nice words, but if DCI had really meant what they said, then DCI leadership over the decades would have not bent under the influence of the powerbrokers that manipulated the activity away from its original context, and DCI would similarly been openly and continuously discouraging the constant influx of all the horrendously-expensive instrumentation, high-priced professional staffers and other fanciful and exorbitant complications that have caused ninety percent of all the drum and bugle corps DCI inherited under its stewardship at its inception to vanish.

Which leads to the topic of local circuits.

For local circuits to exist, there'd need to be local corps. During the pre-Midwest Combine/DCI Golden Age, local circuits were everywhere ... but by the threadbare mid-2000s the dying Drum Corps Midwest in Illinois, one of the last remaining local circuits, included the Renegades from the West Coast in order to fill out its competition card.

[Jeff Ream]

Does anyone else find it interesting that DCI is seemingly behind this venture of local circuits? I mean, didn't they actually have a hand in killing all the local circuits?

Another thing I find interesting. We all know DCI does not seem to care about smaller, local corps. But I do not think it has ever been official. This pretty much makes it official. DCI is out of the business of ever promoting a grassroots campaign for building drum corps. That is the only reason I can figure out as to why they posted this on their web site.

DCI in their 5 year business plan did start to talk about the need to start more corps. With this idea, and DCI's backing, good things can come.

[kansasDC]

OK....but before we assemble the lynch mob:

1. Since it was a DCI.org news blast that got this thread started, it's kind of silly to suggest that DCI is "out of the business of ever promoting a grassroots campaign".

2. I was DCW rep to the Garden State Circuit when it elected to shut down operations again after the 2002 season. At that point, all the remaining organizations participating in the circuit were also involved in DCI division II/III and the Atlantic Division. Those five organizations chose to have the Atlantic Division manage their shows from 2003 forward. This option was entirely voluntary, arrived at by the directors of those five corps. There was no DCI representative in the meeting room.

Fact is, these corps directors did a lot of extra work to run an independent local circuit for as long as there were local corps (i.e. non-DCI corps) that needed it. Once there weren't, that extra work wasn't necessary anymore, so it ceased. Now, maybe there is interest in local corps again, and a circuit is being talked about....with DCI's blessing.

I know the DCI parade has stepped on some toes over the years, and there's certainly more to be said about how certain regional circuits were transitioned into DCI divisions....but honestly, I don't believe it has ever been part of the agenda of DCI or any of their members or staff to "kill" local circuits.

My Dad was the Executive Director of the Long Island Kingsmen for 18 years. Growing up in his house I learned a ton about what it took to run a drum corps and a drum corps circuit. Over the years, we were a member corps of the Sounds of Suffolk Circuit, the Long Island Circuit, the Greater New York Circuit, the Garden State Circuit, Eastern States Circuit, UOEC, DCE, and DCI. Almost all of these circuits had virtually no infrastructure at all, other than the "offices" of the member corps themselves (my corps' "office" was our family room at home ). The "budgets" were what the corps themselves provided, scheduling was accomplished by the Directors, and the "President" of the circuit was whichever corps' Director had not served their time in that role for a while. The circuit meetings were usually held at a local restaurant or the VFW/American Legion hall that sponsored one of the corps (some even happened in our living room!). Virtually all of the shows were sponsored by the corps themselves, which was normally a requirement of circuit membership. These circuits were truly "homegrown" and took nothing except the cooperation of the corps themselves to work. And they were the home to thousands of kids every summer for many years, myself included. The idea that a drum corps circuit (and the corps themselves) needs millions of dollars in the bank, a large office complex, and a fulltime staff of employees may be one of the things that killed so many of these corps and their circuits.

If anyone is interested in meeting in the central area of the country and discussing how we grow a local division of Drum Corps North America, I would love to be a part of this. I think KS, OK, NE, MO, etc. could absolutely use some local corps. There is no way these areas will ever be able to financially support a DCI-model corps right out of the gate.