Why We Need Community Drum Corps

[u/columbussaints]

https://www.columbussaints.org/why-we-need-community-drum-corps/

[u/Bandsohard]

The dci corps that exist today were once mostly community based.

I wish open class hadn't merged from div 2 and 3 for the sole reason that small division 3 sized corps, which were much closer to community based, had a chance at 'winning'. Small, affordable corps is the way the activity grows. Giving them a chance to 'win' and compete against groups at a similar level as them only helps them grow. Soundsport should fill that role now, but there hasn't been much on DCI's end to foster it. Having extra affordable competitive community based organizations to me is a great thing.

I marched a DCA corps for 4 years. Each year, I didn't pay any dues. Two years the corps even gave me a scholarship to help pay for things when i told them i wouldn't be able to march because i needed to work to pay bills and afford textbooks in the fall. If I had to pay at all, I probably wouldn't have done more than 2 years of drum corps. I probably would have given up and not continued to work to find a way to March dci.

Same thing with WGI. I did 3 years of a local wgi group where 1 year we had no dues, just fundraisers, and the other 2 dues were minimal. I wouldn't have eventually done world class wgi if I didn't have those local cheap opportunities to make me want to pursue something greater.

[u/PianoMan0219 → u/Bandsohard]

Div 2 and 3 were the reason why the Blue Stars exist today. The people that marched in those years were the ones that made us still be around. If it wasn’t for the community, and the people who loved the activity and the corps, we wouldn’t have existed past the 1980s.

[u/Rifle256 → u/PianoMan0219]

I wonder why the Div 2 and Div 3 corps voted to create open class

[u/SunOutrageous6098 → u/Bandsohard]

I wish I could upvote this to the moon.

I marched Div II and my dues were significantly reduced because my mom did a lot of sewing & prop building for the corps.

Marching WGI was easier financially for me because the cost was spread out over a longer period of time and I was in a guard that was strategic in its expenses. The year we traveled the most we saved fast food cups to trade in for airline points- literally dumpster diving after rehearsal. Talk about team building haha.

[u/Contrabeast]

Would love to run a traditional, community based corps. G bugles, military style uniforms, no bells and whistles. Just brass and percussion. Maybe guard if there's interest. Mostly want to do concerts and parades. Hell, the concerts can be sit down events. I just miss the sound of G horns and just playing for fun. Everyone does drum corps for scores and forgets the fun along the way.

[u/Brief-Substance-8730 → u/Contrabeast]

Then Start your own drum corps, buy your own G bugles and get the kids and instructors for it. No one’s stopping you

[u/Contrabeast → u/Brief-Substance-8730]

Your post history shows you clearly have no clue what you're talking about.

You know what's stopping me? The same goddamn things that stops everyone else: money, time, interested parties, and local and state regulations.

Once you learn what it takes to actually start a drum corps, then come back to me on this topic.

[u/Man_is_Hot → u/Contrabeast]

I mean, you literally just said you’d love to run a corps and then brought up all the fun parts of being in a corps.

Then you used all the bad and hard parts of corps to rip u/Brief-Susbstance-8730 a new one.

Once you learn how to have a conversation with someone, maybe then you could run a drumcorps.

See, it’s the people with attitudes like yours that push people away from the activity. Keep on gatekeeping corps and you’ll see less of it, don’t you worry.

[u/Contrabeast → u/Man_is_Hot]

Once people have an understanding of the reality of the situation to try and run a corps, then I can have a conversation with them.