Drum & Bugle Corps

Today was one of those days you will never find in junior corps. While all summer high school and college students are on tour, the luxury of having one sole job as a member is shockingly apparent. Members live together, eat together, and shower together every day for 3 months. However, when you are a member of an all-ages drum corps, this philosophy is only a saucepan of gravy on the backburner. Instead of the usual 8 AM bright and early report time for hornline members, we began lining football fields at 11. This change gave some flexibility for those with jobs, and ensured that if the members with full-time jobs couldn’t make it to rehearsal during our four hour block, they would be able to catch up fairly quickly, unlike a day that we rehearsed for seven plus hours. Read More

Lions and tigers and . . . hulu hoops?  Minnesota Brass’s Mad Circus will pull into town at Mendota Heights this Friday evening for one night only!  Don’t miss the 2015 edition of Sounds of Minnesota at Saint Thomas Academy. The show starts at 7 p.m. and gates open at 6:00 p.m.  Tickets are on sale now! Premium seats are available online in advance for $10; Standard seats are $10 at the gate. While children of all ages are welcome, only kids who are six and under will be admitted free.  For more information, call 651-717-4382. Proceeds from the show help support the Saint Thomas Academy Band Backers.

Sponsored by Minnesota Brass, Sounds of Minnesota will feature top all-age drum corps from Minnesota and Wisconsin, as well as other ensembles in exhibition. Each competing unit will perform a 15-minute field show and will be evaluated by a panel of judges.

Units appearing in competition include the Govenaires of St. Peter, Minn.; Chops Inc. of Minneapolis; the Kilties, from Racine, Wis.; and Minnesota Brass. Both Minnesota Brass and the Govenaires won the 2011 Drum Corps Associates (DCA) World Championships in their respective divisions. Preceding the competition will be performances by Minne-Brass, the small-corps ensemble of Minnesota Brass (and winners of DCA’s first mini-corps championship in 1999 and again in 2005) and a special exhibition from the Brian Boru Irish Pipe Band.

The host Minnesota Brass Drum and Bugle Corps was established in 1947. Since 2008, including the 2011 World Championship, the 120-member unit and has never placed lower than third among upwards of 20 competing units. The Sounds of Minnesota show will be the final chance to see Minnesota Brass perform in the Twin Cities before the corps heads to Rochester, N.Y., to compete in the 2015 DCA World Championships.

As the 2015 Drum Corps International World Championships get underway, Minnesota Brass would like to recognize one of our biggest groups of alumni  yet who perform in the corps competing this week in Indianapolis. Members include: Read More