The FloMarching team recently became aware of a feature story shared on St. Louis Public Radio by Visuals Editor Brian Munoz, and wanted to, in turn, share it with the FloMarching audience.

The story is called, "‘Broadway on a football field’: Drum corps blurs the lines of sport and art in Belleville" and takes the reader through the highs of a drum corps performance, both from a member perspective and a fan perspective. It also sheds some light on the historical significance of drum corps in the St. Louis area, and provides insight into the logistics of getting a drum corps through a summer tour. 

Fans are encouraged to check out the full story, which includes audio clips and photos, here!

Here's an excerpt:

The thick Midwestern heat and humidity hang in the air as more than 160 performers stand at attention on Pattonville High School's football field.

Instructions and feedback boom from the press box. A conductor echoes the calls. So do the members on the field. The clanging of a metronome cuts through the haze.

Then, a burst of motion.

An electronic whoosh. The rush of speeding feet. A surge of sound. Though the performers carry brass, drums and flags, this isn’t your typical school band.

This is drum corps — an elite and high-octane version of marching band that blends art and sport.

At its highest level, “marching music’s major league” is a multimillion-dollar activity that features college-age performers from around the world. They spend their summers traveling the country on buses, sleeping on gym floors and chasing a perfect 12-minute show — all for a shot at the world championship.

“It’s Broadway on a football field,” said Jim Sturgeon, a longtime judge with Drum Corps International, the nonprofit that oversees the activity’s competitive circuit. “It has many of the same elements. It can have colors. It can have different costumes. It can have set pieces. It can have all of these things and lots of enrichment from a musical standpoint.”

The memorized shows can range thematically from straightforward, like the Santa Clara Vanguard’s 2013 interpretation of Les Misérables, to pushing the envelope, like the Bluecoats’ exploration of entropy in their 2024 world championship program “Change is Everything.”

The Boston Crusaders’ show this year is called “BOOM,” a retro-futuristic production exploring the conflict between innovative optimism and atomic-age fear.

“It’s not just marching band. It is something that transcends it so much,” said Jeffrey Turk, who is from Cape Girardeau and a color guard member with the Boston-based corps. “It's the reason why we spend all this money, go leave our homes for months at a time and go to who knows where — so we can do it over and over again. It’s because we love it.”