ADDRESS:

An Expansion Plan for Drum Corps (Part I)

Dr. Richard Vincent Lamb

On Jul 25 of this year, Jay Wise and I had this to say in the thread Re: Nervous over falling
membership:

Jay: Based on the 49 open corps available in 1981, there were 674,102 available youths for each
corps. In 1995 that would be 1,229,652 available youths for each corps. Is this a shortage?

Vince: I think it's a shortage of Div. I corps. Gee, isn't that what you said was happening in the
first place?

Jay: There are plenty of available kids for drum corps, sans Vince's great research efforts. 28
million eligible kids means we ought to be able to find enough to stock 50 corps.

Vince: I agree! And then 50 Div. II corps and 100 Div. III corps. At least one Div. III corps in
every state (heh, even Nevada could stock 2-4, depending on whether ones could be started in
Carson City and Winnemucca) and the rest (plus Div. I and II) in the 150 most populous cities!
Then add Canada--5 more Div. 1 corps, 10 more Div. II corps and 20 more Div. III corps.
How's that for a vision of junior drum corps?

I thought very hard about that statement and wondered what the activity would look like if this
were true. I thought about how many corps there would be if there were a Div. III corps for
every 100,000 marching aged youth, a Div. II corps for every 250,000 marching-aged youth, and
a Div. I corps for every 500,000 marching-aged youth and the corps were spread evenly over the
United States and Canada. Here are the results. Numbers to the left of the slash are rounded
down, to the right rounded up.

TABLE 1. Marching-aged (14-21) population and possible corps for U.S. States and Canadian
Provinces for 1993 and actual corps for 1979, 1993, and 1996. Data from U.S. Bureau of the
Census (1995), Statistics Canada (1993), and Brian Tolzman (unpublished data).

Possible corps Actual

Marching-aged
State Population DIII DII DI Total 1979 1993 1996

Maine 130.7 1/1 0/1 0 1/2 2 0 0
New Hampshire 116.9 1/1 0 0 1/1 4 2 1
Vermont 63.8 0/1 0 0 1/1 0 0 0
Massachussetts 603.8 6/6 2/2 1/1 9/9 36 13 13
Rhode Island 104.0 1/1 0 0 1/1 2 0 0
Connecticut 315.1 3/3 1/1 0/1 4/5 6 0 0
New York 1843.7 18/18 7/7 3/4 28/29 32 6 8
New Jersey 757.0 7/8 3/3 1/2 11/13 20 6 7
Pennsylvania 1220.0 12/12 4/5 2/2 18/19 8 5 5
Ohio 1191.8 11/12 4/5 2/2 17/19 4 3 5
Indiana 636.6 6/6 2/3 1/1 9/10 1 1 0
Illinois 1242.5 12/12 4/5 2/2 19/20 17 7 5
Michigan 1042.8 10/10 4/4 2/2 16/16 3 3 2
Wisconsin 550.6 5/6 2/2 1/1 8/9 14 10 9
Minnesota 539.6 5/5 5/5 1/1 8/8 3 0 0
Iowa 308.0 3/3 1/1 0/1 4/5 4 3 4
Missouri 558.4 5/6 2/2 1/1 8/9 1 2 2
North Dakota 72.6 0/1 0 0 0/1 0 0 1
South Dakota 81.5 0/1 0 0 0/1 0 0 0
Nebraska 178.2 1/2 0/1 0 1/3 1 2 0
Kansas 279.5 2/3 1/1 0/1 3/5 3 0 1
Delaware 73.6 0/1 0 0 0/1 0 0 1
Maryland 494.0 4/5 1/2 0/1 5/8 0 0 0
Washington DC 56.1 0/1 0 0 0/1 0 0 0
Virginia 690.7 6/7 2/3 1/1 9/11 0 0 0
W. Virginia 199.5 1/2 0/1 0 1/3 0 0 0
No. Carolina 754.5 7/8 3/3 1/2 11/13 0 1 2
So. Carolina 414.8 4/4 1/2 0/2 5/7 0 0 0
Georgia 774.2 7/8 3/3 1/2 11/13 1 1 1
Florida 1207.4 12/12 4/5 2/2 17/18 4 2 1
Kentucky 423.3 4/4 1/2 0/1 5/7 1 0 0
Tennessee 548.5 5/5 2/2 1/1 8/8 0 0 0
Alabama 469.4 4/5 1/2 0/1 5/8 0 1 1
Mississippi 323.6 3/3 1/1 0/1 4/5 0 0 0
Arkansas 267.2 2/3 1/1 0/1 3/5 0 1 0
Louisiana 507.4 5/5 2/2 1/1 8/8 2 0 0
Oklahoma 362.6 3/4 1/1 0/1 4/6 0 1 0
Texas 2082.9 20/21 8/8 4/4 32/33 0 2 1
Montana 92.1 0/1 0 0 0/1 0 0 0
Idaho 133.6 1/1 0/1 0 1/2 0 0 0
Wyoming 56.1 0/1 0 0 0/1 1 1 1
Colorado 380.6 3/4 1/2 0/1 4/7 0 1 1
New Mexico 185.4 1/2 0/1 0 1/3 0 0 0
Arizona 425.5 4/4 1/2 0/1 5/7 0 0 0
Utah 262.3 2/3 1/1 0/1 3/5 0 0 0
Nevada 134.8 1/1 0/1 0 1/2 0 0 0
Washington 554.1 5/6 2/2 1/1 8/9 6 2 1
Oregon 315.6 3/3 1/1 0/1 4/5 1 0 0
California 3341.5 33/33 13/13 6/7 52/53 9 11 12
Brit. Columbia 363.6 3/4 1/1 0/1 4/6 1 0 0
Alberta 301.4 3/3 1/1 0/1 4/5 4 2 2
Saskachewan 117.5 1/1 0 0 1/1 0 0 0
Manitoba 127.2 1/1 0/1 0 1/2 0 0 0
Ontario 1137.8 11/11 4/5 2/2 17/18 21 17 11
Quebec 762.0 7/8 3/3 1/2 11/13 33 20 18
New Brunswick 90.8 0/1 0 0 0/1 0 0 0
Nova Scotia 104.6 1/1 0 0 1/1 0 0 0
Newfoundland 80.6 0/1 0 0 0/1 0 0 0
Total 30,113.9 277/306 99/118 37/60 413/484 246 127 116

Statistics Canada, Demography Division. Annual Demographic Statistics, 1993. (Catalogue
91-213).

U. S. Bureau of the Census. 1995. Statistical Abstract of the United States. (115th Edition).

I shall describe what kind of activity junior drum corps can be if it actually reaches these
numbers.

As part of last year's symposium, I did a study of the correlation between the numbers of
marching-aged youth in the United States from 1979 to 1995 and the numbers of junior drum
corps. I then looked at the Census Bureau data and projected what the marching-aged
population would be in 2000 and 2005. As a reminder, here is what I wrote:

"I described how the marching aged population fell from its high of 34,116,000 in 1979 to a 30
year low of 27,568,000 by 1993, a drop of 6,548,000 (19%) during 14 years. This population
loss correlated with the decline of open class corps from more than 50 competing at DCI prelims
during the late 1970s to only 20 at Preview of Champions prelims this year (1995)."

Looking at the birth data and population projections, I then wrote:

"These same data give hope, though. Starting in 1980, births rose to more than 3.5 million. In
1985, births reached 3.75 million. Finally, in 1989, they regained their Baby Boom levels of 4+
million a year (Table 1). The Census Bureau predicts that this will result in a dramatic rise in
first 14-17 year olds and then 18-21 year olds during the next decade. The projection is for high
school aged people to reach 1980 levels (and 14-21 year olds to be at 1985 levels) by 2000 and
for the marching age population as a whole to regain its 1980 size by 2005.

The projections are for 16,045,000 14-17 year olds, 14,883,000 18-21 year olds, and 30,928,000
14-21 year olds. The U.S. currently has 14,591,000 14-17 year olds, 13,691,000 18-21 year olds,
and 28,282,000 14-21 year olds. That means 1,454,000 more 14-21 year olds, 1,192,000 more
18-21 year olds, and 2,646,000 more members of the marching-aged population.

The projections are for 17,333,000 14-17 year olds, 16,366,000 18-21 year olds, and 33,699,000
14-21 year olds. That means 2,742,000 more 14-21 year olds, 2,675,000 more 18-21 year olds,
and 5,417,000 more members of the marching-aged population than today--a 19% rise in 10
years!

The next decade has the potential to be a great one for drum corps if we can survive the present
crisis."

IMO, the activity seems to be stabilizing after a long period of decline. Brian Tolzmann, a Drum
Corps World Writer who runs the Drum Corps Information Archives (and whose data I am using
for this paper--thank you, Brian!), has recorded an increase from a record low of 108 corps on
the field in North America during 1995 to 116 during 1996. Furthermore, this past year, there
seem to have been more announcements of new corps starting on RAMD than ever before. I am
not the only one to notice this. Levi Boldt wrote in article
<3289A42E.517D@pilot.msu.edu>: "this is the first year in quite a while that I've counted more
new corps being formed than old corps folding (only one!)."

However, the population projections alone do not guarantee a rosy future. Back to what I said in
the conclusion of that part of my paper last year:

"This assumes that the upcoming generation (the Echo or Millennial Generation) and their
parents (mostly Baby Boomers) will be interested in drum corps. If not, the activity is in real
trouble. Unfortunately, I think that the way the activity is currently structured and how Echo kids
and Boomer parents will perceive it will make it unpalatable for many, keeping drum corps from
realizing its potential. I shall explain why I think this to be so and what drum corps can do about
it in my next post."

And here is what I said in "my next post"--part 2 of my paper from last year:

"If competition and entertainment for a national audience remain drum corps' emphasis, then the
activity will wither away. Parents of the next generation of potential marching members will not
want to see their children traipsing about the continent pursuing an activity that is purely
oriented towards enterainment and competition. If it has no higher purpose and contributes
nothing to rebuilding the sense of community that they feel has been lost, then they would want
nothing to do with it."

I expanded on this in an email last year, in which I wrote:

"Again, I go back to Jay Wise. He wonders why a local group of supporters should fund a corps
*not* composed mostly of local kids, but instead largely filled with a selection of collegians
from around the country. A national talent pool makes the corps great competitors and
(potentially) entertainers (and provides a safe, if expensive, way for the members to live out the
modern version of the fantasy of running away to join the circus :-), but does next to nothing as
far as returning the host community's investment back to the community as better local youth.
Hell, big time college athletics gives back more to the university community--for state colleges,
more of the athletes are probably from in-state than in, say, the Cadets, and the revenue and
pride go to the entire university community."

"Jay also thinks the activity has priced itself out of the "youth activity" business. At the elite
level, it no longer seems to be interested in serving the community's interests in youth. Instead,
it serves youth's own interest in competitiveness, performance, and comeraderie. Stuart might
even say it exploits these youthful desires. I might even agree. :-) It certainly isn't about saving
poor youth from their environments, although it might incidentally save middle class youth from
themselves by keeping them busy and tired! :->"

The above pretty much summarizes what I think the structural problems of the activity are. In
my paper, my prescription for the activity for the ills of the activity was:

"Now think about the discipline and motivation to work for a common goal that drum corps
teaches. If drum corps could sell *that*, along with gearing the activity to local and community
goals, drum corps will thrive."

And I ended with a call for action:

"Here's a final thought for you. When I aged out in 1981, everyone who marched on the field at
finals this past August had already been born. As of this writing, everyone aged 14-21 in *2009*
has already been born. Make sure we plan for them better than we did planning for today's
marchers in 1981. I want there to be an activity there for them if they want it."

And there I left it. I was unable to connect demographic trends with my ideas for a more locally
based activity until Jeff Wise posted his gRAMDie-winning post "Found your own drum corps!"
that I began to connect the two. Repeated constructive criticism from his brother Jay shaped my
ideas. The following, which I posted yesterday, was the final inspiration for this article:

On Jul 25 of this year, Jay Wise and I had this to say in the thread Re: Nervous over falling
membership:
Jay: Based on the 49 open corps available in 1981, there were 674,102 available youths for each
corps. In 1995 that would be 1,229,652 available youths for each corps. Is this a shortage?

Vince: I think it's a shortage of Div. I corps. Gee, isn't that what you said was happening in the
first place?

Jay: There are plenty of available kids for drum corps, sans Vince's great research efforts. 28
million eligible kids means we ought to be able to find enough to stock 50 corps.

This certainly seems like more of a vision for the activity as national youth activity (instead of a
national entertainment activity, as I've seen the competing school of visionaries on this
newsgroup), than anything else I've seen. Drum Corps has been through a very long period of
contraction where its priority has been mere survival and has adjusted its structure accordingly.
It has apparently not thought seriously about what would happen if conditions changed to allow
expansion. Time to do that kind of thinking has arrived.

As Levi Boldt also wrote: "Let's help the activity grow in numbers, not kill off more corps."

And *that* is the reason for this paper and this symposium!

As I wrote yesterday about the vision of how large the activity could be:

"I thought very hard about that statement and wondered what the activity would look like if this
were true. I thought about how many corps there would be if there were a Div. III corps for
every 100,000 marching aged youth, a Div. II corps for every 250,000 marching-aged youth, and
a Div. I corps for every 500,000 marching-aged youth, and the corps were spread evenly over the
United States and Canada."

Given 30,114,000 marching-aged youth in the U.S. and Canada in 1993 (U.S. Census Bureau,
1995; Statistics Canada, 1993--Canadian statistics provided by Whitney Densmore, voted most
helpful :-), that would result in 301 Div. III corps, 120 Div. II corps, and 60 Div. I corps for a
total of 481 corps. Despite first appearances, this is not an unreasonable goal. First, the activity
was able to support more than 400 corps in the early 70s (420 in 1972, Brian Tolzmann, personal
communication). Second, even if all corps were full (DIII at 60, DII at 90, and DI at 128) this
would be only 36,540 youth involved continent-wide in the activity. This is only slightly more
than one-tenth of one percent of all marching-aged youth in the U.S. and Canada! Compared to
Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts that same year, this is nothing--they had combined youth
memberships of 6,778,000 that same year in the U.S. alone (U.S. Census Bureau,
1995--information pointed out by Whitney Densmore, the most helpful person on RAMD :-)

Table 1 shows the results of this. Population is in thousands. The numbers to the left of the slash
under each column show how many corps each state would have if the number of marching-aged
youth as divided by 100,000 for Div. III corps, 250,000 for Div. II corps and 500,000 for every
Div. I corps and the result were rounded down. The numbers to the right of the slash give the
numbers of corps if the results were rounded to the nearest whole number.

For comparison, the table also includes the number of active junior corps on the field (both
competitive and exhibition) in each state and province as compiled by Brian Tolzmann from
Drum Corps World and Drum Corps News...

The first estimate gives 277 Div. III, 99 Div. II, 37 Div. I, and 413 total corps. The second
estimate gives 306 Div. III, 118 Div. II, 60 Div. I and 484 total corps. The second estimate is
much closer to that from the total population of the continent for 1979 (the year of peak
marching-aged population), 1993 (the year to which these data apply), and 1996 (last year). It
also includes the number of corps in each state and province. Note that Massachussetts and
Wisconsin support as many or more corps as predicted from the second estimate and that Iowa
supports as many as predicted from the first estimate. These goals can be met!

Here is what I think the activity would look like if it were structured geographically according to
the table above.

First, it would bring the supply to where the demand is. There are *lots* of people marching in
the big name corps (this includes Troopers) who are from areas where there are no corps. True,
the new corps would never get the people now marching in those corps to march in the new local
corps, but the out-of-staters show that the demand is there. If we agree that drum corps is good
for youth (and I'm sure that most of us reading this are!), then we should be interested in
bringing the activity to youth, not making youth make great sacrifices to come to corps (beyond
the "blood, sweat, and tears" that are inherent in the activity).

Second, it would move the focus of the activity back down to the local level. Throughout most
of the continent, corps would be within reasonable one-day drives of each other for shows (so
long as corps are sponsoring shows). There would also be enough drum corps within a state that
they could compete against each other and still have a worthwhile season (and not bust
themselves financially). In other words, the establishment of a staple of pre-DCI drum
corps--the local/state circuit. I'll present a case study--Utah.

According to the table, if Utah supported corps at the same level that Wisconsin does, it could
have 5 drum corps, 1 D1, 1 D2, and 3 D3. Let's place these corps in the major population
centers--The D1 in Salt Lake City, the D2 in Logan, and a D3 each in Provo, Cedar City/St.
George, and either as a feeder in SLC to the D1 corps or in the rapidly developing Park City area
to the east. Here's how a season might work out:

Third Saturday in June: Exhibition/Evaluation--SLC
Last Saturday in June: Cedar City/St. George
July 4th: Parades and exhibitions
1st Saturday in July: Provo
2nd Saturday in July: Ogden
3rd Saturday in July: Park City
4th Saturday in July: State Championship--SLC

And then the corps that wanted to could travel on the DCI tour for August. Those that wanted to
go during the week or on Sunday to DCWest contests could do so. Those that wanted to stay
home would be able to do so knowing that they had provided a good summer of activity and
education for their members. All kinds of involvement in drum corps would be rewarded and
not going to DCI would not be considered a kind of failure.

Other kinds of schedules are possible, such as two shows a weekend for the last week of June
and the first week of July, then a break for a DCW tour, then State Championships, and then a
DCI tour for those so inclined.

Third, local competition and weekend shows would allow for a weekend, part-time activity
continent-wide for most participants. This is the condition in the Garden State Circuit, which
shows that this kind of activity is not only still possible, but worthwhile and capable of
producing good competitors, such as Jersey Surf and the Bayonne Raiders. This would
*increase* the number of youth available to march.

Fourth, it would give local communities a stake in the success of the organizations. If most or
all of the members of a corps live within a half hour of the corps hall/host town, then the people
in the community would not only know the corps, but likely know someone in the corps
personally. This would make them more likely to go to shows, go to fundraisers (other than
bingo or corps-run businesses), and be supportive of corps members (and their parents')
sacrifices to march. Corps could become (as Troopers once were) a source of civic pride.

Fifth, after an initial increase in price from increased demand, it would start to drive down the
costs of equipment (particularly G bugles), from economies in scale and competition between
companies to serve the market. Anyone who marched during the late 70s remembers that several
companies manufactured bugles. Now there's just DEG and Kanstul. Revival of healthy
competition would increase quality of horns and decrease prices (or at least keep them down). It
works--look at the American auto industry once it responded to the Japanese!

Finally, it would improve the market for drum corps even more than any change brought about
by a "new (performance) paradigm"--increasing the audience by increasing involvement of the
community should go a lot farther than tinkering with the product *on the field*. The activity
has seen all kinds of changes *on the field* that have changed the shows--not for the better in all
cases, either. What needs to help junior drum corps has to take place *off* the field.

A final piece of advice. Bill Cook has told you what you need to do to run a drum corps. It's
good advice. Here's mine:

Don't start a corps. Start a circuit. Several corps (Chesapeake comes to mind, but others also)
have foundered in part because they were founded at the geographic edges of the activity and
had to travel long distances for all their shows. This is because people are trying to integrate the
corps by founding what they hope would be the next big corps (one of the ones under the DI
column above) in isolation and then trying to integrate it into a system for the big corps in the
major regions. Instead, find someone far enough away from you (say 45 minutes to 1.5 hours
drive) who is also interested in founding a drum corps. This makes you far enough away that
you won't compete for members and funding, but close enough that you can go there and back on
a Saturday afternoon. Then do this until you have a network of corps. Then you'll have a circuit.

Stay local--don't shoot for DCI. Look at the success of Pacific Crest. They are growing within
their means and will appear on the national scene when they are ready. Make the circuit you've
helped found a worthwhile endevour.

Stay small. Not everyone is going to be the next big Div. I corps This is much more efficient for
providing services to local youth and will keep you from going bankrupt.

REFERENCES

Statistics Canada, Demography Division. Annual Demographic Statistics, 1993. (Catalogue
91-213).

U. S. Bureau of the Census. 1995. Statistical Abstract of the United States. (115th Edition).

Source: geocities.com/marchingresearch