Drum and bugle corps to compete at Gateway High School
The 2019 Drum Corps International Summer Tour gets underway this week and once again there will be opportunities to see many elite corps at Pittsburgh area locations.
Innovations in Brass: Pittsburgh returns to Gateway High School’s Antimarino Stadium in Monroeville June 26 at 7:30 p.m. Last year’s event was held at Moon High School because of renovations at Gateway.
The Bluecoats of Canton, Ohio, who sponsor the show along with the Gateway band boosters, will be performing along with the Cadets of Allentown, Pa.; the Boston Crusaders of Boston; Spirit of Atlanta from Atlanta and Music City of Nashville, Tenn. The Bluecoats won the DCI World Championship in 2016 and the Cadets are 10-time world champions.
“It’s a tremendous honor for DCI and the Bluecoats to have chosen Gateway for this event,” said Gateway band director Jim Hoeltje. “As a teacher, it’s a tremendous opportunity to share this with our students. The Bluecoats will be at our stadium for two days (including an all-day rehearsal June 27) and that’s such a blessing for us.”
Five local residents are among many from the Pittsburgh area who will be on tour this summer.
Leonardo Capone, 21, is in his second season playing trumpet for the Bluecoats. His brother Tony, 19, is a first-year member in the front ensemble (also known as the pit) with the Cadets.
Both are from New Kensington and are Pittsburgh Central Catholic High School graduates. The Capones are the fourth generation of a family that has ties to drum corps as far back as the 1930s.
Leonardo just finished his junior year at Baldwin Wallace University and is majoring in music education. He will be student teaching at Avon Lake High School in Ohio in the fall.
When asked about the challenges of drum corps, Leonardo said, “The length of the season is 90 days straight, and we rehearse for around 10 hours a day. The level of athleticism that’s required for these long days is unparalleled to anything else I’ve seen.”
But he is eagerly awaiting the summer tour.
“I’m looking forward to spending it competing against my brother, who is marching with the Cadets.”
Tony, who will be a sophomore at John Carroll University and is majoring in psychology, was the percussion section leader at Central Catholic. Now he is following in his family’s footsteps.
“My parents being in drum corps definitely influenced how I found out about it and feel connected to it,” Tony said. “I’ve always liked the Cadets shows and the emotion that they put into their performances. I feel that they do that better than any other corps.”
In the front ensemble, he plays malletSTATION, a mallet keyboard controller that makes it possible to play marimba, vibraphone and xylophone parts through a laptop computer.
Springdale’s Connor Fitzgerald, 20, has returned for a third year in the Bluecoats’ color guard.
Fitzgerald said that learning new choreography daily during spring training is difficult but well worthwhile.
“I look forward to be performing in front of audiences all over the country and inspiring people just like I was inspired a few years ago,” Fitzgerald said.
Henry Yoho, 18 and a 2019 graduate of Mt. Lebanon High School, is in his first season as a tuba player with the Cadets. In high school band, he had played saxophone but learned to play tuba before his senior year.
After watching drum corps shows on YouTube, Yoho said he knew what he wanted to do.
“When I saw how much fun the performers had performing their show, that was when I decided that tuba looked the coolest and I wanted to switch to it and march someday,” said Yoho, who will be attending Duquesne University in the fall to study music performance.
Magnolia Krimm, a 2019 Gateway graduate, recently joined Spirit of Atlanta and will be an alternate in the color guard. Krimm, 17, was one of Gateway’s drum majors this past season and has been a member of Gateway’s color guard since sixth grade.
Krimm, who also plays various instruments, writes music and sings, plans to attend Community College of Allegheny County and Carlow University in the fall to become a perfusionist (a person who controls a heartlung machine during surgeries).
As an alternate in the color guard, she is aware she may not get the opportunity to perform.
“The experience of traveling will be a once in a lifetime opportunity,” Krimm said. “You get to be a part of this whole new family and meet so many different people and that will make it worth every step.”
DCI Premiere at theaters Thursday
The DCI Tour Premiere on Thursday at Ford Field in Detroit can be seen live at local Cinemark movie theaters at Monroeville Mall, Robinson, McCandless, Center and the SouthSide Works Cinema. The nationwide broadcast begins at 8:30 p.m.
In addition to the Bluecoats, Boston Crusaders and Cadets, other competitors will be Carolina Crown of Fort Mill, S.C., Phantom Regiment of Rockford, Ill., and Blue Stars of La Crosse, Wis.
Seven corps to compete at Elizabeth Forward
Another local show this season will be DCI Pittsburgh at 7 p.m. Aug. 4 at Elizabeth Forward High School Stadium in Elizabeth.
Hosted by the Elizabeth Forward Band Boosters, the competition includes the Blue Devils of Concord, Calif., Spirit of Atlanta, The Academy of Tempe, Ariz., Madison Scouts of Madison, Wis., Troopers of Casper, Wyo., Genesis of Austin, Texas, and Cascades of Seattle.
Tickets for the events at Gateway ($15-$35) and at Elizabeth Forward ($35) are available through the DCI box office at 1-317-275-1212 or www.dci.org. Tickets can be purchased at the gate, but prices increase the day of the event.