Drum Corps International Inc.

Elite '09

544

907

Dave K.

Sunnyvale, CA

12/3/2007

Drum Corps International (DCI), formed in 1972, is the non-profit governing body operating the North American drum and bugle corps circuit for junior corps, whose members are between the ages of 13 and 22.  DCI consists of only a small full-time executive and administrative staff in Addison, Illinois. It was announced on August 8, 2006, that DCI headquarters would be relocating to Indianapolis, Indiana by 2008.

The primary purpose of DCI corps is their competitive summer tour, consisting of DCI-sanctioned competitions (known as the Summer Music Games) throughout the United States and Canada, culminating in August with the week-long DCI World Championships. Many other drum corps associations around the world are based upon DCI. It continues a tradition of exceptionally high-quality drum corps, with membership in the top corps highly sought after and extremely competitive, attracting the interest of potential members from many countries.

For 2008 and beyond, the classes have been renamed from Division I, II, and III to World, Open, and International.  Some people maintain that having a "major league" structure chokes out smaller corps.  This can be evidenced by the fact that with such demand of talent and large budgets (for a non-profit), the elite corps tend to stay at the top and only after years if not decades can a younger corp reach the upper echelon.  At the same time, it can be said that those top 12 corps produce some of the most amazing and spectacular performances.

DCI has done a great job of marketing and evangelizing drum corps.  It is still a very esoteric and exclusive phenomenon, but the attendance has increased over the years and thanks to events like Classic Countdown, Blast!, and the airing of the World Championships on ESPN2 the past two summers, drum corps is slowly gathering a following outside of the die hards and the corp alum.

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