Friday, July 17, 2009

Spectacular!

Hey everyone, I wanted to post something that happened to my drum corps last Saturday.  I'm copying and pasting our public relations person's forum post here:

The Vigilantes will hit the field for the first time this week.

After a handful of standstills, the field show will debut this Friday at day 2 of the DCI Dallas show. The corps will have a long Saturday rehearsal and a second opportunity to perform Sunday evening at the DCI show in Denton. The corps is excited to get it all on the field and in front of some rather large crowds (Dallas is usually 15,000, Denton 20,000). Due to circumstances beyond the corps control, no scores will be announced. 

Last weekend was what Vigilantes affectionately call a power weekend. The corps rehearsed from 9-9 on both Saturday and Sunday with high temperatures of 103 and 104 per the weather reports. There was good news and a fun break during the Saturday lunch break.

The corps has been talking with a new fast food chain that is moving it's headquarters to the area. The grant process has been encouraging. A few members of the management team decided to eat at one of the restaurants for lunch, talk with the store manager, and develop some local lines of communication. As fate would have it, the corporate marketing director was to visit that store during the visit. So, the fund raising guru asked to talk with her when she arrived. The marketing exec was there to film footage for internal corporate videos as well as commercials. During their discussion it came up that the drum corps was a few miles down the road and available to do some performing.

So calls were made to get the corps to the store quickly. Once at the store, Brass Caption head Mike Rossi taught the brass a quick arrangement of Michael Sembello's "Maniac." Paul Rennick and his crew drew up drum parts and Jenn Vaught taught some guard work. 15 minutes later cameras rolled! After playing that tune (it coincided with their email "club" that sends out coupons and promotions to loyal customers), the corps played the field show opener ("It Don't Mean a Thing (If Ain't Got That Swing).

The impromptu show was played in front of the restaurant. A good bit of a traffic jam was created as drivers passing by would stop to watch and listen. The marketing team loved that as they took the opportunity to hand out coupons for free meals. It was not planned at all, but it gave the corps some much needed exposure and a short break from the oppressive afternoon heat. The restaurant brought trays of food and drinks as well as providing T-shirts for every member of the corps. Once filming was complete, the marketing team was ecstatic. They were hoping to get some happy customers on film when they arrived, but got a live drum corps instead! Many had never seen one live and commented that they got goose bumps during loud volumes. 

The corps has been promised film once clean up is complete. The corps will share with the public when it becomes available! 

3 comments:

Brenda said...

very cool!

Bert Bananas said...

So when are you going to have the Corps over to the store?

Post a photo of you in the t-shirt!

vq said...

Way cool, Jenny!