Competitive corps

When school got out for the summer, members of the Spokane Thunder drum and bugle corps didn’t kick back and relax. They practiced all day, every day, in the punishing sun for a week to get ready for a tour this week. The sun glinted off the silver horns as the students went through the same steps over and over, trying to stay perfectly in step and finish in the right position with their lines exactly straight. “Reset,” said instructor Eric Parker. “Let’s do it again with quality. Small, small errors like that on the line are going to look like huge, huge mistakes.”

Parker was a stickler for perfection, often asking students to move only half an inch to their left or right. The students must play while keeping an eye on the yard-line marks on the field to keep track of their position. “Watch the rotation,” Parker said. “Use your eyeballs. Don’t get there early.”

There are about 70 youths age 13-21 in the corps, almost all band students at local high schools. They play only drums and various brass instruments while marching through intricate patterns. “The kids that like to do this are kind of the best at their high school,” said choreographer Mark Staley. “The talent level we have here is really exciting.”

Despite the long days and hot weather, there was nearly perfect attendance during the weeklong rehearsal. “This is something the kids feel like doing,” said executive director Tony DeLateur. “Everybody is here because they want to be.”

No one complained about doing the same steps over and over again. Some would occasionally drop down and do push-ups without saying a word.

“If you mess up, you do push-ups,” explained horn player Katie Sieck, a senior at East Valley High School. Sieck said she didn’t mind giving up a chunk of her summer vacation to practice marching. “It’s just the camaraderie,” she said. “Everyone has to work together.”

“It’s harder,” said Danielle Stevens, a senior at Rogers High School. “It takes you to the next level. It’s rough, but it’s definitely going to be worth it.”

Spokane Thunder was formed March 1 after years of “kitchen table” discussions, said DeLateur. “It became obvious that both the time and the place were right for a drum and bugle corps,” he said.

When the group began practicing, they didn’t have uniforms or instruments to call their own. “We borrowed,” DeLateur said. “The kids were able to use their own horns and school horns. As we went along we were equipping ourselves on the run.”

The uniforms are now in and the horns were purchased, but some of the larger stationary drums in “the pit” are still borrowed. Jessie Labrie, a senior at East Valley High School, plays both the vibraphone and the chimes. “We all play a real big variety of instruments,” she said. “Nobody plays just one.”

Labrie started out her drumming career in the sixth grade on the snare drum. Then she discovered the vibraphone. “It’s got a very unique and jazzy sound,” she said. “It was also something different than what everybody else was doing.”

A drum and bugle corps is focused on competition. DeLateur heard from many people who said it wasn’t possible to get a new group ready for competition in only four months. But he and his staff of a dozen instructors didn’t listen.

When the word went out that Spokane Thunder was forming, the idea attracted a lot of interest. “I think we have kids from practically every high school in the area,” he said. Some decided the corps wasn’t for them. “Some kids took a look at it and jumped in with both feet.”

Students in the corps get a higher level of instruction than is available in most high school bands. That’s largely because there’s a tighter focus and a smaller instructor to student ratio. “We don’t have to play for pep rallies and basketball games,” DeLateur said. “A drum and bugle corps is for the youngster who sees the value of disciplined performance. A drum and bugle corps is not for the faint of heart.

“These kids do not deserve the name band nerd at all. These kids are tough. When it comes to music they take no prisoners.”

This is not the first time a drum and bugle corps has played in Spokane. The Percussion-naut Patriots was formed in 1961 by members of the West Valley High School drum section. The popular group won many awards before quitting competition in 1974. The Renaissance Drum and Bugle Corps enjoyed a brief run in the late 1970s before it, too, faded from existence.

Spokane Thunder is organized as a nonprofit and is largely supported by fees paid by members. They pay dues of $55 a month during the active season and a one-time fee of $50 for uniforms and instrument repair. They also pay a tour fee, which varies depending on how far they travel and for how long.

The group is allowed to have 135 members, so there’s still room to grow. There was no audition process this year, though that will likely change. But the corps will take youths of all skill levels. “We’ll teach them from the ground up,” DeLateur said. “Next year, we’ll have an entry level program.”

Spokane Thunder also has a military-style color guard that escorts the U.S. and Washington State flags with dummy ceremonial weapons. There wasn’t an instructor available to lead a more traditional color guard that includes colored flags as part of the marching performance, DeLateur said.

Still, he’s pleased that Spokane Thunder has come as far as it has in such a short time. “It’s something unique and we all need to have our heads examined for doing it,” he laughed.