| Location | Madison, Wisconsin |
|---|---|
| Division | World Class |
| Founded | 1938 |
| Executive Director | Chris Komnick |
| Corps Director | Dann Petersen |
| Championship Titles | 1975, 1988 |
| Uniform | Dark green, short sleeved shirts resembling those of Boy Scouts uniforms. White neckerchiefs, maroon sashes, and white chords on the shirts. Dark green pants / dress shoes and the traditional white Aussie hats complete the uniform as of 2010. |
The Madison Scouts Drum and Bugle Corps is a summer youth drum corps based in Madison, Wisconsin that competes in the Drum Corps International (DCI) circuit. Founded in 1938, it is the third oldest corps in the DCI circuit, after the Cadets, and the Racine Scouts, founded in 1934 and 1927, respectively. The corps is one of two remaining all-male corps, the other being The Cavaliers. The Madison Scouts Drum and Bugle Corps belongs to the Madison Drum and Bugle Corps Association umbrella organization.
Being of Boy Scout origin, the corps symbol is the fleur-de-lis. The members of the corps were registered with the Glacier's Edge Council of the Boy Scouts of America as Venturers.
The Madison Scouts chose to let their charter with Glacier's Edge Council expire in June 2011 and are no longer registered in or covered by the Council as Venture Scouts.
The corps song of the Madison Scouts is "You'll Never Walk Alone".
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The Madison Scouts Drum and Bugle Corps was founded in 1938 after a group of Madison businessmen saw the Racine Scouts Drum and Bugle Corps perform and thought that Madison should have its very own Boy Scout drum and bugle corps.[1] Clarence H. Beebe led as executive director soon after the corps was conceived and continued in that position until his death in 1968.[1]
In 1951, the corps split into the Madison Explorer Scouts and the Madison Junior Scouts, with the Junior corps serving as a feeder group for the Explorer corps. The Explorers were the first recognized musical post in the Boy Scouts of America and evolved into the current-day Madison Scouts. In 1995, the Juniors merged with the Capitolaires Drum and Bugle Corps (an all-female corps) to form the Capital Sound Drum and Bugle Corps.[2]
In the early 1960s, corps members Rich and Dennis Stone, with the assistance of color guard instructor John Price, designed a flag to be used to represent the corps' home city of Madison as the corps toured throughout the Midwest and the rest of the country. In a resolution dated 12 April 1962, the City Council officially adopted the design as the flag of the city of Madison. To this day, the flag may be seen flying by such places as the city municipal building, Monona Terrace, or the State Capitol. In commemoration of the seventieth anniversary of the corps and the forty-fifth anniversary of the flag's adoption, the city presented a copy of the flag to the corps in 2007, which has traveled throughout the country with the corps ever since.
The corps is a founding member of Drum Corps International. During the 1971 season, both the Explorers and Chicago Cavaliers (now The Cavaliers) performed shows that pushed the envelope of creativity.[3] The American Legion and Veterans of Foreign Wars (VFW) circuits imposed strict rules on competition in which no participating corps had a say. To overcome this, several youth corps, including the Madison Scouts, banded together to form DCI.[4] The first DCI world championships were held in 1972 in Whitewater, Wisconsin's Perkins Stadium.[5] From 2003 to 2006, the corps has begun every summer by learning the show on the campus of the University of Wisconsin–Whitewater and performing its dress rehearsal in Perkins Stadium before going on its national tour. During the time between the 2009 and 2010 seasons the corps hired the help of Jim Mason, the founder of Star of Indiana and Blast!, as the program coordinator for the 2010 season. He enlisted many of his former colleagues to be on the instructional team for the Madison Scouts. The corps now rehearses at the former Star Hall outside of Bloomington Indiana.
The corps employed the use of a single female in the color guard in 1971 and in 2005 for the roles of Alice (Alice in Wonderland) and Carmen, respectively. Neither female was admitted to the corps as a member.
The corps was DCI World Champion in 1975 and 1988. In addition, it placed second in 1974 and 1976 and third in 1981.[6]
The corps used a female to play the role of Alice from Alice in Wonderland in its field show. It placed 10th in the VFW Nationals with a score of 84.85.
The corps won its first DCI championship with a score of 92.50 after narrowly missing it in the 1974 season. They edged out The Santa Clara Vanguard by 1.5 points, after missing the title by .65 of a point to Santa Clara in 1974. With a score of 92.50 the Scouts 1975 show was the first to break the "90" barrier in Drum Corps International history as well as being the highest score as of 1975. In 2005, the 1975 Madison Scouts performance was voted as one of the shows to appear in the DCI Classic Countdown, a film of the top twelve shows of all time, with one show for each corps.
The Scouts won their second DCI championship with a score of 97.10, beating the undefeated Blue Devils and edging out the Santa Clara Vanguard by two-tenths of a point. After spending several weeks of the summer touring Europe as part of their 50th anniversary celebration, the corps entered the DCI Championships as a dark horse. The finals followed a unique preliminary competition that included undisclosed scores and placings. The last half of the show was Malagueña, a corps classic. This show was selected by fans for the second Classic Countdown in 2006.
The corps performed "A Drum Corps Fan's Dream: A Day in the Life of a Bull Fighter", placing 4th with a score of 95.40. The closing was Málaga, a corps classic. This show was picked for the third DCI Classic Countdown.
The corps, following their performance from the previous year, played a show entitled A Drum Corps Fan's Dream: Part Dos.
Near the end of the finals performance, the drum major picked up a camera, turned around and took a picture of the audience. The same move had first been made by a Madison drum major, to close out his 8th season in 1980 in Birmingham, Alabama. The corps placed 5th with a score of 93.90 and an entitled "The Pirates of Lake Mendota". (Lake Mendota is one of the lakes on which the city of Madison was founded.)
The corps performed a show based on the music of Andrew Lloyd Webber's Jesus Christ Superstar and finished in 6th place with a score of 93.40. This show had the biggest crowd reaction of any Madison Show in history.
With a program entitled "Conquest", the corps placed 14th in the semifinals with a score of 84.85 and did not advance to finals. This was only the second time since the inception of DCI that the corps did not make it to the World Championship finals, the first time being 30 years earlier at the first DCI, when the corps also placed 14th.
The all-male corps featured a female in its field show for the second time in its history, with the guest performer portraying the role of Carmen from the opera of the same name. The show was entitled "The Carmen Project", and featured the music of West Side Story, in addition to that of Georges Bizet. The corps climbed to 6th place and had a score of 92.625.
2007 brought another staff change for the Scouts, including the second director in four years. Madison's season started out roughly, with only a single DCI Division I corps not having posted a higher score than the Scouts. In response, the corps' field show was completely rewritten in midseason, and they rebounded to achieve 15th place at the semifinals, their lowest placement ever at semifinals and the third time the corps did not advance to finals. The program was entitled "Unbound" and included the music of Led Zeppelin's Kashmir, Alanis Morissette's Uninvited, the "Pie Jesu" and "Agnus Dei" movements of Gabriel Fauré's Requiem Mass, Astor Piazolla's "Libertango", and El Tango de Roxanne, from the movie Moulin Rouge!. Post season saw another change in staff of the Madison Scouts. The brought in famous names in the Marching Industry from the West Coast including Ramiro Barrera, Vince Oliver, and Ken Karlin as the new Design Team.
2008 saw a return to the World Championship finals for the Madison Scouts. Although the corps struggled early on in the season, placing as low as 18th place, it came from behind to capture 12th place by the end of the season. The program "La Noche de la Iguana" featured music celebrating Latin American culture. During the post-season, the Madison Scouts had another change in the staff. The design team looked out west for a different visual staff to complement the strong brass finish that the Scouts had enjoyed in '08. They brought in Neil Adkison from the west coast along with many talented instructors from the west coast.
In 2009 the Madison Scouts performed a classic Latin show, with a musical program called Relámpago. The repertoire was:
The show was about the life of a Mexican superhero named Relámpago. The Scouts ended in 15th place at Drum Corps International semi-finals at Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis, Indiana. The Scouts again made a push through the season starting as low as 19th place. Near the end of the season the Madison Scouts once again had design problems, and the board once again decided on a new direction on design.
In the 2009 off-season, the Madison Scouts hired a new distinguished design team. The team included: James Mason, Donnie VanDoren, Jim Prime, Thom Hannum, John Vanderkoff, Jeff Lee and Jim Moore. The design team have all worked together in the M.E.G. (Mason Entertainment Group) corporation and have achieve great success with Blast!, Shockwave, Star of Indiana, Carolina Crown Drum and Bugle Corps, and The Blue Stars Drum and Bugle Corps. The corps' 2010 musical program did not have a title and included Gershwin's "Rhapsody in Blue" and "Slaughter on Tenth Avenue" from the musical On Your Toes. The Madison Scouts once again defied the odds and made the step from 15th to 10th. According to many people in the Drum Corps community this is "the best Madison we've seen in a decade.
The Scouts' 2011 show was entitled "New York Morning". Repertoire included "New York, New York", "Oh What a Beautiful Morning", "Beautiful Morning", "Requiem", and "Empire State of Mind". The show remembered the tragic event of 9/11. It payed homage to those who died in the event. At the Drum Corps International World Championships, they placed 10th with a score of 88.550.
The Scouts ended the season with a 10th place finish at the DCI World Championships.
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