Surprise – no biking this weekend! John’s birthday is this week and to celebrate, his request was to go see the Drum Corps International show in Allentown.
It was about a 4-1/2 hour drive down there. We checked into our hotel and then went over to the stadium. Holy crow was it crowded! You all know I am not the biggest fan of crowds, too.
This show was on for 2 nights since there were so many groups and we still saw 12 bands play! Each band does a 13 minute show. One thing that the punctual person in me totally appreciated was how the bands got on and off within a couple minutes, even with all of their stuff. The show stayed right on track for the times of the performances, which was great. Very fast paced.
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I just did a few snippets of video just to give you an idea, but don’t want to broadcast a lot of their stuff since they are in competition. Big ending from an early band:
There were lots of different themes going on. One group did a Game of Thrones theme.
I loved the colors and the costumes. Watch the rifles being thrown in this one (it comes into focus shortly)
The better bands were in the second half and wow – were they good! My only beef was that a lot of the groups had someone singing, which is okay, but seems weird for drum corps. I guess they have to try to do different things. It’s amazing to me how they can run around the field and dance and still be able to play:
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This group actually used real horns instead of marching horns on a stage for part of their number, and that was my instrument – so that earned brownie points from me 😀
Really good show. Long, but good.
On Sunday, we headed home after finding a local coffee shop for breakfast!
Not sure who the cartel is, but the coffee was good 😉
We hit up a really big antique shop which was fun to browse in, but I didn’t get anything.
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We also stopped and visited my uncle and his wife in Pennsylvania since it was sort of on the way home. We had lunch there and a nice visit. It was great to be able to get a chance to do that. We managed to squish a lot into about 36 hours LOL!
Now if they would just use woodwinds:). Sounds like a fun weekend. Happy Birthday, John.
SO SO SO FUN.
I grew up watching them as well.
My parents are huge fans.
Watching those videos brought me back to sitting in the stands, watching my son perform with his HS marching band. Ahh, memories! 🙂
What fun Lori!!!! Glad you had a nice get away!
Love that you guys got out of town for fun and got to catch up with relatives – win/win!
Gosh Lori that brought back memories of attending marching band competitions with my daughter in highschool…fond memories! Thanks for that! Your chair looks terriffic! I would have to doodle something on that chair back…. all the white just calls for it. 🙂 Hugs! deb
What a fun event!!!!
Oh how cool! We don’t have showbands like that here, I think there are a few but not enough to fill a whole evening (or 2).
Looks like you had a great trip!