For the 11th consecutive year, Cory Coken of Noise Floor is the location audio mixer for Drum Corps International (DCI) competitions that began June 20 with the tour kickoff in Austin, Texas, and will end August 11-13 with the World Championships in Indianapolis.
Noise Floor is contracted by video production company Tom Blair, Inc. of Lake Zurich, whose big, 16-camera mobile production truck both tapes the colorful competitions and broadcasts them live.
Blair, then an editor, and Coken met years ago when both worked for the now-defunct and still lamented Avenue Editorial.
On July 30, the DCI Southeastern Championship round takes place in the Georgia Dome in Atlanta, noting that “this event is very tiny compared with the exhibitions in Austin and Indianapolis, which is their world series.”
Each Drum corps is composed of 200 talented youngsters, age 13 to 20, who play drums, horns and percussion. Unlike marching bands, there are no woodwind instruments.
Each year, drum corps come from across the globe to try out in Rosemont, The chosen few tour the U.S. all summer by bus, accompanied by trucks of tubas, snare drums, French horns, xylophones.
Coken says, “In Austin, it was 106 degrees, and the kids were marching all over in the heat.”
The drum corps play everything from Queen to Wagner to their own compositions. In Austin, one corps wore costumes and re-enacted scenes from The Bourne Identity.
Two of the bands that will compete in Indianapolis are from Illinois: The Cavaliers of Rosemont and the Phantom Regiment of Rockford.
Indianapolis ‘world series’ to employ some 35 mics
For the DCI World Championships with 24 competing bands next month, Coken will be joined by NoiseFloor partner/mixer Jamie Vanadia and possibly a third.
Coken will mix sound in 5:1 surround sound, from some 30 microphones placed throughout the field, mostly up in the air to capture the cheering crowd in the stands, announcers describing the show and judges evaluating the drum corps performances.
“I’ll record the corps directors’ commentary for the DVD, which tells the whole meaning of the show,” Coken says.
“The kids are fantastic,” Coken says of the band members. “They work hard to put this show together and are exciting to watch. They have a flair for acting, theatre and the stage. They are fun to be around.
“They make me wish I had listened to my mother and taken piano lessons,” he laughs.
