After nearly a year of planning and collaboration, the Crossmen transition to independence from Youth Education in the Arts is taking clear shape, including the construction of a new Web site that will be available soon. Members, fans and friends of the corps should stay tuned for an new Web address announcement, according to Crossmen Director Mark Chambers.

The elections for a new Drum Corps United Kingdom board will take place at the DCUK Championships next month. Forms have been distributed to members corps for nominations for the DCUK board for the coming 12 months.

The draw for the DCE Championships prelims will take place coming Saturday 18th August. Lots will be drawn to determine the order within the various groups, six weeks before the spectacular event in Rotterdam.

The Blue Devils completed their three-day sweep of the 2007 Drum Corps International World Championships Saturday night, winning the final show of the season in impression fashion with a 98.000 and sweeping the Brass, Percussion, Ensemble Visual and General Effect caption awards.

Spartans and Memphis Sound took the Drum Corps International Division II and Division III World Championship honors today at Pasadena City College Stadium.

Fans gathered at Rose Bowl Stadium last nnight for the Drum Corps International World Championship Semifinals. The top 17 corps in the world took to the field tonight, giving fans and each other some of the greatest performances of the year so far.

Jersey Surf won the DCI Division II competition last night, barely edging past the Spartans and members of Memphis Sound won the Division III competition maintaining their lead ahead of Fever. Twenty-two drum corps performed at Pasadena City College's Robinson Stadium for the Division II & III Prelims.

Due to unforeseen bandwidth difficulties at Pasadena City College, today's live webcast of the DCI Division II & III Prelims competition will not be broadcasted.

Admission tickets for the British Drum Corps Championships 2007 are now on sale. Tickets can be ordered online through the DCUK website or by downloading a ticket order form.

After 'The Castle' and the Erasmus Bridge, another Rotterdam symbol now forms the basis of the DCE Championships. The artist Peter Franken has designed a European Championships logo for Drum Corps Europe that focuses on the well-known cube houses.

Twenty-two corps will battle it out for the title of 2007 DCA World Champion on Saturday, September 1 in Rochester, NY in the preliminary round, hoping to secure a spot in the finals the next evening. This year, there is no distintinction between A Class and Open Class in the prelims.

Drum Corps Europe has confirmed the date for the DCE European Championships in 2008. Next year, the European Championships will be held on Saturday, September 27th.

Midsomer Norton Marching Brass has announced the successful launch of a new senior performance ensemble: Redivus. Redivus (derived from the latin for reborn) are an adult, all brass ensemble, who were formed in February 2007. The current line-up comprises ex-marching members (also some current instructors) from Midsomer Norton Marching Brass.

You can now order your British Youth Band Association Finals tickets online through the BYBA website and use a multitude of transaction options including credit/debit cards as well as Paypal if you have an account there also.

Artur Hennig from Gevelsberg will be joining the Drum Corps Europe staff team. Artur is already a familiar face in the field of German drum corps. He was one of the founders of Drum Corps Germany and is connected to the 'Drum Corps in Deutschland' portal.

Two BYBA corps will be setting off from their respective Headquarters in Cheshire and Warwick on Sunday morning and travelling to Devon. Poynton Commodores and Warwick Girls will meet up in Newton Abbott where they will be based for the Devon leg of the tour.

It is with deep regret and much sadness to announce the passing away of Mike Usher, BYBA/DCUK/WGUK/DCE/BB judge, yesterday, 25th July 2007.

A new video web site for the marching music activity has been launched: Marching TV Channel. The website contains several videos with tips and questions to answers about drum corps and marching band.

Premier Percussion is proud to support the 2007 Drum Corps Europe Championships in Rotterdam, The Netherlands on Saturday 29th September in connection with Music and Marching Centre, Oldenburg, Germany.

A large field of 21 bands and corps made their way to Barnsley in the North of England for the last BYBA show in the first half of the season. It was also the first time that the DCE system was to be used in the UK as a trial for Division 1 and Associate Class.

On Wednesday, August 8th, the world's best competitive eaters will converge on Knott's Berry Farm, America's first theme park, to compete in the first-ever Drum Corps International Peanut Butter & Jelly Eating Championship. Among the eaters vying for the cash prizes and bragging rights will be Joey Chestnut, the number 1-ranked competitive eater in the world and a former trumpeter.

Like last year, the order of the performances during the DCE Open Class Prelims will be determined by a draw, partly based on the contestants' results last year.

The DCI San Antonio Southwestern Championship from Texas next Saturday will be 'webcasted' through DCI's website. The webcast will feature all competing units from afternoon and evening performances, broadcast live to you on the internet from the confines of San Antonio's Alamodome.

Thousands of fans filled the Georgia Dome last night to watch the top 12 Division I drum corps compete head-to-head against each other at the Coltrin & Associates DCI Southeastern Championships in Atlanta - Georgia. The top seven corps have been switching positions the entire season, but the Blue Devils (88.475) came out on top at tonight's show with the Cadets (88.150) and the Cavaliers (88.125) very closely behind.

Sky Blues Drum & Bugle Corps is a new independent corps based in Kenilworth with an aim to recruit from Leamington, Warwick, Stratford, and Coventry. The corps is looking for staff.

For a number of years discussions have taken place regarding providing a Prelims and Finals event for classes other than Open Class and so for 2008 WGUK are pleased to announce that the Junior Class and A Class will have a 'preliminary round' on Championships day with the top three guards in each class progressing to a Finals competition prior to the Open Class Finals.

Over the last few months the Directors of both Vintage Percussion and 37th Kingswood Scouts have been in discussions about how both organisations can work together to raise both organisations profiles to support a separate winter and summer programme with no impact to their organisation and the activity as a whole.

Winter Guard United Kingdom has announced that at our 2008 Championships on 5th April we will be presenting the first British Indoor Percussion Championships.

BYBA Chairman Tony Patrick was one of the Federation representatives that agreed a major European initiative at the recent meeting of 'Marching Bands of Europe', held during the Danish National Championships in early July.

Following the success of the Spintastic event held in May, Winter Guard United Kingsom is putting together a team of people to take this ground breaking event on the road and bring it to units neighbourhood.

The Senators Drum & Bugle Corps from Eastleigh topped the second DCUK contest, last Saturday in Wood Green - London. The Kidsgrove Scouts came in second.

The Blue Devils have won the big DCI contest in Allentown. Sunday night they scored 86.475, bypassing The Cavaliers with 1.15 points. The Cadets, who performed on Saturday night, scored 85.700.

They say lightening cannot strike twice in the same place. With the current British weather anything is possible - and following the last minute change of venue for the first DCUK Contest at the beginning of June it is the weather that has had a major hand in now forcing the second DCUK Contest this coming weekend (7th July) to move venues.

The junior corps of Showband USA from Hellemmes - France, founded in January 2007, has added a color guard section. The new group will be directed by Sandy Sueur.

In another exciting turn of events in the 2007 Summer Music Games, the Bluecoats (83.700) won Monday night's competition in Centerville - Ohio against the Blue Devils (83.500) and the Cavaliers (82.700). This is the first competition the Bluecoats have won this year after placing a close second at many others.

Stafford Lancers appeared live at the National Indoor Arena, Birmingham in from of over 7,000 delegates at the National Kleeneze Summer Sales Conference June 2007.

At the weekend in Dordrecht - Holland, senior representatives of the major marching band and drum corps organisations met for the second time to thrash out some further steps to help give their members experiences that will bring them closer together.

Marching Show Concepts, a collective of succesful music arrangers and drill designers, has decided to sponsor Drum Corps Europe in 2007. MSC has been a leader in show design for over 20 years.

During the tour through South-Africa the Vlamo (Belgium) delegation visited four field bands. In part 7, Geert Vanmaeckelberghe highlights the field band of Stellenbosch. Translation: Hans Kloppert.

Spirit of Coventry is a new drum & bugle corps based in the Wyken area of Coventry. Spirit is a non-profit making youth marching band with a mixed sex membership, recruiting from anyone aged 7+. The corps plans to do UK competitions in 2008 as well as carnivals, fetes, parades and concerts.

Jubal Drum & Bugle Corps from Dordrecht has topped the Drum Corps Netherlands contest in their home town. But it was a close call: Northern Star became second, winning four out of eight captions.

With the recent debut of the revised DCI.org website, a new feature is available to assist fans when viewing the 2007 scores pages. The new score pages are updated immediately following the completion of each sanctioned Summer Music Games Tour event although technological limitations may sometimes cause a minimal delay in releasing scores. These are the only scores officially certified by Drum Corps International.

"For more than seven years, the Norges Musikkorps Forbund (NMF) and the Fredskorpset (FK) have supported the Field Band Foundation. The exchange programme that was realised is of great importance to the further development of various field bands in South Africa." Written by Geert Vanmackelberghe. Translation: Hans Kloppert.

It was a busy weekend on the West Coast as 10 corps from California competed in all divisions at two lively shows. These competitions in Pleasant Hill and Stockton - California, showed that the race for this year's World Championships has the potential to be close between the two West Coast champions, who both took home a gold medal over the weekend.

The Drum Corps International competition season started yesterday in Coon Rapids - Minnesota, Pleasant Hill - California, and Annapolis - Maryland. Although scores from different contests are not fully comparable, The Blue Devils received the highest score of all corps.