DCI makes ESPN deal official
DCI Executive Director Dan Acheson announced Tuesday that ESPN2 will be the official home of the 2005 DCI World Championships highlights broadcast, marking the first time ever that a drum corps show will be broadcast on a commercial television network.
According to Acheson, the broadcast will be aired on September 6 during primetime. The broadcast format is expected to be the same as previous years, a two hour highlights show featuring the top eight corps with smaller clips of the 9-12 corps. As with previous years, DCI will produce the broadcast with veteran producer/director Tom Blair as executive producer. Although there has been no announcement on who will anchor the show, sources close to the deal say it will most likely be hosted by Steve Rondinaro.
Neither ESPN nor DCI would comment on the details of the deal. It is not known if this is a multi year deal, or if the contract is just for one season.
Since the 1970s, Public Broadcasting has been the home of the DCI annual telecast, including several live finals broadcasts. But in recent years, each PBS affiliate has had the option airing the DCI show, and in recent years many PBS affiliates have been choosing to drop the show all together because of lack of support from viewers on sponsorship drives. Some affiliates had been airing the broadcast in early morning time slots, making it more difficult for the activity to attract new fans.
According to an ESPN spokesperson, the network reaches over 84 million homes, just 2 million less than its sister network ESPN who reaches just over 86 million homes. (Text: drumcorpsplanet.com)
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