Chapter 4-Drill Camp # 1

"Flight 561 to Rockford, now boarding at gate 27" said the voice on the loud speaker at the airport. "Here we go, we're off to camp again," said Amanda to Andrew as they stood up to board the plane. Once aboard they settled into their seats next to each other and after that began studying their drill charts for it was their first drill camp and the goal for the camp weekend was to learn the drill for the entire opener. The last February and first March camp were the last of the music camps and by then the corps was done with their entire musical repertoire. Now it was time to put the music on the move and get the showing rolling literally. "Where are you in the opening set?" asked Andrew as he carefully plotted his dots. "I'm right here," said Amanda pointing to her dot on the page, "I'm at the front sideline on the 40 in between those two tubas, where are you?" she then asked. "I'm splitting the 15 and the 20" "Nice, we're all over the field" said Amanda nodding her head in approval. "So?" she asked, "are you ready to learn drill?" "Yeah" replied Andrew, "I'm excited but I'm nervous too, its gonna be real tough and the last thing I want is an angry visual or battery tech getting in my face like a Marine Corps drill instructor." "Yeah, I'm nervous for that too" said Amanda.

After the two hour flight and a 45 minute bus ride from the airport, Amanda and Andrew arrived at Beloit College in Beloit, Wisconsin for camp. Once again Andrew and Amanda did the normal things, paid their dues and said hello to their fellow drumline members who they had not seen since the beginning of the month. Amanda in particular went to talk with her friend Jessica who was a member of the front ensemble; the two had met last camp and had become fast friends, Amanda had learned that Jessica hailed from Virginia and was attending the University of Texas at Arlington where she was studying percussion performance. "Hey Jess, what's up?" asked Amanda as she placed her sleeping bag on the floor of the gym. "I'm awesome and you?" asked Jess as she set up her air mattress on the floor next to Amanda's sleeping bag "I'm good, so, first drill camp for the brass and battery, I'm pretty excited and a little nervous." "Yea" said Jess, "That's sweet, for me it's just another camp with the pit, music, music and more music." They both laughed. "So Amanda" asked Jess as they began to walk out of the gym together, "I noticed you and Andrew the snare drummer hang out together a lot when you're here at camp, are you guys a couple?" Amanda froze for a second before she answered because she knew that Andrew and her had considered themselves best friends and were obviously very close but both of them didn't exactly consider themselves a "couple". She finally found the words to answer the question and said, "Well, we're not exactly a couple but we are very close, he and I went to high school together and we both go to UMass together as well and have been best friends since our high school days, we went to prom together too." "Oh ok," said Jess in response "but I guarantee, you two will be a couple by the end of tour, tour does that to people, you'll see, we all become best friends." "Yea," said Amanda as they passed through the outside doors of the gym and into the courtyard of the school, "It may very well happen, he and I have already agreed to be bus partners this summer during tour" "Oh, then its a given," replied Jess with a light laugh to her voice "you two will be a surefire couple by the end of tour" "We'll see" said Amanda and with that the two girls walked together to the corps meeting talking about everything else from TV and movies to college.

When they entered the performing arts center of the school, Jess and Amanda went to find that the percussion section all seated together in one section, both battery and pit. She also had found that Andrew had saved a seat for her. She went over and sat down next to him and asked him if Jess could join them to which he accepted and Jess took a seat next to Amanda. Five minutes later the board of directors came forward and Rick Valenzuela again addressed the corps. Like always he started by saying good evening Phantom Regiment and was responded to by a loud good evening from the corps. He then started to explain the weekend as one of the most important camp weekends of the season, it was now when the corps would start working drill and putting the moves to the music and it was also when the show would truly begin to come alive. The speech ended quickly after that and after his speech, the corps immediately went off to work. The brass and the battery immediately moved to the field house while the pit went off to sectional. Andrew and Amanda were then went onto the field and sat down in front of the drum major's podium and the caption head's scaffold where they were greeted by the visual designer Jamey Thompson and visual caption head Jay Emmert. Thompson spoke first and explained the goals for the night. The goal was to learn as much of the opener as possible. The whole corps would learn drill together and in order for it all to work they explained, the entire corps would have to work together in order to make sure all the drill was learned. After the discussion ended, the corps members hit the field and plotted their opening drill spots. Andrew charted his and walked to the front sideline on the 40 yard line and then carefully marked his drill spot. About a minute later, Jamey's voice came out loudly over a loud speaker and said, "Alright, everyone find your dot on page two and go there." The corps began walking to their new positions and Andrew and Amanda passed each other along the way and smiled as they walked by eachother. After he found his position, Andrew looked back at his old position to see where he came from and to think of the step size. Soon after the corps was asked to head back to their first set and march their first two counts- a move that lasted 16 counts. Everyone hurried back to their opening set and when the corps was ready, the Dr. Beat was turned on and the corps was given an 8 count count-off from the tower. 8 counts later the corps was marching and as soon as it has started, it was over. The corps repeated the process quickly with each drill set and as more pages were learned, the show began to come together. Amanda considered the music as she marched and thought about what she would be doing musically during each set. She sang her rhythms in unison with the corps who were each singing their horn and drum parts. As each drill set was learned, the show began to come together visually and over the 3 hour block more drill was learned and the staff proudly exclaimed at the end of the block that 1 minute of the show was now on the field. The members of the corps looked at each other in sort of a state of disbelief realizing that all that work was only 1 minute of an 11 minute field program but still, "it was nice to have something and tomorrow there would be more drill, 1 minute down, 10 to go" thought Amanda as she stood next to Andrew in the corps' huddle listening to Jamie and Jay wrap up the drill session.

Following wrap-up, the corps had snack before going to bed. Andrew and Amanda stayed with the drumline and during this time, there was plenty of conversation but for the most part during snack, it was quiet as the corps members were tired from the tough drill block. After snack the corps headed to bed and got ready for the big day they had ahead of them that would start the next morning.

The next morning the corps awoke and had breakfast. After breakfast, the corps went to music rehearsal for the morning block and Andrew and Amanda relished the chance to do some much needed work on the music. Though it was enjoyable, the morning block passed quickly and after lunch the corps went back to learn drill and for the next several hours, the corps would continue the drill learning process. The drill learning continued for the next four hours and each member put their body to the test with the high velocity drill. Amanda thought of herself dressed in the white uniform of the corps and playing her drum as she marched and thought of herself gliding across the field like a figure skater. More and more drill was learned and finally the corps finished the opener and with time to spare. With that the corps began to connect sections of the drill and the show finally began to come together or at least the opener.

Eventually the block ended and the corps came off the field and sat before Jay and Jamie who congratulated the corps on a job well done for finishing the opener. The corps let out a loud cheer with the congratulations yet realized that there was still more work to do. Jay then introduced the rest of the schedule for the evening. The corps would break for dinner for one hour and then after warm-ups, the corps would have their first music on the move session where music and drill would come together. The staff hoped to have enough done for a run through of the opener on Sunday. Jay then said that the toughest work for the corps was ahead and that it would only get tougher as the corps began marching and playing the challenging drill and it would take concentration on the part of every member in order to put the music to the drill. With that the corps was dismissed and began to walk to the food truck for dinner.

Andrew and Amanda found each other at the door to the field house and began to walk to dinner. Along the way, the talk was mostly about what had happened during the day but then Amanda brought up a new subject. "Andrew, I was talking with my friend Jess when we got here yesterday, and she asked if you and I were a couple because she noticed you and I are together a lot. What do you think of that?" "Andrew froze in his mind because he too had never considered his relationship with Amanda to be that of a boyfriend and girlfriend though they were together almost all of the time and were very close. Then he realized that Jess wasn't the only one who had noticed this but Chris, Andrews's best friend on the battery noticed it as well that the two of them were like a couple. He looked for the right words to say to Amanda and finally said "yeah, I've heard that too, a lot of people say that about us." "True" replied Amanda as they continued their walk. Suddenly Amanda and Andrew stopped at a bench and sat down at Amanda's request. Amanda then continued her statement "Andrew, we are very much like a couple, you and I, we are together a lot, we're very close and all but are we really a couple, I've never really considered us a couple, I've always considered us best friends" "Me too" said Andrew, he continued "Chris said that if were not already a couple, we'll definitely be a couple by the end of tour since we know we're gonna be bus partners." "Yeah" said Amanda. Andrew thought of what to say next, the conversation was taking him towards asking her to be his girlfriend; he had in the back of his mind always wanted to have her as his girl, he wondered if she felt the same. "You know Amanda," said Andrew, "I think it might very well happen, we really have the potential to be boyfriend and girlfriend." Amanda froze when she heard this, this was something that she always wanted, to have Andrew as her boyfriend but she never thought of it actually happening. She looked for the words to say and after what seemed like forever to her, she said "Andrew, I think you're right, we do have the potential, who knows?" "Yeah" said Andrew. "In the meantime" said Andrew, lets just keep being what we are best, the best of friends" "Definitely" replied Amanda who continued "c'mon lets go eat, I'm starved" "me too, all that marching makes me hungry" replied Andrew.

After dinner the corps returned to the field house for the second drill session. The brass and battery would now be doing drill with instruments, sometimes playing but for the most part, it would be air and valves for the brass however the battery would play. Andrew put on his drum and moved to his opening spot. He watched Amanda walk by him with her bass drum and he thought to himself "she is so beautiful with her drum on". The Corps began to go through the drill and the room echoed with the sound of drums and the brass blowing air through their valves. Though it had already been hard without drums, drums on made it even harder and both Andrew and Amanda put their bodies to the test as they kept track of both music and drill.

After the final drill block ended, the corps went to bed for the night and next morning was back to business. The corps returned for more strenuous drill work and went through everything, going through the entire opener set to set. The corps was firing on all cylinders at this point and the corps was also beginning to play and move and as the music and drill came together, both Andrew and Amanda felt an adrenaline rush go through their bodies with each rep. The corps pushed on through lunch and then just before dismissal, went through a full run through with the pit. When the staff announced the run through, the corps let out a resounding cheer and immediately took their positions in the opening set of the opener. When everyone was set up, the corps was called to attention and then the drum major counted off. The pit started into the opening statement and the corps began to march. Amanda carefully counted her tacets as she marched and listened closely for the snares' opening statement as Andrew carefully played his first notes building to the opening hit. The opening hit came on quickly and the hornline attacked filling the field house with sound. The next minute and a half was for both Andrew and Amanda, the greatest moment of their lives as they had been dreaming of this for years and now there they were, marching and drumming with Phantom Regiment. Despite taking in the moment, it ended abruptly and soon all that was left inside the room in terms of sound was the dying sound of cymbals and gongs as well as applause from the staff congratulating the corps on a job well done. The corps came off the field after that, each member smiling from ear to ear about what they had accomplished, the show was really starting to transform and come alive. The staff was proud and it showed in the speech Rick Valenzuela gave to the corps at the end of rehearsal, "excellent job Phantom" he said, "you really did well with this camp and we can only get better from here so get ready for the next camp, there will be more drill and we will be outside on the field where we will really see this show come alive and I don't know about you but I can't wait to see it come alive." The corps gave its' resounding seal of approval with a round of applause and then Rick gave the final word and said "see you in a few weeks for drill camp number 2, you did great this weekend, keep pushing. Corps dismissed"

Soon after the speech, the corps was dismissed and after packing the truck and their things, Amanda and Andrew climbed aboard the bus and took their seats next to each other, as the bus began to drive off to the airport, Andrew and Amanda began to talk, mostly their conversation was about the weekend but then Amanda said, "Andrew, remember our talk on Saturday night?" "Yeah", said Andrew. "I was thinking about it for a while", said Amanda, "and came to the conclusion, why should we wait till tour to be together? We pretty much are together anyway and you know, we should just be boyfriend and girlfriend now, what do you say?" "Amanda" said Andrew, "I will gladly be your boyfriend, I love you." "I love you too" said Amanda, "and I will gladly be your girlfriend." The two embraced then and for the rest of the bus ride, just took in the moment with both of them realizing that they we're now each other's.