Drummers, flag squads fill PSU campus

On Monday, Pittsburg State University will be marching to the beat of a different drummer – hundreds of drummers, actually. Between 500 and 600 students are expected for the Cutting Edge Auxiliaries camp, which begins Monday, July 17, and runs through Thursday. In addition to high school drummers, the camp draws color guards, drum majors and band leaders.

Doug Whitten, director of Athletics Bands at PSU said that the Cutting Edge Auxiliaries camp is very popular with high school bands throughout the region. It has become especially so, he said, because it is scheduled to coincide with the Brass Spectacular drum and bugle competition on Tuesday, July 18. Participants in the Cutting Edge camp not only receive tickets to the Drum Corps International competition at 7 p.m. Tuesday, but also receive a special drum corps clinic on Tuesday afternoon.

"This is an opportunity that area high school drummers and other members of the auxiliary teams rarely get," Whitten said. "It inspires them to be better when they take the field with their own high school bands in the fall."

Whitten noted that it has been a busy summer at PSU. Earlier this summer, the university hosted the Kansas Lions Club state convention and hundreds of students in the Kansas Lions high school band camp. The week after the Cutting Edge Auxiliaries camp and the Brass Spectacular drum and bugle corps competition, PSU will host the Kansas Shrine Bowl and the Kansas Shrine Bowl Band. About 235 high school musicians from across Kansas are expected to participate in that band.

Whitten said there will be just a short break before members of the university's Pride of the Plains Marching Band report for band camp on Aug. 15.

---Pitt State---