What will Genesis be in 2021?
In March of 2020, our entire drum corps activity was shut down in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. For the first time in our history, there was no drum corps during the summer…no buses, no food trucks, no gym floors, no revenues, and most importantly, no performers on the field together, living like rock stars and creating life long bonds. It has been a difficult road for all of the organizations that make up Drum Corps International, but just like all the obstacles we have faced in the past 49 years, we have faced this road together and are forging forward with plans to bring our activity back to full strength. The 2021 drum corps season won’t be “normal” and the summer tour won’t look the same as it has in the past. But what it will be is exciting, challenging, determined and just what is needed to heal our activity from the devastation caused by COVID-19. And we may just find, together, that our new experience this season makes drum corps even better than it ever was before!
To accomplish this, the Genesis Plan will create a 4 week Spring Training Bubble at a facility in the Austin area, working with our local medical professionals and adhering to the strictest of CDC and pandemic guidelines and rules of the closed environment. As information evolves from December through April, we not only intend to adjust our plan but to also add live performances, competitions and a collegiate band camp tour to our summer program for our 3 week performance experience…all leading up to joining the rest of our fellow organizations for an incredible event in Indianapolis in August and completing our 7 week program. Our spring training will begin no earlier than June 26, 2020 and we will only travel if it meets the safest of guidelines and is in a strict, safe travel zone.
As we have more details we will release them here and to the members that make up our 2021 team first. There will be drum corps in 2021 and Genesis will help lead the charge in creating an unforgettable experience. If you are interested in joining our team and enjoying the FENIXperience please check out our auditions page. If you would like to contribute to our 2021 recovery efforts please consider a donation at any level on our DONATIONS PAGE.
We look forward to seeing you this summer,
The Fenix Fam
It is a story that is really not much different than yours. 2020 kicked off with incredible promise and excitement in November of 2019. We saw record turn out for auditions and our organization was set up for the most successful season in our brief 11 year history. By February we had our team in place, had developed strong alliances with some incredible new sponsors, added more quality educators to our staff and were set to embark on our most robust season of education to date. And, just like your story, COVID-19 brought all of this excitement to a halt.
Although our summer tour was cancelled we all knew that it would not stop Genesis from marching on! Over our 11 years we have faced many obstacles and challenges…we were prepared to face this pandemic.It would have been easy to close our doors and look to 2021, but our performers and staff told us a different story. We shifted focus and met almost daily in March to develop our plan. A collaborative idea started to come to life…and Project Genesis was born.
Project Genesis was developed as a collaborative “think tank” and combined ideas and input from our entire organization. We made investments in new technologies and options to serve our team during the shutdown. Among several projects we launched individual lessons for our members, commissioned new music from our creative staff for a Christmas album project and passed out 7 new pieces to our members, kept our staff in place and working, brought in clinicians for online masterclasses and brought our alumni together for a history documentary event. We also saw the need from our students for instruments at home to practice with.
Genesis made investments in new instruments and at home options to provide to our students who were in need. We provided all of the keyboard students and staff in need with Pearl MALLETStations to practice at home. We provided brass and percussion instruments to members not able to access these from their schools and made the investment in this without rental fees or impact to our students. We committed to our students only and did not open our options to the public and we did so in order to make sure that our 2020 team was given an experience unique to only them.
