The Blue Devils Drum and Bugle Corps is a World Class competitive junior drum and bugle corps based in Concord, California. The Blue Devils are members of Drum Corps International (DCI).[1] They have finished in the top three at the DCI World Championships since 2006, and have placed no lower than fifth since 1992. They also hold the record for the highest score in DCI history, winning the 2014 DCI World Championships with a score of 99.65. The Blue Devils hold a record of twenty-one titles to date.
History
In 1957, Tony and Ann Odello and the Concord VFW post assumed control of the Martinettes, a defunct drum corps and drill team. They reorganized the unit as the Blue Devils. Initially, the group performed as an all-boy drum corps with an all-girl drill team. In 1958, the Blue Devils added glockenspiels, becoming a drum and bell corps, while the girls became a separate baton twirling troupe, the Majorettes. The two units continued to perform together, winning numerous state and local competitions between 1957 and 1970. In 1961, the Blue Devils added a flag section to the unit that was then competing in the state's Junior division. In 1968, the drum and bell corps moved into Senior Division competition, and the new junior corps, Blue Devils B, was founded.
In 1970, a group of buglers was added to the Blue Devils drums and flags, and the corps entered its first competition as the Blue Devils Drum and Bugle Corps. By 1972, the unit, now with over seventy members, advanced from Class B competition to Class A and traveled on tour outside California for the first time. The summer of 1973 marked the Blue Devils first national tour and their first appearance at the Drum Corps International World Championships in Whitewater, Wisconsin. The younger Blue Devils C Drum and Bugle Corps was also formed in 1973. In 1976, the Blue Devils won the first of the corps' twenty-one DCI World Championship titles.
Over the years, the Devils have often made use of jazz and Latin music repertoires, notably Bill Reddie's Channel One Suite (made famous by Buddy Rich) and charts from the music of Chick Corea and Chuck Mangione and that written for Stan Kenton's big band. Since 1994, the percussion caption head has been Scott Johnson.
In 2014, the Blue Devils won their sixteenth DCI World Championship. At the DCI Finals in Indianapolis on August 9, the corps received a record high score of 99.650. The Blue Devils are also the only corps to have crossed the 99-point threshold twice in DCI World Championship history, achieving a 99.050 in 2009, and a 99.650 in 2014.
In the Blue Devils' 2017 program, voiceovers were used from a newly-discovered audio tape recording of the late former director Jerry Seawright addressing the crowd at the Blue Devils' first appearance as a drum and bugle corps in 1972.
In 2023, the Blue Devils claimed their first Three-Peat in the corps’ history. After winning in 2019, 2022 and now its third title in a row, the corps reached a DCI Title “Three-Peat”. The Cadets and The Cavaliers are the only other World Class corps to reach such a feat in Drum Corps International history.
The Blue Devils Drumline was featured in the soundtrack of the 2013 animated film Monsters University. In 2020, the Drumline partnered with Extreme Music to release Bang To Rights, an album consisting 16 distinct of drumline grooves.