October 5, 2013 - Camden NY Homecoming Parade

For the first time ever, the Red Band was invited to march in the Camden NY annual Homecoming Parade.

The parade started from the parking lot of the Camden High School.

At precisely 1pm the parade was signaled to begin by musket fire and the thundering drumming from the Continentals Fife and Drum Corps of Camden NY.

We proceeded down Main Street and right through the center of town.

It seemed that everyone in Camden participated. If they weren’t in the parade they were lining the sidewalks all along the route – most wearing the royal blue and white colors of the Camden Blue Devils.

The football team itself filled the backs of trucks followed by cheerleaders and pep rally clubs – for this was the Homecoming Parade.

Some of the children on the sidewalk were waving blue and white pom-poms but almost all of them were blowing on small blue cylinder shaped noisemakers.

We could hear hundreds of them “accompanying” our music as we marched by them.

We may have brought the team luck – The Camden Blue Devils trounced South Jefferson by a score of 41-27 later in the day.

The Red Band has a personal connection to Camden. We have a new member in our clarinet section this year. Her name is Karen Castine from Camden.

She was extra-excited about performing this year. It had been 19 years since she played in the same parade as a member of Camden’s school band and returned this year with our band.

A devoted musician – Karen also plays the violin and cello.
Welcome to La Banda Rossa!

For more photos of the parade please click on

Camden Homecoming Parade

September 28-29, 2013 - Sts. Cosmas-Damian Feast St. Anthony's Church Utica, NY

The Sts. Cosmas and Damian Feast was celebrated at St. Anthony’s Church in Utica, NY on a glorious autumnal weekend.

On Saturday evening the Statues emerged from the Church and the Red Band was waiting on the sidewalk to greet them by playing “Marcia Reale”.

The band continued to play Italian Marches as the buses from Canada pulled up at the curb. By the time we finished - the Statues were surrounded by hundreds of pilgrims pinning Canadian dollars on the Saints and then receiving a Holy Card for each donation.

Because we had to wait for the candlelight procession and the final Benediction to finish – we could not start our concert until 8:45pm even though we had a large audience patiently waiting for well over an hour to hear us.

We played until 10:30 taking only a very short break as the buses began picking up the passengers to return to their hotels for the night.


 

The crowd seemed larger than ever and the lines for food and pizza fritte were exceptionally long.

On Sunday the Red Band was there for two processions – the first is a small procession to escort two young boys dressed as the Saints from a nearby house back to the Church for Mass.

For the Grand Procession after Mass we split into two bands –one leading the way and escorting the Statue of St. Cosmas and one at the end following the Statue of St. Damian with hundreds of Pilgrims in-between chanting and praying in Italian.

Also present was a Statue of St. Padre Pio and his fairly large group of followers.

Every year along the route we are greeted by the Tocco and Aiello families who had husbands and fathers that once played in the band. In their memory each family has a “Marcia Reale” played for them.

We also stop and play “Marcia Reale” to honor all the homes displaying large posters of the Saints. Many of these homes were also decorated with pretty fall flowers and looked very nice on a beautiful, sunny, autumn afternoon.

For more photos of the Feast please click on

St. Cosmas - St.Damian

VIVA LA BANDA ROSSA!!!